Title: What is Faith? /Hebrews 11:1
We believe in Jesus, the Son of God, and become Christians. Christians are people who live by faith and enjoy the infinite blessings of faith and cannot live apart from faith. So what is faith?
1. It is the reality of what we hope for.
“Faith is the substance of things hoped for”
This does not mean that what you hope for and hope for will come true in the future. Faith is not just wishing. Faith is the reality of what is hoped for in the present, being seen, seen, and enjoyed. In reality, it is what I experience and enjoy in the present. If it is not the present, it is not faith but hope. “Therefore, I say to you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours to you” (Mark 11:24). Then I didn't say I'd get it. Whatever you pray for and ask, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. Hope is in the future tense. But faith is in the present If you are sick and want to be healed or to get out of poverty, you must receive it by faith now, not in a vague hope that it will come true in the future. It is because of faith, whatever you pray for and ask for, if you believe that you have received it, it will come to you.
So, is hope low? no. Hope is just as important as faith.
Hope must be put in the right place.
Our true hope is the return of the Lord Jesus Christ and the kingdom of heaven we will enter.
2 Faith is the evidence of things not seen
Faith is evidence of things not seen Faith is always accompanied by evidence. If you believe and act as if you do not see it, the history that is the evidence will surely appear. Faith is not a vague illusion without evidence. Faith does not see, but if we act as we see, we will surely get evidence. and believe that what he says will come true, and do not doubt in his heart (Mark 11:23).
Faith without works is dead faith (James 2:26) Faith is works, and if you do not have any doubts in your heart, it will come to pass. Too many people think that I can do anything after the power of God, the power of healing, the power of the Holy Spirit is first transferred to me. But faith is what I respond first, then the evidence appears.
3. By the faith of Abraham
The faith of Thomas, the disciple of Jesus, was not based on the word of God, but on the basis of physical perception. Abraham, on the other hand, believed in God as the One who raises the dead and calls things that do not exist as though they were. Abraham hoped and believed when he could not hope. He was sure that he was also able to fulfill what he had promised (Romans 4:21) “Therefore, the blessing of Abraham will be ours to those who come through faith” (Galatians 3:7).