What one thing would the world would be hopeless without? A person without this is also hopeless. What gives hope? The answer is Faith. Faith is many different things to many different people. Is there a true faith? How does a person demonstrate faith? How can people be faithful? There are many questions about faith. People need to know this because faith is the key part of the Christian life.
What is faith? Faith has been defined as, “Giving credence, confidence, trust, or holding something or someone as true.” Giving credence is giving due credit to one that deserves it. The perfect example of this is creation. A person has to have faith that God created the world. This one thing will change the way people live. A person that gives credence to God understands that there is a higher being that rules over him. He must obey God. Yet, a person that does not believe in creation also believes there is no God to rule over him. So he does right according to what he thinks. Giving credence to the right person will affect a person’s faith. Confidence and trust is very important as well. People demonstrate this in everyday life. A person has faith in a chair when one sits down, in a car when they drive it, and in God with their salvation. Trust and even confidence can be boiled down to one thing and that believes that God, someone, or something will do what they say they will do. Holding someone or something as true is the most important part of faith. Jesus is true. People can not have faith if He were not. Many people have faith in Allah, the three hundred gods of Hinduism, and Buddha. The one thing that separates Jesus from the rest is that he is true. All the rest people never have one hundred percent faith in. Jesus is the only one that can provide faith people can hold as true.
Since Jesus provides true faith, people can learn about it in God’s book, the Bible. The Word of God gives several commands about faith. The commands are found in I Timothy. First you must hold to the Apostolic faith. Apostolic faith is simply faith that was taught by the prophets and apostles that wrote the Bible. A person must believe the Bible as truth. When the Bible states that Jesus rose from the dead, people must believe it and hold it as faith. When the Bible teaches that a person needs to be kind to his neighbor, they should have faith that it needs to be done. A person must have faith in what God says.
A person can also never teach faith that is not taught by the Apostles. Doing this is call teaching false doctrine. God takes this very seriously. It has been said that petty doctrine leads to purposeless preaching. Purposeless preaching leads to faith that lacks faithfulness.
Faithfulness is faith put in action. A person’s faith must be evident in his life. This means when a person has faith in God he must hold to the faith. One must do right no matter what the cost. People should not look at the cost if it is a matter of faith. For instance if a person is a Christian he must believe the Bible. In the Bible, it states that lying is wrong. Therefore he must never consider a little white lie to get out of trouble. A person can be considered faithful is he always does right and does not quit. Quitting and faithfulness can never coexist. Faithfulness demands that one keeps on doing it even if times get rough. Churches across the nation have trouble with this. People say they will do something whether it be the nursery, bus ministry, or cleaning the toilets. People will do it and enjoy it. That is until the glamour is gone or times get rough. People say well it must not be God’s will. It is never God’s will to quit either. This will always get rough, but a person that is faithful will keep on till the job is finished. A perfect example is Noah in the Bible. When he was build the ark time got rough. Every person on earth at the time thought he was nuts. People harassed him and it even took him one hundred and twenty years to build it. Sure he got discouraged but his faithfulness kept him going. Now all the world owes him if it weren’t for this one man the whole world would have dies and we would not be here now.
It is always good to learn faith and faithfulness from people that are faithful. Abraham has been called the father of faith. In his life once can see the demand, reward, and assurances of faith. The demand of faith can be seen when Abraham was told by God to leave Ur and start a new nation, God’s people. This is a great honour, but it came at a cost. Faithfulness always has a cost. Abraham was to leave Ur his home for many years and leave his family and friends behind. Being faithful demanded a lot from Abraham. Abraham decided to do it, but he did not do it all at first. God commands complete obedience anything less is not being faithful. Alas Abraham eventually did do that entire God wanted of him, but the incomplete faithfulness cost him. Abraham had to die to self in order to be faithful. Paul puts it, of daily deaths, daily mortifications of the old man and of the flesh and the world.
Abraham had rewards for his faith. Having faith and being faithful always has rewards. First of all Abraham had peace because he had saving faith. Saving faith brings peace because one knows that God has and will save them from eternal damnation. Secondly, Abraham had faith that God keeps his promises and he did. God promised him that he would be the father of the God’s people. Abraham is the father of the Jewish nation. There are so many Jews one can not number them. God promised Abraham that his descendants would out number the sands and they do. God has rewarded Abraham for his obedience and faithfulness. The same can happen to any person that is faithful to God.
Faith is the key part of the Christian life. A person needs faith to have a fulfilled life. More important than faith is faithfulness, this for a Christian should go hand in hand. People should always be an example of faith and faithfulness, then like Abraham they might be known for their faith.
