The Faith and Hope Link

Romans 4 gives us a picture that has been overlooked. Many of the "faith" ministries exhort solely about faith, completely overlooking that we cannot operate on faith without hope.

Romans 4 (NKJV)

 ¹⁷  ...  God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did;

¹⁸ who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”

¹⁹ And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead (since he was about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb.

²⁰ He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God,

²¹ and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform.

²² And therefore “it was accounted to him for righteousness.”

It is crucial to remember, Abraham had no "Bible"-he had the direct word of the Lord and that is what he relied on. His promises were one-to-one, God to Abraham.

Hope is a seed that God plants in us when He has a dream for us. Without hope, we cannot achieve anything. Faith will not work without hope first being anchored within us. It is the anchor of our souls. Hope is what faith attaches to.

Once we have the hope which comes through the promises of God, we can then begin the process of believing. Whatever we need at the moment, say healing, we start with hope which is either directly given by God or is found in scripture. Then we use the measure of faith that He has given us (Romans 12:3) and we begin to build, exercising that faith. Faith now begins to wrap around the hope and give it flesh. The hope begins to take on a form that was not there before. Hope is the seed in the center of it all.

You can either consider that faith attaches itself to the seed or that faith becomes the water that nourishes the seed. Whichever way is easier to see. Hope and faith together paint a picture.

Every promise of God has HOPE at the core. It is the LIFE contained within the word that our faith begins to water. Without attaching faith to the hope in that word, be it logos or rhema, nothing will ever happen. The seed of hope will remain dormant and inactive. Kenneth Copeland is fond of saying, “The word of God has the power within itself to bring itself to pass”. That power is the life contained within the seed, HOPE.

And how was Abraham strengthened in faith? How did he become fully convinced? I am convinced it was by the visions the Lord gave him of Isaac as a young man or as a father himself. We don't know the exact nature of the visions but this is how God operates. And Hebrews 11 does say that Abraham received Isaac raised from the dead in a figure. That means a vision even if only one of those vaporous images God so often grants us. This is a standard pattern He employs with His children. He gives us the images to hang onto so we can dream The Dream with Him!

Prayer, Getting It Right

Prayer the way we have been doing it is like being out in our yard. Suddenly you spot a big, ugly black rat or a cobra. It slips out of sight while you are searching for a tool with which to dispatch it. You beat all the high grass, all the bushes near where you saw it, but it is quietly hiding far from where you are endeavoring to locate it.

This is how prayer has been in our lives. We have not realized that the Father has a plan for us, He has an answer to every dilemma. Instead of seeking Him and His answers we go about using all the tools we have learned in sermons, books, reading the Bible, etc instead of praying according to the Father’s wisdom and His will for that specific situation. Ask Him what He wants us to pray; how simple could it be?

God has already told the Holy Spirit what His heart is on the matter, but now we need to get into agreement with God, Holy Spirit and Jesus and pray with them, not contrary, off on a wild tangent.

Instead of praying trying to wrench the answer from God’s hand we need to switch our understanding and our strategy and pray with the answer in the first place. We’ve been doing it backwards. So, in effect, we have been at odds with both the Holy Spirit and Jesus. Our prayers can’t get the answer when we are out of agreement.  A house divided cannot stand. This applies to our prayer life as well as the rest of life.

I John 5

¹⁴ Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. ¹⁵ And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

Romans 8

²⁶ Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us^[b] with groanings which cannot be uttered. ²⁷ Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

Hope

The Lord is saying, “Hope is strong and mocks the song of defeat in your life and others. Hope in Me is ever sure, strong, stronger than any circumstances that want to drag you down.”

Hope may be deferred for a season with God (Prov 13:12), but that does not mean He is saying "No" to you. It merely means that you are in a season of training. There is something that He wants to teach you. You are learning with Him one step at a time and one day at a time. The sooner you learn to yield to Him, the more quickly you will learn the lesson. And then we move on to the next lesson!

It is vital to value and appreciate each day of the journey. You will never get the day back. Glean what you can from each day. Each day is fresh and has new opportunities. Enjoy the sunshine today (or the rain or snow, as the case may be), enjoy each new chance to interact with the people you come in contact with each day. You are impacting them as they are impacting you.

Have a Blessed and Glorious day in the Lord!

Rites of Passage

I believe the terrible things that we endure in our lives are meant to be like rites of passage for us. There are things we must undergo so that we may enter in to the places that God has prepared for us. Destiny.

Rites of passage in tribal cultures are a means of qualifying the young and inexperienced to become full-fledged members of their culture, to be considered members of full age, fully equipped and ready to assume the greater tasks of their society.

But until we endure the hardship of these rites which are administered by the enemy of our souls, we are not qualified to enter in. We need to begin to look on all of these trials and hardships as the qualifying instruments the Lord means them to be in our lives. Consider for a moment that the devil has one purpose: to make us shine like the Son!

We take on the polish of Heaven when we learn to violently take the Victory that God has already assured is ours!  " 'Victory in Jesus!' my Holy warriors cry. 'Victory in Jesus!' is the battle cry."

Forward march!