Skip to main content

Faith Is A Choice

LUKE 22:67 NASB 67 "If You are the Christ, tell us." But He said to them, "If I tell you, you will not believe;

 No one can force anyone to believe anything. Each one of us chooses whether we will believe something, based on our evaluation of the evidence presented to us. Faith and belief may have different English meanings, but in the New Testament they are different forms of the same Greek word. Believe is the verb and faith is the noun for the same word. (Like think and thought are in English.)

 JOHN 20:25 NASB 25 The other disciples therefore were saying to him, "We have seen the Lord!" But he said to them, "Unless I shall see in His hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe." Note that Thomas said, "I WILL NOT believe."

Many think seeing miracles would cause people to have faith. But the only ones who believe as a result of seeing miracles are those who choose to accept the miracle as sufficient evidence for them to believe. It is still a choice.
 JOHN 12:37 NET 37 Although Jesus had performed so many miraculous signs before them, they still refused to believe in him, I used to think faith was difficult to pin down with certainty -- something like a feeling or state of being. But now I understand that once we make the decision to believe, we are in faith, no matter how we may feel.

 At its heart, faith is always a decision. No one can force you to believe in anything. The choice is yours. However, we cannot believe or have faith in anything without evidence. We must have evidence that convinces us before we can believe something. The primary evidence God has given us so that we may have faith in Him is His Word. God is not a liar; He can be trusted. Whatever God says, always comes to pass.

 So if someone says they don't have much faith, the solution is for them to see the evidence from God's Word on that subject, then choose to accept what God said as true. Then they will have faith. At that point they may not feel anything, but they have faith. The primary action of faith toward God is speaking in agreement with God's Word. Jesus said if you had faith you would say. So we express what we believe by the words we speak. And then we stand in that position of faith, regardless of feelings or circumstances.

 SAY THIS: Nothing can force me to believe. I must choose to believe.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I Now Believe God Loves Me

 1 JOHN 4:16  So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.  Although I have endeavored to walk with the Lord for awhile, only in recent times have I started to really believe God loves me. My problem was that I kept focusing on myself, instead of God. I saw myself in my immaturity with all my faults and failures. I was not looking at Jesus the perfect sacrifice, but focused on myself and my shortcomings.  Even though I spread messages on the love of God, I never had confidence that God truly loved me just as I was. Instead I thought more in terms of God tolerating me, but not being too happy with me. I was trying my best to do what I thought God wanted, not really realizing that I could never earn God's love.  Now I am realizing that God's love is not dependent on me, but is entirely dependent on God alone. He does not love me because I am lovable, but because by na
Post a Comment
Read more

welcome to my blog

Oh the waterfall of cleansing Grace! Welcome to my Grace blog.  I hope to both share and start a dialogue about Jesus Christ and how his life, relationships and teaching have a practical working value in our everyday lives. To go beyond our belief of Jesus... and into our belief in Jesus. I hope we can learn more about how the finished work of Christ on the cross empowers his work in us in our daily lives. I hope we can grow in His Grace and Wisdom! The name came from a Joseph Prince story in his book  "Destined to Reign"...here's the story: Prince tells the story of a young boy who found a rock out in the woods. Though it looked rough at first, he rinsed it in the small waterfall of a nearby stream. Turns out, the rock was marbly, smooth, and full of color. Not wanting to lose the rock, and afraid someone would take it from him if he took it home, he buried it back in the dirt in a tucked away place before he went home for the night. There, he left it. The ne
5 comments
Read more

Building Trust When Faith Wavers

  Mark 9:21-24 21 And He asked his father, How long has this been happening to him?" And he said, From childhood. 22 It has often thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us!" 23 And Jesus said to him, `If You can?' All things are possible to him who believes." 24 Immediately the boy's father cried out and said, I do believe; help my unbelief." Since faith is the core of our Christian experience, the consequences of wavering faith are far-reaching. Vacillating trust can lead us to make wrong decisions. Sometimes, after praying for direction, we might receive an answer that leads us to think, I can’t do that. So, instead of asking God to strengthen our faith, we make excuses. We may choose to postpone our obedience—even indefinitely—in order
Post a Comment
Read more