Acts 14:9 The same heard Paul speak: who stedfastly beholding him, andperceiving that he had faith to be healed,

Acts 14:10 Said with a loud voice, Stand upright on thy feet. And he leaped and walked.

Welcome To The Light-Washed Path,

Most people hold beliefs for which they have no personal faith. For example, they will be committed to the belief that God is good, but doubt that He wants to do anything good for them. They will believe that God can heal, but have no faith that He will heal them. They will base their beliefs on the divine concept of sowing and reaping, but have no confidence that they will ever reap a blessing from God. They will believe in prayer, and participate in it without any faith that God will answer them.

The most people have lost personal faith in their commonly held beliefs because they haven’t seen any manifestation of reality in their own life. This is why people become wearied with religion. They carry on with the rituals of beliefs, but can’t remember the last time, if ever, that they had a real experience with it. Some beliefs in Biblical Truth don’’t see any real manifestation because they are wrongly viewed. But many correctly held beliefs seldom see the light of reality simply because few people actually come to the place where they can truly embrace them with faith.

John 6:29 Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.

Jesus tells the Pharisees that the work of God was to believe in Jesus. Well, the Pharisees were great believers in God. But had long since lost their ability to actually exercise any faith towards Him. Hence, they were incapable of receiving Jesus, when He came, though they had believed in Him all their lives. Ironic isn’t it?

Obviously the manifestations of some beliefs are relegated to the future: such as the belief in Heaven. You believe in Heaven but don’t expect to go there this weekend. That’’s fine, yet you believe in its existence and are convinced you’ll be there some day. But what about your beliefs that pertain to the here and now? Do you expect to see God manifested in the practices of your faith? Do you really harbor a living, thriving expectation within your heart and mind, concerning the promises of God when you act upon them? Or do you simply believe in them? If you read  …

1 Pet. 2:24 Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.

And you believe it’’s true, do you actually believe YOU were healed, when you pray for healing from a condition you’ve become afflicted with? If you do believe 1 Peter 2:24 concerning your own condition, are you able to have “faith to be healed” as the lame man did in our opening text? Or do you simply believe in the truth of the verse in principle?

The fact is that you are probably like most people: you believe the promise of scripture without having an immediate faith that God is going to do it for you, right now. Especially when it comes to extraordinary answers to overwhelming conditions, you are probably weighted down with a good deal of doubt. That would be normal. But Jesus invites us to believe His Words above the claims of the normal, the reasonable and the routine. Faith is super-normal. The faith of God, delivered to the believers by the Lord Jesus is by nature a challenge to the course of this world. Yet we hold our beliefs within the safe guidelines of reason, as defined by circumstances, rather than at face value – in the face of the One Who spoke them.

Matt. 17:18 And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.

Matt. 17:19 Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out?

Matt. 17:20 And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.

We are more in tuned with our circumstances than we are with our God. And that is why we believe in Him and His Word, but don’t have faith for its manifestation in our own case. It’s a matter of who we are “with” the most.

Luke 1:37 For with God nothing shall be impossible.

More tomorrow, so until then……

Stay On The Path