Lesson 6. Developing Faith. A school on “Faith and Confession” that lays an amazingly deep foundation on the Word of God. Charles Capps teaches how to activate the power of God in your life.
There are people who try to believe that they will have millions to do good works, while they have not yet learned to believe that they can even pay their electricity bills. Such people have overloaded their faith. Some people have faith only for having 10 hryvnias, yet they try to use it to obtain a million. We need to learn to use our faith at the level we are at.
I think this is the main reason churches have trouble with this kind of person. They attended a seminar where they heard someone teach: “You can have anything you say.” But they heard only part of the teaching and came home thinking that they could now have everything.
They did a lot of foolish things, calling it all faith. Then the pastor of the church they attend has to sort it all out. They overloaded their faith and made a great deal of noise about nothing, while the pastors think the teachings of the seminars they attended are to blame.
Act at Your Own Level
We are going to look at the problem that arises when people act beyond their level of development.
You need to remain at your level of faith development and grow from there. But you must begin at the level where you are. What I am going to talk about may seem very simple to some people, but it will help many understand that you cannot begin construction on the second floor while skipping the first.
Start from the level you are at, and be sure that you know what you are aiming for. Jesus said that no one should begin building without first counting the cost. This is good advice, but sometimes, when people want to live by faith, they forget to count the cost of what they confess.
I remember a man who once heard teaching about faith and confession. He was at the beginning of his professional career. He found a house he wanted to buy. It was expensive—approximately $100,000.
He began confessing that he would buy the house. He began to believe it and confess the Word of God in this area.
Eventually, he bought the house. The way it happened was almost supernatural, because he had no savings to make the mortgage payments on the house. By faith, he completed the purchase.
This man liked the method so much that he began confessing and believing that he would have an airplane. He bought the airplane in the same way he had bought the house. Then he discovered that his income was insufficient to maintain everything he had purchased.
I am telling this story not to belittle this man, but to warn others against making the same mistakes. Sometimes people abandon common sense when it comes to faith. Do not develop your faith merely to receive things from God. You may receive so much that you get into trouble.
Some points concerning faith are often not mentioned at all. But they need to be discussed because they will help you avoid a trap. Always develop your faith so that you can maintain everything you believe for before you receive it.
Yes, you can use your faith to obtain something you cannot afford. First, calculate whether you will be able to maintain what you want so badly.
Many miss this point, failing to develop their faith to receive the money needed to maintain what they believed for and received. Then they give up and say, “None of this works.”
But quite the opposite is true: it worked so well that it got them into trouble. They did not fully understand how it works, because they found a method for obtaining things but did not use common sense to count the cost.
Always count the cost. Measure twice, cut once, —says the old proverb. And it is good advice.
Faith or presumption
You need to draw a clear line between faith and presumption. Do not abandon common sense and accepted methods that work simply because you have begun to believe.
Once, a man approached me at one of the seminars. He said:
“Some of us came here only because we heard that you are a farmer and a person of faith. And we want to know whether you use fertilizer on your farm?”
I replied, “Yes. Do you use gasoline in your car?”
Will Rogers once said, “Everyone is ignorant—only in different subjects.” I am not trying to make fun of that man; I simply want to point out how people think. They want to please God, but sometimes they have more zeal than knowledge. Do not abandon good, accepted methods simply because you have come to faith. Use your faith to be successful in your work.
Look at what Hebrews 11:1 says:
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen.
Without Substitutions
If you try to substitute good business practices for faith, you will get yourself into trouble. On the other hand, do not try to substitute faith for all the good skills and abilities you have acquired. Never settle for merely a good, profitable business. Every day, people go bankrupt by relying only on their skills and not turning to faith. They speak only negative things, quote the ten o’clock news, and are filled with negativity.
You need to combine faith with everything you do. Exercise faith whenever you are engaged in anything (Psalm 1:3).
There was a time when one man called me constantly. One day he called and said, “Brother Capps, I am doing what the Word of God tells us to do. I am confessing God’s Word over my finances. But why isn’t it working?”
The very fact that he asked, “Why isn’t it working?” already showed his unbelief that it would work. This man was not walking in faith; he was looking at the circumstances around him. In his case, believing meant holding firmly to his confession, knowing that it would work.
This man said, “I have done everything the Word of God says. What should I do now?”
I replied, “Keep doing what you are doing! It’s not over yet! Just keep going in the same direction. It won’t happen in an instant. This process takes time to change something. You won’t receive what you confess in an instant, and you won’t change it in an instant.”
About a month later, he called again and said that nothing had changed and that nothing was working.
Finally, I told him, “Your problem is three centimeters below your nose—it’s your mouth. God says it should work, but you say it doesn’t work.”
Your faith and the Word of God + time = change
I met this man a year later, and he joyfully declared that the Word of God works!
It has power all the time; it simply took time for it to be fulfilled. Many people fail simply because they forget that it takes time for something to develop and come to pass. It also takes time to change something. If you have been a negative person for more than 15 years, you will not change in a few days.
First, you need to set things in motion in the spiritual realm. Seven hundred and fifty years before God sent Jesus to earth, He prophesied about it through the prophet Isaiah. God began speaking about it 750 years before the prophecy was fulfilled. Yet we so often want everything to happen in the blink of an eye.
Lack of Knowledge
When I first heard teaching about faith and confession, I said, “I didn’t even know that the Bible talked about this.”
Before that, I had never heard anyone preach on this subject. I didn’t know that Jesus said we can have whatever we ask for. I thought: “If this were really true, people in our church would talk about it.”
But no one in my church knew anything about it. When I first heard about it, I opened the Bible and checked. It was mentioned in the Bible; Jesus Himself said it.
Jesus answered and said to them:
Have faith in God, for truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him.
Therefore I tell you: whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.
Mark 11:22–24
Faith and Declaration Produce Results
Notice that the verses above say whoever says. If you ask people who is being referred to, they will tell you that it is someone. But it is not simply about someone; it is about the one who says… If anyone says… and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him, whatever he says.
This does not mean that this applies only to believing that a mountain can be moved. We must believe that everything we say will come to pass. In other words, release faith through every word you speak.
This is the point I could not understand for such a long time. I heard many different sermons on this subject, but one day, as I was reading this passage again, it suddenly dawned on me: “...whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
I suddenly understood that this means more than simply commanding circumstances or a mountain. We need to develop faith in what we say, believing that everything we declare day after day will surely come to pass.
The only way to accomplish this is to say only what we truly want. Do not say aloud what you do not want for yourself. Do not confess what you do not want. We so often say things that we really do not want to come to pass. Therefore, we cannot believe everything we say.
For example, if Jesus appeared in your church, walking down the aisle, touching everyone and saying, “After I have touched you, whatever you say will happen,” do you think this would change our vocabulary?
If Jesus did that, in most churches the congregation would jump to their feet and say, “Wow! Jesus, You have made us happy to death!” I assure you that you would spend the next two weeks holding funerals!
We have become so accustomed to speaking negative things. Most of our statements are negative. The enemy influences us so strongly through our everyday speech that it keeps us from releasing faith through our words.
Jesus said that whatever we say in faith, without doubting, will be done for us.
Let your words be honest and truthful
It will take time before you can fully believe that everything you say will come to pass. You will not be able to change in an instant, because you have spoken foolish and perverse words for so many years.
You have said things like: “I’m telling you, I’m already sick and tired of what I eat,”
“It made me happy to death,” “I nearly died laughing,” “I’ll die if I don’t go there,” “It’s killing me,” “It cost me my health.” It is good that we were not releasing faith when we said such things.
Why is there so much negativity in our speech? It is the work of the devil. He twists words and makes them work against us rather than for us. All these statements are intended to keep us from believing in our own words.
We need to learn how to release faith in everything we say. Let everything you say be simple and honest. This is how Jesus spoke about it:
But let your word be, ‘Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.
Matthew 5:37
The apostle Paul says the same thing in 2 Corinthians 1:17–20:
When I was planning this, was I acting lightly? Or the things I plan, do I plan according to the flesh, so that with me it is ‘Yes, yes’ and ‘No, no’?
God is faithful: our word to you was not both “yes” and “no.”
For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us—by me, Silvanus, and Timothy—was not “yes” and “no”; but in Him was “yes,” -
For all the promises of God in Him are “yes,” and in Him “amen,” to the glory of God through us.
Therefore, we need to cleanse our mouths and our conversations so that we can release faith through our words, just as God did.
The more you develop in your faith, the sooner the manifestation will come. I have heard people say, “I confessed the Word of God. I confessed abundance and no lack. I gave generously and confessed that it would be given to me—good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over. But weeks, even months, passed before it came to pass. Yet as soon as I said something negative, it happened immediately.”
The reason is that we are more developed in negative things than in positive ones.
Faith comes by hearing. And if you hear yourself speaking negative things, and you have been doing this for many years, it means you are highly developed in these negative areas.
Guard Your Mouth
When you decide to stop speaking negatively and to speak only positively, agreeing with God, it will take some time for this positive truth to become hidden in your heart, so that you become, in a sense, pregnant with it. Weeks and months will pass before it becomes a reality in your life. Then you will have to remove certain words from your vocabulary, because they may work against you. They keep you from having faith in what you say. They weaken your words, so that they lack the positive faith that would work for you.
Job had a deep understanding of this when he said:
For the thing I greatly feared has come upon me, and what I dreaded has happened to me.
Job 3:25
Job was not merely afraid of something; he was terrified. Job even uses the word terror. Drive fear far from your life. Resist it just as you resist the devil. You need to learn to use God’s principles.
Do not expect to become positive and for your faith to grow in an instant. For this to happen, you must practice diligently. Eventually, you will reach the point where you speak words that can change the direction of your life. And remember: if you say something only once, that does not mean it will happen. But continually speaking it aloud allows your faith to grow and releases faith in what you are saying.
Completely Certain
Just like Abraham, you can be completely certain. The Bible says that Abraham was … fully convinced that He (God) was able to do what He had promised (Rom. 4:21). How did Abraham become fully convinced? Surely, it was not because he repeated what the devil whispered to him or what his circumstances told him.
The secret is that, in order to be completely certain of what God tells you, the Word of God must continually be on your lips. This is exactly what God commanded Joshua in Joshua 1:8. And in Deuteronomy 28, we find a classic example of how God teaches Israel to enter into His promises.
If you, when you cross over [the Jordan], will listen diligently to the voice of the Lord your God and carefully obey all His commandments that I command you today, then the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth;
And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you listen to the voice of the Lord your God.
Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.
Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land, and the fruit of your livestock, and the fruit of your cattle, and the fruit of your sheep.
Blessed shall be your barns and your storehouses.
Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
Deuteronomy 28:1–6 Obedient in order to declare
All these promises are conditional. Look at the first verse: … If you carefully obey the voice of the Lord your God, diligently observing all His commandments that I command you today…
The voice of the Lord God that we hear today is the Word of God spoken aloud. We need to read these verses very carefully in order to understand well what is being said.
When I began studying this passage of Scripture, the Lord said to me, “Pay attention to the word listen and what it means in Hebrew.”
I thought I understood and knew the meaning of this word quite well, but I looked it up anyway. Originally, the word translated for us as hear in Hebrew means “to listen wisely.” It also means “to be obedient” and “to declare.”
God also told me to pay attention to the word carefully. I thought I knew what it meant to do something carefully. But, to my surprise, I discovered that in Hebrew this word means “fully, completely, far, steadfastly, and louder and louder.” And it could be used with precisely this meaning.
I allowed myself to paraphrase this passage slightly:
If you will listen wisely, be obedient, and declare fully, completely, steadfastly, louder and louder what God has said to you; if you will obey all His commandments that God commands you today, then all these blessings will come upon you and be fulfilled in you.
And what God says in Deuteronomy is very similar to what God said to Joshua.
God said: “Simply confess what I have said. Listen carefully to My Word; begin to declare it fully, completely, steadfastly, louder and louder.”
God commanded them to have His Word on their lips.
Then God said: “When you do all these things, all these promises will come upon you and be fulfilled in you.”
And this does not happen in the blink of an eye. First obedience, then blessings.
Then God speaks about curses. Notice that they come into people’s lives only when they are disobedient. Remember that we are talking about faith and confession. And the power of faith works only in the heart. And God told Israel how to develop faith in their hearts in order to receive blessings. The secret was to continue declaring God’s promises until they were fulfilled.
The Second Epistle of Peter speaks of the promises of the New Covenant.
Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received with us the same precious faith through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
2 Peter 1:1
Note that Peter is addressing those who have received the same precious faith as we have. He is speaking about born-again believers—that is, about us.
May grace and peace be multiplied to you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ our Lord.
2 Peter 1:2
God’s Increased Desire
Grace is God’s desire to use His power and abilities on your behalf. And this grace is multiplied in you through knowing God. When you gain knowledge of what the Lord is going to do, this multiplies His grace—or His desire (will)—in you. God already has the desire, but your faith grows in equal measure with your knowledge of God. Thus, when you gain knowledge of God, it multiplies God’s desire to use His power and abilities on your behalf.
His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness.
2 Peter 1:3
Knowing Him
By what means has God given us everything we need for life and godliness? Through the knowledge of Him. You cannot believe in something if you have no knowledge of it. When you learn about a promise, you will have a certain measure of faith regarding that promise. If you declare that promise aloud, your faith will increase, again, in relation to that specific promise.
The apostle Peter said that as His divine power has given us…. This is exactly how God gives us these things—from His divine power. The Good News is that the Word of God is His power. Paul said: …the Gospel of Christ…is the power of God…(Rom. 1:16). He sends us His divine promises through His Word. In other words, He has given us everything through His promises. Notice that the word given is in the past tense, not the present or future tense. He has already done it.
Through which He has given us exceedingly great and precious promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
2 Pet. 1:4
Divine power
When you begin relying on God’s promises, confessing them every day, there will be people who tell you that you think you are God by repeating what God has said.
No, I am not God, but I am a partaker of the divine nature. And God’s divine power has already been given to us. God’s power is hidden in the Word of God. God… upholds all things by the word of His power…(Heb. 1:3).
He created everything by His Word. His Word contains divine power. Through His divine power, God has given us everything. His power is His Word. Verse 4 confirms this, saying: through which He has given us exceedingly great and precious promises… The seed that enables the promise to become reality in your life is the promise itself .
Divine power has given us promises, which are the Word of God. The word power in this verse is the Greek word dynamis. Words such as dynamite and dynamo (generator) derive from this word. In this context, the word means that God has given us power (dynamis) capable of producing spiritual strength, enabling us to possess God’s promises. Through God’s power, we have a way to possess the promises.
Let us remember that …faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen (Heb. 11:1).
Faith needs spiritual power to bring about what is hoped for, and this power comes from the Word of God. Through God’s promises, He …has given us everything we need for life and godliness… (2 Pet. 1:3).
But first, you need to learn about the promise. Once you know what has been given to you, you must decide to act according to the knowledge you have received.
A promise on your lips multiplies power in your heart
Paul gives us an understanding of how this works:
…but the righteousness that comes from faith says this…
…the word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart—that is, the word of faith…
Rom. 10:6, 8
The promise is first on your lips, then in your heart. With your lips, you speak the promise. And as soon as you speak it, your inner ear catches it and directs it into your heart (your spirit).
And when it is in your heart, it seeks to reach your lips. The more often you speak it with your lips, the stronger it becomes in your heart. And when it is firmly rooted in your heart, it gains greater power on your lips as well. The promise is in your heart and on your lips.
And every time this process takes place, it gains greater power. The Word of God contains power capable of generating faith, which can move mountains in your life.
The only secret is that positive confession of the Word of God must continually be on your lips. You cannot confess only Mark 11:23, for example, and say, “Everything I do not say will be mine simply because Jesus said that everything I do not say will be mine.” Because the Bible contains other passages besides Mark 11:23. Mark 11:25 says: “And whenever you stand praying, forgive…” If you do not forgive, condemnation will silence your faith.
Attacks on the spiritual heart
Some people live in strife and cannot understand why their faith does not work. Their heart condemns them. They are experiencing an attack on the spiritual heart. They can no longer act according to the faith in their heart because their heart itself condemns them. Their heart condemns them because they are not fully obedient to the Word of God.
There are people who live in known sin and do not understand why their prayers remain unanswered.
For if our heart condemns us, [how much more will God], because God is greater than our heart and knows everything.
Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, then we have confidence before God,
and whatever we ask, we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do what is pleasing in His sight.
1 John 3:20–22
There are people who want to live by only one passage of Scripture, forgetting the other passages of the Bible. But we need to live by every Word of God. And some people do crazy things and call it faith.
Once, a woman approached a minister and said, “You must agree with me—just agree with me—that this man will be my husband.”
The minister replied, “Wait. Tell me more about this.”
She replied, “But you must agree with me. The Bible says that if two agree, it will be done for you.”
The minister asked, “And does this man want to marry you?” The woman replied, “Do I really have to answer that?”
The minister said, “Yes. How can I agree if I don’t know what I am agreeing to?”
She replied, “To tell the truth, this man is already married, but you must agree with me that he will be my husband.”
Yes, there are people like that. This woman’s heart condemned her. What she wanted contradicted the Word. How can anyone release faith for God to destroy a family so that a man will become another woman’s husband? Someone called this ignorance. God’s people suffer because of a lack of knowledge.
The Word of God is the will of God
What God has given us comes through His promises. You should not take Mark 11:23, or the part of this verse that says you will have whatever you say, and say, “I will have 9 million oil wells.”
The principle will work only if you believe, do not doubt in your heart, and believe that what you say will come to pass. But you cannot believe if there is no promise. Without the Word of promise, you cannot acquire faith in that promise. If you use your faith only to become
the owner of oil wells, Mr. Important, your heart will condemn you, and this will stifle your faith.
There are also people who believe that you must not prosper and that you should not use the Word of God to receive what God has promised. They are always concerned that you are going to receive something from God that He does not desire to give you.
But there is something that helps maintain balance in this matter. Jesus spoke about it in the Gospel of John 15:
If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask whatever you desire, and it will be done for you.
John 15:7
Someone may say, “This cannot be true, because you cannot ask for everything you want. What if what you are asking for is not the will of God?”
By saying this, they miss the first part of the verse: If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you…
What is the will of God? It is the Word of God. The Word of God is always His perfect will.
Balance in the Law of Faith
If the Word remains in you, then God’s desire fills you. The problem is that people continue to ignore the Word of God and do what they want. For example, there was a woman who wanted to believe that a married man should leave his wife and marry her. Since this was her own desire, she wanted to use her faith to manipulate the Word of God. There is not a single promise in the Word of God that would support faith for something evil. God will never become part of anything unrighteous. Scripture provided no confirmation of the kind of agreement that woman wanted, so faith for such evil was out of the question.
The following is inherent in the law of faith: if your heart condemns you, you will not find biblical faith for this.
God did not say that you would receive answers to your prayers only because you had done something good. We must be very careful not to
adopt the idea that we need to earn answers to our prayers by doing things that please God.
But by relying on the entire Word, rather than selecting only certain parts, you gain a clear conscience before God. Paul said that we must be holding the mystery of faith with a pure conscience (1 Tim. 3:9).
Who can keep their conscience pure by using faith and the principle of agreement to steal someone else’s husband? Is it possible to have a pure conscience while asking that someone lose a check for a certain amount of money so that you can meet your needs? Such thoughts immediately bring condemnation. You will experience an attack on your spiritual heart. By this I mean that your own heart will attack your confession, doubting that God could become involved in such a scheme.
Thus, there is no basis for believing that through faith we can receive a whole lot from God, including things He does not want us to have. There is a default safeguard: faith must be kept with a pure conscience.
And yet, John 15:7 speaks of the will of God, His desires. If the Word remains in you, then God’s desires fill you. Always remember that before you begin declaring or believing anything, determine God’s will. Base your confession on biblical promises. If your confession is a promise of God, then God’s will is on your lips.
You miss this point when you begin declaring something without a biblical foundation, because faith, or the power of God that enables you to possess the promise, is the promise itself. Therefore, you will see the difference when the Word of God becomes the foundation of your confession. This is not merely a mechanical action, as some might suppose. It is a spiritual process. And this process was devised by God. Your word in addition to God’s Word is the path to the fulfillment of the promise. When you do your part, this principle will certainly work. But if you do nothing, nothing will happen.
Remember that the Apostle Peter said that God has given us everything we need for life and godliness. And He gave us all this through His exceedingly great and precious promises. Luke 6:38 is one such promise. 2 Corinthians 9:10 is a precious promise concerning finances.
God multiplies the seed that has been sown
But there will be people who say, “Yes, all this is true, but I know why you are so generous! You give a lot in order to receive, and that is selfish.”
But the Word says that if you give, it will be given to you. God supplies seed to the sower and multiplies the seed that has been sown. The law of sowing and reaping is God's law, and it can be traced throughout the Bible. As long as the earth exists, this law will surely remain in effect (Gen. 8:22).
If you need money, give money. If you need time, dedicate your time to God. It will be multiplied and returned to you. Everything reproduces according to its kind (Gen. 1:11–12).
But some will continue to insist that you give only in order to receive.
It is as if you approached a farmer and said, “I know why you sow beans: you want to get more beans.”
Yes, this is God's law. Such people do not criticize farmers for growing something. This is the law of sowing and reaping, so do not criticize those who obey God in carrying out the law of giving and reward.
I understand that you may have had wrong motives. We must carefully watch for this. But as they say, do not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Do not reject everything simply because someone is motivated by wrong motives.
People who behave this way will not get very far, simply because their own hearts will condemn them.
The Mystery of Faith
Therefore, do not be afraid that someone can bankrupt God by taking advantage of the message of faith. God is far wiser.
The mystery of faith consists in a clear conscience. The farther you are from having a clear conscience, the weaker your faith will be. Condemnation will ultimately destroy your faith completely.
You must have a clear conscience before God. Jesus said: “...and when you stand praying, forgive...” (Mark 11:25). These words are a fully legitimate part of the message of faith, just as Mark 11:23 is. You must forgive
people. You must obey the principles of the Bible. Walk in love. Be obedient to the Word of God.
This means more than simply quoting a couple of passages from Scripture; it means living by the Bible and being a doer of the Word. Jesus told us to live by every Word of God.
God also said that in order to reap a harvest, it is necessary to sow. So how can anyone claim that it is wrong to expect a harvest if you have sown something?
It is not biblical to give and not expect a return. You can choose to do it that way. You can give and say, “Lord, I give and expect nothing in return! I simply want to be humble.”
Be honest with yourself. You do not want to be humble; you are trying to impress God. You are trying to convince Him that you are so humble that He should bless you with much more. Admit that this is true. We have all acted this way in the past. Do not try to cheat God.
Be honest with God and simply obey His Word and say, “Lord, You said that if I give, it will be given to me—good measure, pressed down, shaken together. And I believe Your Word and declare that I receive according to Your promise.”
The Law of Giving and Receiving
When you give, you put the law into action. Every time you give to the work of God in the Name of Jesus, you will receive a return, and it will be multiplied. But the problem is that sometimes people do not understand this, and therefore do not believe that this law is at work. Everything may end well, but they miss it because they are simply not looking for it.
I believe that a return always comes. Let us put it this way: The opportunity for blessing is always there. It may involve a business deal or be something you did not expect at all. But you may miss the moment and fail to recognize it because you were not looking for a reward—you simply did not believe in it.
But you should expect a return in faith. Some people simply put their offerings in the basket, saying, “I think it will be credited to me. My reward will be in heaven. And that will be wonderful! I will receive all the treasures I am storing up now.”
What are you going to do with all those treasures in heaven? We sing a song: “How wonderful it will be when we are all in heaven!” Yes, it really will be wonderful there. But what about here and now? How will you pay your bills, and what will you do about all your needs?
We are talking about practical things now. Not everything is spiritual. Do not interpret everything said in the Bible from a spiritual perspective. Do not try to say that when Paul spoke about money, he meant something spiritual. Paul spoke about finances and money in 2 Corinthians, chapters 8 and 9. He devoted two whole chapters to this subject. A time comes when we begin to trust God and use our faith in the area of finances.
Do not let people talk you out of the promises of God. What God has promised us cannot be wrong for us. Begin to declare the promises of God, and do it according to the Bible.
Let us hold firmly to the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.
Heb. 11:23
Therefore, we must hold firmly to the confession of our faith.
The Power of Confession
Your faith cannot be greater than your confession of the Word of God. When you realize this, you will understand the importance of confessing what God has said instead of saying what the devil says about the situation you are in. If you have failed to keep your faith, then you do not need to hold on to a confession of such faith.
Confession is to your faith what thrust is to an airplane. Without thrust, an airplane’s wings cannot generate lift, and without it, the airplane will plunge downward.
Confession has a similar influence on your faith. To remain in faith, you must continue confessing. You do this not because God wants to make everything more difficult, but because God knows that faith comes by hearing the Word of God.
Hear Better
You will hear better if you speak to yourself with your own mouth. Many do not realize that faith comes much faster when you hear your own voice,
quoting the Word of God. Hearing someone speak all day will not influence you as much as saying it yourself two or three times.
You have probably heard people speak of “blind faith.” Faith is not blind. Faith always sees. Faith always sees through the storm and the tempest. Instead of focusing on the present, faith always sees the end result.
Everything Can Be Changed
This is what the Apostle Paul says in his second letter to the Corinthians, 4:18: …while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. Therefore, God's method is to use the eternal power that is faith and change what is visible—the temporary.
The word temporary means “an object for change.” This means that if you can see it, feel it, touch it, or taste it, then you can use your faith and the Word of God to change it. I have good news for you: all evil is temporary. There is no eternal evil. Illness is an object for change. Poverty is also something that can be changed.
Faith as a Seed
…if you had faith as a mustard seed and said to this sycamine tree, ‘Be uprooted and be planted in the sea,’ it would obey you.
Luke 17:6
Faith in the heart is a spiritual power that fills the human spirit and comes from the Word of God. Faith in a person's heart enables the human spirit to conceive what God has promised. Only after you understand and receive it will it come to pass.
Jesus said this in Mark 10:15: “Whoever does not receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.” I am convinced that we have misunderstood Jesus' words. We assumed that He meant we should have faith like little children. If you study this passage carefully, you will understand that Jesus was saying that when you first receive the Kingdom of God, it is like the smallest of seeds. But it grows and becomes the greatest among plants.
In other words, it—the Kingdom of God—will become the greatest thing in your life. Jesus demonstrated a perfect example of how this works in your
life when He said: “If you do not receive the Kingdom of God like a child, you will not enter it.”
This is how it all works. Everything starts small. Children are never born grown, and faith does not become great immediately. Faith in a person's heart is the human spirit's ability to conceive. It is like a child growing in the mother's womb. The same happens with the Kingdom of God, which grows within you. And you receive it as a mother receives her child. The Word of God is the seed, or embryo, that grows and develops in the womb of your spirit. Your faith develops in the same way. You do not receive fully developed, great faith.
Measuring Faith
By the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but think soberly, according to the measure of faith God has allotted to each.
Romans 12:3
It is true that God has allotted each person a measure of faith. But He gave us this faith through His Word, so the only way to measure your faith is to determine how filled you are with the Word of God. It does not begin with God’s faith. You start with the Word you know, which is usually not much. It grows within you; you learn more and more and hold fast to it.
When Jesus said that we must receive the Kingdom of God like a child, He meant the human spirit receiving the seed. This seed is very small—smaller than anything else—when it first enters your heart. But as it grows, it becomes the largest of all. The Kingdom of God grows in you alongside the growth of your faith. God is the God of faith. He shares His faith through His Word. Faith brings joy to God.
I believe that faith in action is the manifestation of God’s character in you.
And without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever comes to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.
Hebrews 11:6
By faith, we please God by living according to His laws. And the law of faith is God’s law. The Apostle Paul mentions this in Romans 3:27.
Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. By what law? By the law of works?
No, but by the law of faith.
Romans 3:27
Paul calls faith a law. In general, we could put it this way: faith is the law of the New Covenant. Works were the law of the Old Covenant, but faith is the law of the New Covenant. Remember that faith in action is the manifestation of God’s character. Hebrews 11:1 says this.
Faith—the substance of God
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the certainty of things not seen.
Hebrews 11:1
Faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the certainty of things not seen. Assurance is the process of fulfillment. Let us return to the first chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews.
God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers through the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir
of all things, through whom also He made the ages.
Who, being the radiance of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
Hebrews 1:1–3
Pay attention to the second part of the second verse: …through whom also He made the ages. This speaks of Jesus, the Word of God. God also calls Jesus the Son …through whom also He made the ages. And Jesus was the Word of God on earth. John said that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Thus, this passage of Scripture speaks of Jesus as both the Son and the Word.
Who, being the radiance of the glory of God and the express image of His person… The phrase “the express image of His person” actually means a complete representation of the expression of God's personality. Jesus, the Word of God, was the complete and perfect expression of God's essence.
Express Image
Do you want to know what God looks like? Jesus said: …he who has seen Me has seen the Father… (John 14:9). …the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner (John 5:19). Therefore, Jesus did only what His Father did.
I have many things to say and to judge concerning you; but He who sent Me is true; and I speak to the world those things which I heard from Him.
John 8:26
Jesus had such great faith because He always spoke what He heard from the Father. Just as He defeated the devil, you can resist the devil in the same way.
There is far more power in the Word of God than people can imagine. Consider the word hypostasis (essence) in Hebrews 1:3, which says: being… the exact representation of His hypostasis… In other words, Jesus, the Word of God, became the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of God's essence. This verse also uses the Greek word person (translated here as hypostasis), the same word used in Hebrews 11:1, where it is translated as substance.
Therefore, it can be stated this way: faith is the person of what is hoped for. Jesus became the Word in personal form, or the incarnate Word. Then Hebrews 1:3 can be read as follows: “Who, being the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of the essence of God…” As God was, so was the Word.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1
The Person of God
Words are expressions of thoughts and desires. The Word of God is an expression of God's essence, His person. When you have a promise from God, it can be called an expressed image of His faith. This is His own person. And this promise has supernatural power. I call it God's divine power, which is the reason the promise is fulfilled.
This divine power, or faith in action, is the expression of God's person through you. God is a God of faith. When we act in faith, it is divine power working in us. This explains what it means to be partakers of the divine nature.
God has given us everything through His promises. By receiving these promises, you can become partakers of His divine nature. I think Jesus expressed this well in Matthew 12:34: for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.
A good person brings good things out of the good treasure, and an evil person brings evil things out of the evil treasure.
But I tell you that people will give an account for every careless word they speak on the day of judgment:
For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.
Matthew 12:34–37
What, then, is the conclusion? Have faith in God's promises and confess them every day.
End of lesson.
Author: Charles Capps
Source: The book “Faith and Confession.”
