Rom. 10:17 (KJV)
So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of
God.
Rom. 1:17
For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith
to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.
By now you may be wondering why several of our discussions
have focused on the subject of faith. Well, the answer is really simple, the scripture
tells us that the Just shall live by faith. Since there is no other way for the
believer to live, other than by faith, then faith becomes a very important
subject of discuss. This is because the more understanding of the subject we
have, the better we are able to live our lives.
The word of God is the foundation of faith. Faith is inseparable
from the word of God because where you find faith, you necessarily will find
the word of God. This is why you will observe that people who fellowship where
the word of God is properly taught have their faith more developed than those
who fellowship in merely religious circles where there is no substance of the
word. Scripture tells us that faith comes by hearing the word of God, take note
it doesn’t say faith comes by having heard the word of God. No, it comes by
constant hearing i.e you may have heard yesterday but your faith may be stuck
if you don’t hear again today. The implication of this is that when you stop
hearing, you stop developing in faith. Hearing just once isn’t good enough for
faith, you must keep hearing until you are bored of hearing. If you ate pizza
yesterday and I offer to take you out for some pizza today, you wouldn’t turn
down the offer simply because you ate pizza yesterday, rather you will come
along for the pizza. That must be your attitude to the word, you heard it
yesterday and you should be willing to hear it again and again. This applies to
any form of intake of the word whether you are reading or listening to the
word.
Some people have argued that it is better not to read the
word than to simply read it as a tradition, but I say that until reading the
word becomes a tradition to you, you will be inconsistent in your walk of
faith. The problem isn’t really reading the word as a tradition because even at
that, the Holy Spirit can still minister to you; the problem is reading the
word without having made a quality decision to do what it says. Sometimes
people complain of reading the word and getting nothing out of it, but that
doesn’t mean that what was read had no impact on the spirit man. Some other
person may say I didn’t read the word because I didn’t feel like it. Well, your
feelings have nothing to do with reading the word just the same way you don’t
always eat your meal simply because you feel like. You eat because your body
needs to feed; in similar manner, your spirit man must feed on the word for
your faith to develop. The truth is that you may not out rightly see the effect
of giving attention to the word immediately, just the same way you don’t see
the parts of your body growing out as you eat your meal, if that were to happen,
it will be an horror movie. But over time you find out that you have put on
some weight or grown taller, and same is the principle that applies to faith.
Beyond giving attention to hearing the word, you must also
spend time in meditation. The process of meditation doesn’t have to happen at
the time that you are reading the word, it could be some other time while you
are doing something completely different. As you bring up what you have read in
your mind and think deeply on it, then light will break forth and you will
catch the revelation of the word beyond the written letters, which will cause your faith to grow.
Let me point out for the sake of those who don’t know where to
start reading their bibles from, it is always better to start from the
beginning so that you can understand the flow and get some foundation. Start
from the beginning and read through to the end, it may take you sometime, but
do it. You can also take studies based of particular topics, bible character,
or bible book. Whichever one you choose, just ensure you are feeding constantly
on the word. Like I said before, if you read through the entire bible, you
would have laid a solid foundation for proper understanding for whichever type of
study you decide to undertake at any particular time.
The process of developing your faith is a gradual process but
the rate is totally up to you. There are people who have been saved only
recently but have developed more in faith than others who have been saved for
several years, the difference is in how much attention that is given to hearing
and doing the word. Don’t wait until you desperately need your faith to work
for you before you start feeding on the word to develop it, rather,
keep your faith growing by constantly feeding on the word and make a quality
decision to do what the word says.
N.B
For questions on this subject and other subjects, kindly use the Prayer request/Testimony pane. You can also send me an email or reach me by Phone on 08081249992
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