by Jacob Ninan
Some people thinking of growing in faith as increasing the size of their faith – thinking that if they could muster up more faith they could demand greater things from God. For example, they think they now have enough faith to ask God to heal a fever, but not enough to ask for healing of cancer! It is like collecting gift coupons from a supermarket, and once we have enough we can go and claim different gifts! This comes from a wrong concept that faith is what makes things happen, but actually, it is God who has the ability to make things happen. Our faith must be 'in' Him as a Person believing that He is able to do anything He wants. Jesus said that even faith as small in size as a mustard seed, if it was placed in God, was able to receive mighty miracles.
Faith is not something we produce by our effort, but a trust we have in God when we know Him. The more we get to know God, our trust in Him increases. Then when we experience answers to prayer and miracles in our life, our confidence in Him grows stronger. When we get to know the different dimensions of His character such as love, wisdom, power, kindness, mercy, justice, etc., we are able to understand Him better and trust Him more.
We may think that the ideal way for anyone to begin their journey of faith would be to hear the Gospel, become convicted in their heart about their sin in the sight of God, repent, and receive forgiveness from God through faith in Jesus as their Saviour. But that is not how many come to Jesus at first. In many cases there is a growth in faith through different paths.
Jacob was a son about whom God had promised his parents that his older brother Esau would serve him. But he cheated his father and brother to get the father's blessings and the birthright. The first indication we get about Jacob acknowledging God is when he is running away from Esau. In a dream he saw a ladder reaching up to heaven with God standing above it. In this dream God told him that He was going to give the land where he was to him and his descendants (Gen.28:12,13). When Jacob woke up, his response was that if God took care of him and helped him to return to his father's house in safety, then He would be his God (vv.20,21). We can say that the level of Jacob's faith at this time was very low, even though he recognised the existence of God and His ability. But his faith grew to the extent that finally, after God had dislocated Jacob's thigh, he was willing to submit to God.
Nathaniel was sceptical when his friend Philip told him that Jesus was the Messiah. But when he met Jesus and Jesus told him how He had 'seen' him sitting under a fig tree earlier, Nathaniel immediately came to believe that Jesus was the Son of God (Jn.1:49). This Nathaniel became a disciple afterwards, and his faith must have grown.
We know that unless we are born again, there is no way to be in the kingdom of God (Jn.3:3). But many come to believe in Jesus first because He answered a prayer, did a miracle for them, etc. They have become 'believers' and they may even join a church, get baptised, etc., on the basis of this faith. But isn't this faith only that they know Jesus is real, answers prayers, etc., and isn't it possible that they have not been born again yet? For them to be born again, they need to hear the Gospel, come under the conviction of the Holy Spirit that they are sinners in God's eyes and that Jesus is the One who can save them from their sins. So, there is a need for their faith to grow, and it would be wrong for them or the others to assume that they are believers without this happening.
All 'faith' is not the same. There is a faith that accepts the existence of God without it becoming something personal in a real relationship with God. There is another one that looks to Him for answers to prayer, and another that looks to Jesus for salvation from sin. And, is it sufficient that someone has been born again? Doesn't he need to grow in sanctification, getting delivered from bondages and becoming more and more free from the power of sin in his life?
In the chapter which lists some of the heroes of faith, Hebrew 11, we are first told of many who experienced miracles at the hand of God. But in the later part of that chapter we read about people who trusted in God and because of which they were tortured and martyred, or lost out on many things in their earthly life. Their faith in these instances was one that did not give up but held on to their faith in God even in the face of great challenges. Isn't this a greater faith to which we need to grow? Paul talks about experiencing justification by faith and then going on to 'celebrate' in our trials, believing that these trials would bring about a transformation of our character into the image of Christ (Rom.5:1-3). Our faith gets tested in difficult circumstances and matures in the process. James encourages us to even 'count it all joy' when we face trials, because we know by faith that overcoming in these trials will lead us to experience more of the glory of God (Jas.1:2-4).
When we are babies in Christ, just after we have come to believe in Him and been born again, we may expect that God will just take care of us and He will do all that is needed while we just enjoy His love. But as we grow, we learn that while God is working inside us giving us a desire to do His will and also the power to do it, we too have a responsibility to work this out in our daily life (Php.2:12,13).
God's word is the spiritual food from which we can grow spiritually (1Pet.2:2). When we hunger for food in order to grow, we will learn to go after this food. God speaks to us through His word and through His Spirit, and helps us to know Him better personally. If we lazily expect the pastor to feed us and that is all the food we receive, our growth will be stunted, and we will never become mature enough to handle our own trials.
Faith comes by 'hearing' the word concerning Christ (Rom.10:17). This is not the same as hearing physically, but it refers to hearing God in our heart as we read His word, listen to preaching, or when the Holy Spirit brings up His word in our heart in the different situations of life. It is our responsibility to keep our heart and mind receptive towards God, so that, like the good soil in the parable of the Sower, we 'hear the word with a good and virtuous heart', 'hold it firmly', meditate on it and act on it, so that we can 'produce fruit with perseverance' (Lk.8:15). If we hear with an attitude of wanting to learn from God, submit to Him and obey all that He tells us, that is to have a good and virtuous heart. When we hear from God, we hold on to the word, meditating on it, thinking of what it implies in our practical life, discuss it with other children of God, etc., that is how we can bear fruit. We also need to persevere with the word, through the different situations of life.
God wants us to grow from faith to a greater faith (Rom.1:17). Let's not be content to stay where we are now, thinking that God will take care, but press on towards getting to know God better. As we do that we can become more and more changed into the likeness of Jesus and also we will be able to fulfill all the plans He has for each one of us.