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THE POWER OF POSITIVE
BELIEVING

“With the all-powerful of the universe as the object of Christian faith, there’s hardly any limit to the spiritual heights that positive believing can take you.”

Faith—we hear that word all the time in youth group meetings and at church. Sometimes we hear people outside the church talk about faith: “Have faith in yourself”; “Keep the faith”; “If you just have faith, everything will work out all right.” It seems that everyone has an idea about what faith is.

In the classic adventure film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, filmmakers Steven Spielberg and George Lucas dramatized one version of faith. In the story, Indiana Jones was searching for the mythical Holy Grail, the cup Jesus supposedly drank from at the Last Supper. In order to reach the grail, Jones had to solve three potentially fatal clues prepared to test the skill and faith of treasure hunters.

Indy solved the first clue just in time to avoid being sliced in half by two huge blades. Before he figured out the second clue, a mistake almost dropped him thousands of feet to his death. But he corrected his error in the nick of time and moved closer to his prize.

In the final challenge, Indiana Jones had to make a “leap of faith.” He came to a deep, impassable chasm. The Holy Grail waited for him on the other side. The clue directed Indy to step from the cliff for an unbroken fall into a deep chasm. After hesitating, he took a deep breath and stepped off the ledge for what appeared to be a long, deadly fall. But instead, after only a few feet, he landed on a pathway of stone, unseen from the ledge above, which led across the chasm to the treasure. His leap of faith into nothingness paid off.

Faith is vital to the Christian life. The author of Hebrews summed it up by writing, “Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Believing who God is, what He says and what He does is the passkey into the kingdom of God.

Furthermore, faith is central to everything we do as Christians. Paul wrote, “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him” (Colossians 2:6). How did we receive Christ? By faith. How then are we to walk in Him? By faith. In Scripture, walking refers to the way we live our everyday lives. The Christian’s daily success at spiritual growth and maturity hinges on walking by faith in Christ. Trusting in what God has done for us and who we are in Christ is the basis for growing up in Christ.

But what is faith? Is it a blind leap into nothingness as in the Indiana Jones film? As Christians, does God demand that we believe in Him without any evidence at all that He is worthy of our trust? Not at all. God doesn’t ask us to take a blind leap. He has given us evidence that clearly shows He is worthy of our complete trust. Jesus became a man and lived among us. He was a real person, a historical figure. People who lived near Him could see and touch Him.

Furthermore, God told us about Jesus and what He would be like thousands of years before He came. God gave us specific prophecies in the Bible—more than 300 of them that were perfectly fulfilled by Christ the Messiah. God told us where and when Jesus would be born and how He would die. To top it all off, Jesus did something only God could do: He came back from the dead and is alive today. Our faith is firmly based on the solid evidence of the life of Jesus Christ and the truth of God’s Word.

THE DIMENSIONS OF DOWN-TO-EARTH FAITH

We tend to think of faith as some kind of mystical quality that belongs in the realm of the spiritual, not in the practical, nuts-andbolts area of everyday living. But faith is more concrete than you may realize. Here are three simple aspects of faith that will bring it out of the mysterious and into the practical side of life.

1. Faith Depends on Its Object

Faith is not simply a matter of believing. It’s what we believe and who we believe in that determines whether or not our faith will be rewarded. Everybody walks by faith every day. Every time you borrow the car from Mom or Dad and drive on the highway, you do so by faith. When you approach a green light, you drive through it believing that the drivers facing the red light will stop, even though you can’t see the red light. If you didn’t believe they would see the red light and stop, you wouldn’t go through the intersection without slowing down to make sure no one was about to run the red light.

Are the objects of our faith on the highway reliable? Most of the time they are because most drivers drive safely. But you or a friend may have been involved in an accident by placing faith in another driver who at that moment proved to be unworthy of that trust.

What happens when the object of our faith fails us? We give up on it—maybe not immediately, but how many failures do we put up with before saying, “Never again!” Once faith is damaged or lost, it is very difficult to regain. Our belief isn’t the problem; it’s the object of our belief that either rewards or destroys our faith. If a steady boyfriend or girlfriend dumps you, or a friend or relative hurts you badly, your faith in that person is weak because he or she did not live up to your trust. When faith in a person is shattered, it takes months or years to rebuild.

Some faith-objects, however, are solid. You set your watch, plan your calendar and schedule your day believing that the earth will continue to revolve around the sun at its current speed. If the earth’s orbit shifted just a few degrees, our lives would be turned to chaos. But so far, the laws governing the physical universe have been among the most trustworthy faith-objects we have.

The ultimate focal point or faith-object, of course, is not the sun, but the Son: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). It is the fact that Jesus never changes that makes Him so trustworthy (see Numbers 23:19; Malachi 3:6). He has never failed to do all that He said He would do and be all that He said He would be. He is eternally faithful.

2. Faith Is Determined by the Depth of Knowledge of the Object

When people struggle with their faith in God, it’s not because God is insufficient. It’s because what they know about God is insufficient. They expect Him to operate in a certain way or answer prayer a certain way—their way, not His. When He doesn’t comply, they say, “Forget You, God.” But God doesn’t change; He’s the perfect focal point for our faith. Faith in God only fails when people misunderstand God and His ways.

If you want your faith in God to grow, you must increase your understanding of Him as the object of your faith. If you have little knowledge about God and His Word, you will have little faith. If you have great knowledge about God and His Word, you will have great faith. Faith cannot be pumped up by coaxing yourself, “If only I can believe! If only I can believe!” Any attempt to push yourself beyond what you know about God and His ways is to move from real faith to the blind faith Indiana Jones displayed. The only way to increase your faith is to increase your knowledge of God. That’s why Paul wrote, “Faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).

“Well,” you may say, “that means there’s a limit to our faith.” Yes, there’s a limit. But God isn’t controlling it—you are. As the object of our faith, He is unlimited. The only limit to our faith is our knowledge and understanding of God. That knowledge grows every time we read the Bible, memorize a new Scripture verse, participate in a Bible study or meditate on a scriptural truth. Can you see the practical potential for your faith to grow as you seek to know and believe God through His Word? It’s boundless!

3. Faith Is an Action Word

When my son Karl was just a toddler, I (Neil) would stand him up on the table and call for him to jump from the table into my arms. Did Karl believe that I would catch him? Yes. How did I know he believed? Because he jumped. Suppose he wouldn’t jump. “Do you believe I will catch you, Karl?” I might ask, and he may nod yes. But if he never jumps, does he really believe that I will catch him? No. Faith involves action. Faith takes a stand. Faith makes a move. Faith speaks up.

There are a lot of Christians who claim to have great faith in God, but who are spiritual couch potatoes who don’t do anything. Faith without action is not faith: It’s dead, meaningless (see James 2:17-18). If it isn’t expressed, it isn’t faith. In order to believe God and His Word, we must do what He says. If we don’t do what He says, we don’t really believe and trust Him. Faith and action are inseparable.

Sadly, one of the common pictures of the Church today is of a group of people with an assumed faith but little action. We’re thankful that our sins are forgiven and that Jesus is preparing a place in heaven for us, but we’re basically cowering in fear and defeat in the world, just hanging on until the rapture. We treat the Church as if it’s a hospital. We get together to compare wounds and hold each other’s hands, yearning for Jesus to come take us away.

But is that the picture of the Church in the New Testament? No way! The Church is not a hospital; it’s a military outpost under orders to storm the gates of hell. Every believer is on active duty, called to take part in fulfilling the Great Commission (see Matthew 28:19-20). Thankfully the Church has an infirmary where we can minister to the weak and wounded, and that ministry is necessary. But we don’t exist for that. Our real purpose is to be change agents in the world, taking a stand, living by faith and accomplishing something for God. We can say we believe God and His Word, but if we are not actively involved in His cause, we don’t believe.

THE MAN WHO THINKS HE CAN

If you think you are beaten, you are;
If you think you dare not, you don’t.
If you’d like to win, but think you can’t,
It’s almost a cinch you won’t.
If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost.
For out of the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will;
It’s all in the state of mind….
Life’s battles don’t always go
To the stronger or faster man;
But soon or late the man who wins
Is the one who thinks he can.¹

This poem reflects the popular view of life known as the power of positive thinking. Christians are somewhat reluctant to buy into this view, and for good reason. For example, you can think as positively as you want that you don’t need oxygen to live. But no amount of positive thinking is going to keep you from drowning if you’re trapped under water for more than just a few minutes.

The Christian, however, has far greater potential for success in life in the power of positive believing. Faith uses our ability to think but is not limited by it. Faith actually goes beyond the limitations of the mind and uses the real, but unseen, world. The believer’s faith is as valid as its object, which is the living and written Word of God—Jesus Christ and the Bible. With the all-powerful God of the universe as the object of Christian faith, there’s hardly any limit to the spiritual heights that positive believing can take you.

Someone has said that success comes in cans and failure in cannots. Believing that we can succeed at Christian growth and maturity takes no more effort than believing we cannot succeed. So why not believe that we can walk in faith and in the Spirit, that we can resist the temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil, and that we can grow to maturity as a Christian. The following Twenty Cans of Success, taken from God’s Word, will expand your knowledge of our faith-object, the Almighty God. Building your faith by storing these paraphrased truths in your heart will lift you from the quicksand of the cannots to sit with Christ in the heavenlies:

TWENTY CANS OF SUCCESS

1.   Why should I say I can’t when the Bible says I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength (see Philippians 4:13)?

2.   Why should I worry about my needs when I know that God will take care of all my needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus (see Philippians 4:19)?

3.   Why should I fear when the Bible says God has not given me a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind (see 2 Timothy 1:7)?

4.   Why should I lack faith to live for Christ when God has given me plenty of faith (see Romans 12:3)?

5.   Why should I be weak when the Bible says that the Lord is the strength of my life and that I will display strength and take action because I know God (see Psalm 27:1; Daniel 11:32)?

6.   Why should I allow Satan control over my life when He that is in me is greater than he that is in the world (see 1 John 4:4)?

7.   Why should I accept defeat when the Bible says that God always leads me in victory (see 2 Corinthians 2:14)?

8.   Why should I lack wisdom when I know that Christ became wisdom to me from God and God gives wisdom to me generously when I ask Him for it (see 1 Corinthians 1:30; James 1:5)?

9.   Why should I be depressed when I can recall to mind God’s lovingkindness, compassion and faithfulness and have hope (see Lamentations 3:21-23)?

10.   Why should I worry and be upset when I can cast all my problems on Christ who cares for me (see 1 Peter 5:7)?

11.   Why should I ever be in bondage knowing that there is freedom where the Spirit of the Lord is (see Galatians 5:1)?

12.   Why should I feel condemned when the Bible says I won’t be condemned because I am in Christ (see Romans 8:1)?

13.   Why should I feel alone when Jesus said He is with me always and He will never leave me nor forsake me (see Matthew 28:20; Hebrews 13:5)?

14.   Why should I feel like I’m cursed or have bad luck when the Bible says that Christ rescued me from the curse of the law that I might receive His Spirit (see Galatians 3:13-14)?

15.   Why should I be unhappy when I, like Paul, can learn to be satisfied in all kinds of conditions (see Philippians 4:11)?

16.   Why should I feel worthless when Christ became sin for me so that I might become acceptable to God (see 2 Corinthians 5:21)?

17.   Why should I feel that others are out to get me when I know that nobody can be against me when God is for me (see Romans 8:30)?

18.   Why should I be confused when God is the author of peace and He gives me knowledge through His Spirit who lives in me (see 1 Corinthians 2:12; 14:33)?

19.   Why should I feel like a failure when I am a conqueror in all things through Christ (see Romans 8:37)?

20.   Why should I let the pressures of life bother me when I can take courage knowing that Jesus has overcome the world and its problems (see John 16:33)?

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I STUMBLE
IN MY WALK OF FAITH?

Have you ever felt that God is ready to give up on you because, instead of walking in faith, you sometimes stumble and fall? Do you ever fear that there is a limit to what God will put up with and you’re sure you have crossed the line of His love? A lot of Christians live like that. They think that God is upset with them, that He is ready to dump them or that He has already given up on them because their daily performance is less than perfect.

It’s true that we sometimes interrupt our walk of faith and have moments of unbelief or rebellion or even satanic deception. It’s during those moments when we think that God has surely lost His patience with us and is ready to give up on us. And how do some respond when they suspect that God has given up? They give up too. They stop walking by faith altogether, slump dejectedly by the side of the road and wonder, What’s the use? They feel defeated, God’s work for them stops and Satan loves it.

God Loves You Just the Way You Are

The important truth you need to know about God in order for your faith to remain strong is that His love and acceptance is not based on what you do or don’t do. God’s love for you is eternal; it never ends. When your walk of faith is strong, God loves you. When your walk of faith is weak, God loves you. When you’re strong one moment and weak the next, strong one day and weak the next, God loves you. God’s love for you is the same no matter how good or bad you are doing in your daily walk.

When Mandy came to see me (Neil), she appeared to have her life all together. She was a Christian who was very active in her church. She had led her alcoholic father to Christ on his deathbed. She was pretty and she had a nice husband and two wonderful children. But she had attempted suicide at least three times.

“How can God love me?” Mandy sobbed. “I’m such a failure, such a mess.”

“Mandy, God loves you, not because you are lovable, but because it is His nature to love you. God simply loves you—period, because God is love.”

“But when I do bad, I don’t feel like God loves me,” she argued.

“Don’t trust those feelings. He loves all His children all the time, whether we do good or bad. That’s the heart of God. When the 99 sheep were safe in the fold, the heart of the shepherd was with the 1 that was lost. When the prodigal son spent his life and inheritance, the heart of his father was with him, and he lovingly welcomed his son home. Those parables show us that God’s heart is full of love for us.”

“But I’ve tried to take my own life, Neil. How can God overlook that?”

“Just suppose, Mandy, that your son became so depressed that he tried to take his own life. Would you love him any less? Would you kick him out of the family? Would you turn your back on him?”

“Of course not. If anything I’d feel sorry for him and try to love him more.”

“Are you telling me that a perfect God isn’t as good a parent to you as you, an imperfect person, are to your children?”

Mandy got the point. She began to realize that God, as a loving parent, can overlook weaknesses and forgive sin.

God Loves You No Matter What You Do

God wants us to do good, of course. The apostle John wrote, “I write this to you so that you will not sin.” But John continued by reminding us that God has already made provision for our failure so that His love continues constant in spite of what we do:

But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:1-2, NIV).

One reason we doubt God’s love is that we have an adversary, the devil, who uses every little offense to accuse us of being good-fornothings. But your advocate—your defender, Jesus Christ—is more powerful than your adversary. He has cancelled the debt of your sins past, present and future. No matter what you do or how you fail, God has no reason not to love you and accept you completely.

God wants you to accept your identity in Him and live as a child of God should. But even when you forget who you are, He still loves you. He wants you to walk in the Spirit and in faith. But even when you stumble off the path, He still loves you.

TRUTH ENCOUNTER

1.   Who is the object of your faith?

2.   Why do you need to really know your faith object?

3.   Why is action so important to real faith?

4.   How does God feel about you when you stumble in your walk of faith? What would that cause you to do when you do stumble?

Note

1.   Walter D. Wintle, “The Man Who Thinks He Can,” quoted in Hazel Felleman, comp., Poems That Live Forever (New York: Doubleday, 1965), p. 310.