p. 37 | FAITH by W. M. Healey

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jan 11, 1899

FAITH.

By W. M. Healey

“NOW faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Heb. 11:1. In this chapter we find many examples cited of what faith will do for those who have it. It shut the lions’ mouths for Daniel. It kept the fire from burning the three Hebrew children. It saved Noah from the destructive flood. It caused Abraham to leave his native land for a country he had never seen. It enabled some to be “sawn asunder,” others to wander in the deserts, cold, hungry, and naked, and they endured all this by faith. It takes fully as much faith to endure persecution and suffering as it does to win battles, or gain victories over the wild beasts or the elements of nature. It requires as strong faith to suffer illness and live a Christian life as it does to heal the sick. But the Bible teaches us that faith is sufficient for all these things. “And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” 1 John 5:4. It is faith that “overcometh the world.” If faith can overcome the whole world, then it is certain it can overcome anything in or of the world, for no part of the world can be stronger than the whole.

When men and women sin, how often they cry out against the “strong temptation;” they bewail the power of Satan; but his power did not prevent them from gaining the victory; it was because they lacked faith! If an army of one hundred thousand is camped near an enemy’s lines and an officer is sent with one hundred men to spy out the enemy’s camp, with instruction to sound the bugle if he needs reinforcements, and he suddenly meets a foe of one thousand, and engages in battle, without calling for aid, and finally succeeds in reaching his camp alone, bruised and bleeding, leaving all his men dead on the battle-field, can it be said that he was overcome by the strength of the foe, and thus he be excused?—No; he was overcome because he did not call for help.

What Is the Faith

which has more power than all the world?—It is simply belief in what God has said. Noah’s faith saved him from the flood, because he believed that what the Lord had said about it was true, and so he prepared for it.

Belief alone is not scriptural faith. Many people believe they will be saved when the Lord comes to make up His jewels. “Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name? and in Thy name have cast out devils? and in Thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from Me, ye that work iniquity.” Matt. 7:22, 23.

While these persons evidently believed they would be saved, they will surely be lost. They had no warrant in the Word of the Lord for believing they would be saved. Verse 21 tells us that “not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven.” They had no Word of God on which to base their faith. There is no promise of entering into the heavenly kingdom while refusing to do the will of the Father, even tho Christ may be called Lord.

Jesus said, “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.” Matt. 17:20. What is the faith of a grain of mustard seed?—It is simply this, that God has made the laws that govern its being and life, and they are perfect and to be obeyed. This small seed never attempts to do anything contrary to the law, word, or will of the Father in heaven, “who giveth to every seed his own body.” It takes what God gives, is satisfied, and so lives and grows thereby.

This is the faith that makes all things possible. Whatever God says to do may be done. If He says move a mountain, faith in His word will cause it to pass from its foundation. But for one to simply believe he can move it without any word of God for him to do so, is to trust in his own strength. So for one to think he will be saved while violating the “will of My Father,” simply because he believes or thinks he will be saved, is not in any sense scriptural faith, having no warrant for it in the Word of God.

Eve believed that she would not die when she ate the forbidden fruit, but this faith, or belief, was a curse to her, not being built on the Word, and it led her into sin and far from God. Believing a thing does not make it so. “Faith is the evidence of things not seen.” But while the things are “not seen” by the believer, they have an actual existence; they are facts, not fictions.

It was a fact that death would follow sin, and Eve’s belief to the contrary made no change of that fact. It changed her relation to God, because she accepted untruth instead of truth. “Thy Word is truth.” John 17:17. Christ told the Jews to “search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life.” Those people thought they had eternal life in the Scriptures, but it is evident they did not, for Christ pronounced them sinners, to be shut out of heaven. Search the Scriptures and see if the things you believe are the truths of God’s Word, and remember that simply because you believe them does not prove that they are the words of the Lord. And if not, belief in them is vain and will lead away from God, from life, heaven, home, and happiness. No man can hold to an untruth without loss.

To maintain that a thing is so simply because we believe it so, is to deprive man of reason, for the facts are not changed, but he is changed. In the insane asylum may be found the ripened fruit of this theory. There in one corner sits a forlorn creature with a stick, and a few pieces of cloth around it, rocking to and fro, singing her lullaby song, believing this is a darling, living child. Her belief does not change the facts, but it changes her from a rational, reasoning being to a demented, helpless soul.

Do not be deceived into the idea that things are as you think. They may seem to be so to you because the mind has been compelled to deny the facts and is not permitted to accept the truth. This is the “deceivableness of unrighteousness;” the “strong delusion,” “that they should believe a lie; that they all might be damned who believed not the truth” (2 Thess. 2:10-12); the “way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.”

Be not deceived. Test every point of what you believe by the Word of God. “The entrance of Thy Word giveth light.” Believe God, and obey Him; for he “that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure.” Pure faith leads to a pure life; nothing else can. W. M. HEALEY.