You Have It by M. A. Dake

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Aug 2, 1910

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 37, No. 30.

You Have It

By M. A. Dake

"Without faith it is impossible to please God."

"How are you going to have faith when you haven't it?"

But, brother, you have it. God never allowed any human to come into being without faith. Suppose you were placed for life on a fruitless island with only food enough to last a year, and seed grain enough for one crop, how could you perpetuate your life?

"Why, by carefully sowing the grain, and reserving from each harvest enough for future seed."

Suppose you hide your wheat and keep sowing thistle seed, how soon will you have bread?

"Never."

But suppose you sow your wheat on a bare rock, or the clean-swept floor, or out on the ocean, how soon will you get bread?

"Not at all."

Then you would perish while all the time you had in your possession plenty of seed, if you had treated it intelligently, to save your life.

Brother, brother, the Creator who gave you the faith, or confidence, that enables you to till the soil, and engage in profitable business with your fellow man, has given to every man the seed of that faith which pleases God, and so wins an eternity of joy. Will you foolishly scatter all your seed faith upon the hard rock of this natural life, or the fickle waters of human character, and finally perish for your folly? Come, brother, cultivate your seed faith by diligent Bible study, sincere, unselfish prayer, and cheerful, prompt obedience to Bible rules as fast as you understand them, and you will never lack an abundant harvest of faith to supply your own needs and help your neighbors.

When Satan would make you believe that you can not or do not believe in God and the Bible, you just emphatically inform him that you will believe, and then live as if you did believe, and your faith will strengthen with every fresh test that impish power can devise.

A man's beliefs mold his character; and humanity never nurtured any other faith that, full-grown, could bring forth such strong, sweet, noble character as the Christian faith. And, brother, you can have it, for the Creator gives to every one the seed faith that alone can nourish us into immortality and eternal wealth. Better not neglect it.