Evidence of Things Unseen

So, we’ve been learning about faith at church the past two weeks. I’ve been working through the idea of faith for a long time now. I have thoughts of people not being healed because I’m praying for them and I have no faith- like if I pray for they’ll automatically be lame again when God sees that the “unbelieving Amanda” touched them. Then I wonder if God would really put that kind of pressure on a human, someone who is incapable of being anything but depraved. I wonder why when I’m scared at home at night and pray scripture over and over again, I’m still scared out of my mind. Is it my lack of faith that makes the scripture seem dead to me? Or is it the enemy creeping in? Or both? I have absolutely no idea. And that makes me wonder if I’ll ever be able to drag myself out of this depression that I find myself in. That if I don’t have enough faith to know God will take care of my for a few hours of sleeping how will I trust that he can heal me emotionally and spiritually of the wounds that the enemy has injured me with. What I know is this- I need to unpack this for myself. My well-being depends on it. My relationship with Jesus has suffered so much because of it. I do not think its coincidence that our daughter’s name is Faith when, since she was born, I’ve been walking through such a tough season. I do think its unusual that I’m just realizing it now.


Anyway, I know (beginning to learn) this:

1. God gives out portions of faith to us. I won’t even begin to try to understand why God gives out how much he gives to each person. I know I’ve met people who trust God with every inch of their life. And some who don’t. And I wonder how he chooses.

2. The Bible says “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” So I need to hear/listen the God through the Bible to be given my portion.

3. The Bible says that God is a “rewarder of those who diligently seek him.” Okay, I’m connecting the dots here. God gives out portions of faith to those who seek him. The more you seek, the more you find.

4. We must exercise the muscle of faith. That is hard for me to grasp. If God gives it out, how can we possibly exercise to build that muscle?

Mike, our house church leader, explained faith like this. He and his wife have a sweet daughter who has profound hearing loss in one ear and severe hearing loss in the other. He knows that God has told him she will hear. He has faith that God spoke that to him. He said that means “I’m gonna pray until I die, she hears, or Jesus comes back.” Floored. That IS faith. Lord, please increase my portion of faith.

Please tell me your experience.  Open the floodgates, people.  I need your wisdom.