Bible Studies

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Hi people, today I’ll be writing on a topic based on my Bible study. This is something I feel that God has revealed to me, so I would like to share it with you all. It about FAITH, I ran a search for “FAITH” in the online Bible and I got 273 hits in 250 verses in the whole Bible, not counting the derived words like faithfully, faithfulness etc. I got about 11 verses from the Old Testament and the balance from the New Testament.

Very interesting I would say because the people of the Old Testament knew God but God did not reveal His tri-union identity until the coming of His Son Jesus & it is in the New Testament where most of the emphasis of FAITH is. Let me explain it in this way, consider a man or a woman growing up, they know that there is right partner waiting for them and they have their hope in that & this what the people of the Old Testament were, who put their hope in the Messiah to come. As for the people of the New Testament, they are like a person who has already found their life partner and what people earlier hoped for is now what they have. So what comes into the picture now is trust or may I say faith because your partner is now someone you know in person & in order to get your relationship going you need to have trust/faith. I am sure no one enjoys spending time with people who they do not trust. So it is the same with the people of the New Testament and forward. God revealed Himself as One in the Father Son and Holy Spirit & we will enjoy spending time with him not because of religious obligation but because we trust him. God deserves our trust not only because he is God but because he earned it all through love by dying for our sins so that we can spend eternity with Him.

Hebrew 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

Well I would not be able to talk on all the verses mentioned considering that they are so many but I will be talking on select few. I think I should take you through some of the stories in the Gospels first.

Matthew 20:29-34 (Jesus Heals Two Blind Men)
29 As Jesus and his disciples were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed him. 30 Two blind men were sitting by the roadside, and when they heard that Jesus was going by, they shouted, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!"
31 The crowd rebuked them and told them to be quiet, but they shouted all the louder, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!"
32 Jesus stopped and called them. "What do you want me to do for you?" he asked.
33 "Lord," they answered, "we want our sight."
34 Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.

Luke 7:1-9 (Jesus Heals a Roman Officer's Servant)
1When Jesus had finished saying all this to the people who were listening, he entered Capernaum. 2 There a centurion's servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. 3 The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. 4 When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, "This man deserves to have you do this, 5 because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue." 6 So Jesus went with them.
He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: "Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. 7 That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. 8 For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, 'Go,' and he goes; and that one, 'Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it."
9 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, "I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel." 10 Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.

Mark 2:1-12 (Jesus Heals a Paralysed Man)
1 A few days later Jesus went back to Capernaum, and the news spread that he was at home. 2 So many people came together that there was no room left, not even out in front of the door. Jesus was preaching the message to them 3 when four men arrived, carrying a paralysed man to Jesus. 4 Because of the crowd, however, they could not get the man to him. So they made a hole in the roof right above the place where Jesus was. When they had made an opening, they let the man down, lying on his mat. 5 Seeing how much faith they had, Jesus said to the paralysed man, “My son, your sins are forgiven.”
6 Some teachers of the Law who were sitting there thought to themselves, 7 “How does he dare to talk like this? This is blasphemy! God is the only one who can forgive sins!”
8 At once Jesus knew what they were thinking, so he said to them, “Why do you think such things? 9 Is it easier to say to this paralysed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven’, or to say, ‘Get up, pick up your mat, and walk’? 10 I will prove to you, then, that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the paralysed man, 11 “I tell you, get up, pick up your mat, and go home!”
12 While they all watched, the man got up, picked up his mat, and hurried away. They were all completely amazed and praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

As you may notice from the above three, you will see that it wasn’t just that the people’s acknowledgment of Jesus as God that healed them but also that the people believed that Jesus would save them from their misery. From Matthew 20:30, you can see that the two beggars acknowledge Jesus as their God and Messiah because scripture says that the Messiah would come through the blood line of David & Joseph was a descendant of David. From Luke 7:9, we can see that it was the great faith that the centurion had in Jesus that pleased Jesus & this harmonizes with Hebrews 11:6, which I have mentioned earlier. From Mark 2:5, we can see that Jesus saw the faith of the people that brought in the paralyzed man & declared forgiveness and healing by his own authority. What we can learn from this is that FAITH is not something that will help only ourselves but will also help those whom we are concerned about. To show the authority in Jesus’ name, let me quote Apostle Peter’s message in the Temple after he healed a lame man.

Acts 3:16
It was the power of his name that gave strength to this lame man. What you see and know was done by faith in his name; it was faith in Jesus that has made him well, as you can all see.

People have done great things with the least of faith, how much more then can we do with just a little more Faith. Ever heard of the saying “Faith can move mountains”, well that is taken from the Bible.

Matthew 17:20
“It was because you haven't enough faith,” answered Jesus. “I assure you that if you have faith as big as a mustard seed, you can say to this hill, ‘Go from here to there!’ and it will go. You could do anything!”

So what is the message from this post, well God cannot work in our lives if we have not faith. Let me provide you with some supporting scripture from the Old and New Testament for the same.

Psalms 78:22 (God in the OT)
22 because they had no faith in him
and did not believe that he would save them.

Matthew 13:58 (Jesus in the New Testament)
Because they did not have faith, he did not perform many miracles there.

Yes we are saved by grace but we are put right with God through faith. Here is some support.

Romans 10:10 (NT)
For it is by our faith that we are put right with God; ….

Ephesians 2:8 (NT)
For it is by God's grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not the result of your own efforts, but God's gift, so that no one can boast about it.

Genesis 15:6 (OT)
Abram put his trust in the Lord, and because of this the Lord was pleased with him and accepted him.

I would to also say that Faith is very big thing, what I am talking of here is just a fraction of that. We must try our very best to make sure that we don’t involve ourselves with stuff that would make us loose faith & it is the worst crime to make anyone drift away from the faith that he has in Jesus. Here is some support.

Matthew 18:6-9 (Jesus talks to his disciples)
6 “If anyone should cause one of these little ones to lose his faith in me, it would be better for that person to have a large millstone tied round his neck and be drowned in the deep sea. 7 How terrible for the world that there are things that make people lose their faith! Such things will always happen — but how terrible for the one who causes them!

8“If your hand or your foot makes you lose your faith, cut it off and throw it away! It is better for you to enter life without a hand or a foot than to keep both hands and both feet and be thrown into the eternal fire. 9 And if your eye makes you lose your faith, take it out and throw it away! It is better for you to enter life with only one eye than to keep both eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

I would like to clarify Matthew 18:8-9, it does not literally mean what it says; it is actually something like an idiom. What it means is that if there is a situation or a person who is causing us to work/think against our faith in Jesus, then we need to cut our selves away from that situation or that person, no matter how close or attached we are to it because that is what is taking away from Jesus & there is no salvation without Jesus. Had the scripture meant what it literally said then God help us because then the law enforcers would be worse than the criminals but thankfully our God is good and that is not what it means.

I would I would like to close this post by encouraging all of you (Christians & non-Christians) who believes in Jesus, with the words of Jesus himself from the Gospel of John. Here is God (Jesus) Himself, telling His disciples of how not to loose their Faith in Him. This applies today in a similar way to us.

John 15:18-27 & John 16:1-15
18 “If the world hates you, just remember that it has hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, then the world would love you as its own. But I chose you from this world, and you do not belong to it; that is why the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you: ‘Slaves are not greater than their master.’ If people persecuted me, they will persecute you too; if they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours too. 21 But they will do all this to you because you are mine; for they do not know the one who sent me. 22 They would not have been guilty of sin if I had not come and spoken to them; as it is, they no longer have any excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father also. 24 They would not have been guilty of sin if I had not done among them the things that no one else ever did; as it is, they have seen what I did, and they hate both me and my Father. 25 This, however, was bound to happen so that what is written in their Law may come true: ‘They hated me for no reason at all.’
26 “The Helper will come — the Spirit, who reveals the truth about God and who comes from the Father. I will send him to you from the Father, and he will speak about me. 27 And you, too, will speak about me, because you have been with me from the very beginning.

1 “I have told you this, so that you will not give up your faith. 2 You will be expelled from the synagogues, and the time will come when anyone who kills you will think that by doing this he is serving God. 3 People will do these things to you because they have not known either the Father or me. 4 But I have told you this, so that when the time comes for them to do these things, you will remember that I told you.

The Work of the Holy Spirit

“I did not tell you these things at the beginning, for I was with you. 5 But now I am going to him who sent me, yet none of you asks me where I am going. 6 And now that I have told you, your hearts are full of sadness. 7 But I am telling you the truth: it is better for you that I go away, because if I do not go, the Helper will not come to you. But if I do go away, then I will send him to you. 8 And when he comes, he will prove to the people of the world that they are wrong about sin and about what is right and about God's judgement. 9 They are wrong about sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 they are wrong about what is right, because I am going to the Father and you will not see me any more; 11 and they are wrong about judgement, because the ruler of this world has already been judged.
12 “I have much more to tell you, but now it would be too much for you to bear. 13 When, however, the Spirit comes, who reveals the truth about God, he will lead you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own authority, but he will speak of what he hears, and will tell you of things to come. 14 He will give me glory, because he will take what I say and tell it to you. 15 All that my Father has is mine; that is why I said that the Spirit will take what I give him and tell it to you.

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