This is part of a new post I am currently working on about faith.

What is faith? There are many misconceptions of what faith is. Faith is not positive thinking. It is not, if you just believe enough, if you have enough faith, it will happen. As if we could manipulate or coherse God into doing something that is not within His will.

Obviously we need to believe that God is in control, that He has power and authority, that He can do anything that aligns with His nature, His will. But having the faith that He can do it does not somehow force Him into doing something. He has the final Word.

Faith bows its knee to God’s will, not our will. It trusts that God loves us, that He will take care of us, but this is not heaven. Things will happen. The Lord’s prayer says “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done.” This is a couplet, a literary device very common in the Old Testament, especially Psalms. God’s kingdom=God’s will being done. Sometimes God’s will being done is a real blessing, other times it requires clinging tight to God in the middle of a raging storm.

In fact we need more faith when we are going through hard times and we do not recieve the answer we were hoping and praying for. We need to have the faith that He is there, that He is with us and no matter the outcome, He is our God and we can trust him.

That is the most important concept of faith, trust. We trust Him no matter what. We are in His hands. If we live, if we die, we are His. If we are healed, if we are not healed, we never stop thanking Him and glorifying Him. This trust/faith leads us to having peace and hope no matter the circumstances. We live in a world full of sin. In Luke 4 the devil says the world is under his power. As counter-culture followers of God, things will happen. This is not heaven, but one day all tears, sorrow and death will be wiped away. But not yet.

Of course a fundamental component of faith is the belief, the trust that Jesus is the only way to salvation, that the Old Testament prophesied His coming, that He is the promised Messiah, that He was the medium for all of creation, that through Him all things hold together, that He was born of a virgin, the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us, that He grew up and did many things to show that He is the Son of God, God in the flesh, through His teachings, His miracles, His love, His compassion, etc. Faith is knowing without a doubt that He died on the cross in our place, that He took the punishment we deserve, that He became sin for us. That He rose from the dead three days later and sits on the right hand of God, that He is over all creation and that He will be on the throne for all eternity, worthy of all praise and adoration forever. Faith is also knowing that when we give our lives to Him, when we ask Him to be our Lord and Savior, asking for His forgiveness and repenting of our sins, that He comes into our hearts, makes us a new creature and gives us His Holy Spirit to be our guide and helper. Then one day, when we die, will be stand before Him with boldness because all our sins have been wiped away, erased, and He will receive us into His heavenly home to live with Him forever and ever.

Being a part of translating the Scriptures into the Mixtec language helped to clarify to me the different aspects of faith. Some equate faith with belief. That, as mentioned when combined with trust, is an important aspect of it. Hebrews 11:6 says: “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.”

In Mixtec, it is an incomplete idea to say that you believe in someone. Believe what about them? You must say what it is that you believe about that person. I believe in Jesus’ words, His teaching, that He died and rose again, that He exists, etc. In Mixtec the concept that most approximates to the idea of faith is trust. Trust in Jesus. Trust in God. Trust and believe that He can do such and such a thing. Not that He will, but that He can.

Faith is not possible if we do not trust and cling to every word that come from the mouth of God. While we can get a personal word from God, we really have all the instruction and guidance that we need in the Holy Scriptures. All the most important and basic things we need to know are found in His Word.

Heb. 1:1-2b: “Long ago God spoke many times and in many ways to our ancestors through the prophets. And now in these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son.”