How can you know if you have faith, if you’re believing? I mean faith in the specific sense of:
Mark 11:23 For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.
or similar scriptures. Jesus says what we say will come to pass if we believe and don’t doubt. How do we know if we’re believing? How do we know if we believe, "…that those things which he saith shall come to pass…" ? If we can believe then we should receive what Jesus has promised, so it would be helful to know when we qualify. How can we know if we’re believing.
I frequently come into contact with people, (In fact I saw one on
James Robison’s T.V. program just today.), who say things like : " I
was in faith but I didn’t receive what God promised." "I was believing
but the answer never came?" " We had people praying and we believed but
the person wasn’t healed."
Sometimes this statement is often followed by a sort of sentimental
theologizing which acquits the Christian of spiritual slothfulness,and
instead makes the failure to receive, a mark of super spirituality and
puts the responsibility for the failure completely on God. That’s
always struck me as being awfully convenient. It’s not that you don’t
have faith it’s that God has some super secret, super spiritual, reason
for not healing you or your loved one, or for not helping you get the
job or the money you needed so you could take your family on vacation.
Warning: Sarcasm Ahead
You can be pretty certain it wasn’t a lack of faith that resulted in
their failure to receive, because they never miss it in any other area
of their spiritual life. They’re always temperate, that’s why you never
see fat people in an American church. They always walk in love; gossip
and unforgiveness are no longer a problem amongst evangelicals. And
everyone is familiar with the extraordinary faithfulness of the average
American Christian. Just ask Barna about their commitment to tithing. Kindness, gentleness, and overall goodness? Fugetaboutit! They’ve got those licked.
End of Sarcasm Zone.
Okay, let’s take their argument a little more seriously. They seem
to acknowledge that faith is required to receive from God; which isn’t
that big of a concession considering that even the number one
Calvinist, Calvin, acknowledges this. Here’s his comment on Mark 11:23-24:
"This passage is exceedingly adapted to point out the power and nature of faith; that it is a certainty,
relying on the goodness of God, which does not admit of doubt. For
Christ does not acknowledge as believers any but those who are fully
convinced that God is reconciled to them, and do not doubt that he will
give what they ask. Hence we perceive by what a diabolical contrivance
the Papists are bewitched, who mingle faith with doubt, and even charge
us with foolish presumption, if we venture to appear before God under
the conviction of His fatherly regard toward us. But this benefit
derived from Christ is that on which Paul chiefly dwells, when he says
thatby the faith of him we have boldness
to approach to God with confidence (Ephesians 3:12).This passage shows also that the true test of faith lies in prayer…" (Emphasis mine.)
Geez,
I don’t think I would have put it that strongly. Prayer is the test of
faith? Wow, if your prayer is not answered then it shows you didn’t
have faith. Hmm, maybe I am a Calvinist after all.
Anyway. So they would, to a certain extent, acknowledge that faith
is required to receive from God. But they seem to say that even though
you have faith, God may still not answer. (I guess they’re Arminians.)
Calvin and I would apparently agree that this is not the case but just
for the sake of argument let’s grant them that. Now they apparently
believe that there are two possibilities for a prayer not being
answered, want of faith or the overriding sovereign will of God. So how
do you know which reason explains a particular prayer failure? If my
prayer can fail because I don’t have faith or because inspite of my
faith God overruled my prayer, how do I know which reason applies? At
this point in the argument they seem, contra Calvin and Greg, to assume
that faith is pretty much a given and therefore whatever you get is
what God wanted you to have.
But is faith a given? What about the other spiritual virtues, love,
joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness and
temperance? They’re not just givens, are they? Why assume that faith
is? The real question we need to answer is, how do we know if we have
faith? How do we know if we’re believing? Maybe you just thought you
were believing like some fat people think they’re dieting. Maybe you
thought you had faith like some really mean people think they’re
walking in love. How do you know if you have faith?
That’s what I want to talk about next.