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Week Five:
Three Ways to Increase Your Faith:
As believers, none of us should ever boast of having the perfect level of faith when it comes to our walk with the Lord. While one person may be able to boast of persistence in their faith, that same person may lack intensity. Likewise, one who may boast of strength may lack persistence. How do you increase your faith? I used to struggle with this as a young Christian. Faith is a spiritual force. Just like a force of electricity, there are certain things that can block faith from flowing from God into our hearts and through our lives. But in time I’ve learned at least three simple ways to help build and increase our reliance on God.
1. Read the Word:
Or at least hear God’s Word. Romans 10 says, So then, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. If no one had ever told me about Jesus, and about God’s plan for your life, or if you had never read for myself about Him, you would be clueless about the need for faith. Reading or hearing God’s Word is like planting a garden. If you want to grow or “build” a garden, you must first plant the seeds, or the actual plant or flower. God’s Word is the seed that grows the faith. Knowing His promises, what God says about you, about life, and about Jesus’ plan for eternal life won’t transplant themselves into your brain by osmosis. Become familiar with the Bible and what faith is all about by meditating on its contents. This will give you the basis for growing or increasing your faith. This is the time to learn how to increase our faith, in which we need to use that “measure” of faith God gives to everyone and build on it.“But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. But I say, have they not heard? Yes indeed:“Their sound has gone out to all the earth,And their words to the ends of the world. ” Romans 10:16-18 (NKJV).
2. Heed the Word:
When we heed to the Word, it offers a second way to increase your faith: But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. “The peril of this century is spiritual apathy. As the body requires sunlight, good food, proper exercise, and rest, so the spirit of man requires the sunlight of the holy Spirit; proper exercise of the spiritual functions; avoiding of evils that affect spiritual health, which are more ravaging in their effects than typhoid fever, pneumonia, or other diseases that attack the body”. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. This is the time when you faith can be tested to see if you obey the Word of God, listen to the Spirit and rely on His wil to have complete control over your life. Oftentimes, what you see in the mirror when you first wake up is not the most beautiful sight. Obviously you will see there is work to do and makeup to apply if you want to add to your appearance. If we fail to heed what we’re reading and ignore what God is telling us, then our faith grows stagnant. It took faith for us to become children of God in the first place. Therefore, in order to grow and increase our faith, we need to use that “measure of faith” God gives to everyone and build on it. “But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.18 But I say, have they not heard? Yes indeed:“Their sound has gone out to all the earth,And their words to the ends of the world” Romans 10:16-18 (NKJV).
3. Test the Word:
There is a difference in “testing” God by “contesting” Him (seeing how far God’s patience will go with your own self will) and “testing,” or proving God’s Word is true.“You shall walk after the Lord your God and fear Him, and keep His commandments and obey His voice; you shall serve Him and hold fast to Him. But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has spoken in order to turn you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of bondage, to entice you from the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall put away the evil from your midst ” Deuteronomy 13:4-5 (NKJV). Testing of the Word offers one practical way God says we can prove Him faithful to His Word. This passage concerns tithing and being good stewards of the things He has given us: Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.” Christianity stands at the crossroads between two great truths. It declares that God knows us. Then there is the assurance that we can know God. This study will outline for us how we can live with that assurance. As you “test” or act on what God says and experience God’s blessing, your faith grows. Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. Test yourselves. Surely you know that Jesus Christ is among you; if not, you have failed the test of genuine faith. Understand, God is not passively watching. He actively tests His children’s loyalties through such calamitous situations. “What is man, that You should exalt him,That You should set Your heart on him,That You should visit him every morning,And test him every moment? ” Job 7:17-18 (NKJV). The process of testing the measure of faith you have may involve trials and difficulties. How can you increase your faith in those circumstances? Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.