Faith & Hope: Foundational Teaching
Have you ever been in the middle of a faith stand, when suddenly it seemed like your faith just quit working?
Maybe you believed God for healing, or financial deliverance, or the salvation of your family. Spiritually, everything was in place. You found the scriptures that promised you what you need. You were firing off confessions of faith like a machine gun.
But as time went by, your spiritual battery began to weaken. The power you had when you first took your stand began to wane, and you developed a gnawing suspicion that nothing would happen.
In desperation, you tried to shove those doubts away by confessing louder and longer. You frantically tried to force your faith to work. But to no avail.
You wound up still sick, still broke, still surrounded by unsaved relatives...and wondering what went wrong.
In the end, you probably just chalked it up as a faith failure.
But I'm about to tell you something that will change your life if you'll pay attention to it. It certainly changed mine. It's this: What you experienced was not the failure of your faith...it was a breakdown of your hope.
Faith or Desperation?
Most believers don't pay much attention to hope. They don't think of it as very important. They certainly don't consider it to be as important as faith. But the fact is, faith won't function without hope.
That's because"Faith is the substance of things hoped for" (Hebrews 11:1). A Hope is the blueprint of faith. When hope is lost, faith loses its aim. It no longer has a mission to accomplish. It just scatters uselessly in every direction.
Supernatural Expectancy.
Before you can understand how important hope is, you have to realize that real, Bible hope is not "wishing." That's worldly hope. People in the world say, "I sure wish I would get a raise at work," when what they mean is, "I want a raise. I don't think I will get it...but it would be nice if I did."
The kind of hope the Word of God talks about is much stronger than that because it's not based on wishing or wanting. It is based on your covenant with God and the anointing God has provided to carry out that covenant in your life.
In fact, (Ephesians 2:12) says before you knew Jesus, you were "...without Christ [or without the anointing], being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world."
"But," you say, "I'm a believer. I know God's promises. Doesn't that mean I have all the hope I need?"
Not necessarily. You see, hope comes when you take those promises, keep them before your eyes and in your ears until they begin to build an image inside you. Hope comes when you begin to see yourself with what God has promised you - instead of seeing yourself without it.
When you have hope, you have a supernatural expectancy that what God has promised will come to pass in your life.
The Apostle Paul talks about that kind of supernatural expectancy in (Philippians 1:19-20 KJV) where he says, "For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ,
(verse 20) According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death."
In that scripture, Paul uses two different words from the Greek language, each of which can be translated hope. One of them means the happy anticipation of good. The other can be defined as eager longing, strained expectancy, watching with an outstretched head, and abstraction from anything else that might engage the attention.
When divine hope comes alive in you, you're so locked in on the Word of God, you can't be distracted from it.
When your hope gets that strong, it doesn't matter what kind of unbelief the devil tries to throw your way, it just bounces off you. You're so one-track-minded, you can't be drawn off course.
That's what the Bible means when it says "faith is the substance of things hoped for!"
Stick Your Neck Out!
How do you develop that kind of hope? You stay in the Word until your neck stretches out.
(Acts 3 KJV) talks about the crippled man at the gate Beautiful. He had been sitting by that gate begging, his head down and his eyes to the ground. But when Peter and John walked by and said, "Look on us!" (verse 4) that man lifted his head and began to expect.
Hope rose up in him because he was "...expecting to receive something of them" (verse 5).
Of course, he received a lot more than he was expecting - he expected alms, but he got legs! That's because his expectancy hooked into their expectancy - and, believe me, their expectancy was running high!
It hadn't been more than a few days since Jesus had risen from the dead, defeated the devil and all of hell. It hadn't been but a few days since Jesus had looked the disciples straight in the eye and said,
"Now, you go into all the world and use My Name to cast out devils. You lay hands on the sick and they'll recover"( Mark 16:15-18 KJV)
(verse 15) And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
(verse 16) He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.
(verse 17) And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
(verse 18) They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
Imagine Peter saying, "Hey, John, you know that crippled beggar down there by the temple? Come on, let's go use the Name on him!"
They could see themselves doing what Jesus said they could do. Their hope was "white hot." So they went charging down to the temple and said to that cripple,"...in the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk."
When they said it, they grabbed him. He had to walk, brother! They yanked him completely off the ground.
What made them do such a thing? Expectancy!
They didn't tiptoe up to that gate, look around to make sure no one was watching and then whisper, "Dear Lord, if it be Thy will, heal this poor crippled man."
The only people who pray "if it be Thy will" are those who don't have any hope or expectancy. If you've been praying that way, stop it! Go to the Word and find out what God's will is. The Word of God is His will. It is His will for you to be well. It is His will for them to recover. His will is for you to be prosperous. His will for you to lay hands on the sick and they will recover.
So stay in the Word until you're so confident and expectant that your neck is stuck out in anticipation. Meditate on the Word until your hope gets crisp and that image inside you gets strong and clear.
Stay in there until you're so full of expectancy that when someone walks up to you and says, "Good morning," you jump on them like a chicken on a bug saying, "Yes! Bless God! It is a good morning. Do you have anything wrong with you? I'll lay hands on you right now and you'll get healed!"
Once hope gets that strong, it becomes courage...and hope plus courage equals the spirit of faith in action!
The Spirit of Faith.
The Apostle Paul refers to the spirit of faith in (2 Corinthians 4:13 KJV) saying, "We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak."
The spirit of faith speaks! It calls things that are not as though they were. It makes faith confessions - not because it's "supposed to" or out of desperation, but because it's so full of eager anticipation and confident expectation it can't keep its mouth shut!
That's what hope does. It keeps you intensely focused on God's promise. It keeps you seeing that promise on the inside, even when you can't see it on the outside. It keeps you operating by the spirit of faith.
When you have hope, the devil can't beat you down. He can't tear you down. He can't stop your faith from working. Everyone around you can just stop in their tracks, but you'll keep right on going.
When the devil knocks you down, you just get up with a deeper resolve to hit him harder the next time...and harder the next time...and harder the next time.
You get to the point where you expect God to move with such vigor that all the distractions in the world can't turn your head. All the failures of the past drift into nothingness. You can't even remember them anymore because you're so absorbed with the expectation of what God is about to do.
When that happens, you no longer sit around wondering what went wrong. You blast off into the glory of God, laying hold of His promises and watching your dreams come true. You live the kind of life that those who give up hope will never know.
In Joshua 3:13–17,
the priests, as commanded by God, stepped into the Jordan, the river
stopped flowing, and Israel crossed the Jordan. How many of us today are
standing on the bank of the Jordan afraid or unwilling to get our feet
wet? And what does the analogy of “getting our feet wet” mean?
To get one’s feet wet means to step out in faith. It is an act of faith and an act of surrender.
Are
you going to just stand on the bank of the Jordan waiting for something
to happen or are you going to take action and get your feet wet?
Joshua 1:9 Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the LORD thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.
Enough is Enough! You have the right to live a victorious life.
Effective Prayers!
To
obtain genuine prosperity resides only in the gospel of Christ. God
desires all-around prosperity, success and health for His children.
Learn how to be victorious. Go to our School of Excellence page and we will teach you how to use Effective Prayers which will help you to be spiritually strong and no principalities will be able to harm you.
Prayer
is the most important tool you can use to defeat the enemy. You must be
wary of the fact that the enemy is all out to frustrate our lives.
You will be victorious at the moment you resist him through prayer.
Remember Jesus has overcome the world, and the Holy Spirit is our helper. We are overwhelming conquerors through Jesus Christ!
So, roll up your spiritual sleeves and go to work. Get ready to have the time of your life and see fast results.
Anyone
who wishes to live a victorious life in Jesus Christ should release
that we all are dealing with a myriad of attacks from the devil.
Many
of you are under attack without even realizing it, or you know that you
are under attack but don't know how to deal with it. The subject is a necessary teaching that has unfortunately fallen
by the wayside in most churches today.
There
are numerous passages in the Bible that address this issue. Perhaps the
most important is that we are overwhelming victors through Jesus
Christ. Jesus made it clear that we have authority over these things and
we are not to be in fear.
A
ministry can easily be inundated by prayer requests from people all
over the world. Prayer teams can be formed for this purpose but the end
result is that no one learns how to win on their own and problems may
come back.
Power To Excel Ministries - their primary teaching is how to pray and have a fast results when thinks are not going well in our lives.
Learn how to become an overwhelming victor through Jesus Christ who loves us (Rom. 8:37).
- Learn to gain victory in every area of your life!
- Learn how to pray so you can achieve and maintain this victory.
If
you wish to have additional Search the Scripture teaching from the desk of our Revivalist and teacher Dale A Rogers go to our School Of Excellence page. For more information go to About Us page.
