“If I want to have a big faith in God, then I need to have a big God.”
I believe everyone can grow their faith in God. I also believe that if we expand our awareness and ‘bigness’ of God and realize His true character, nature, and ability, then our faith will automatically grow. The larger our view of God is, the greater the faith we have in God.
I believed God healed, but I also had not seen that in my life until I experienced a defining moment with my kids’ healing. I had desperately prayed for my mum to be healed of cancer, and she died. I had desperately prayed for a close friend and fellow youth minister, aged 27, to be healed of a brain aneurysm, and she died. I had desperately prayed for us to have children, and we had to wait over ten long years. Thus, I had incorporated a false belief that God healed but not what it came to the ‘big’ things.
Then, my children were healed of anaphylaxis and allergies – anaphylaxis to eggs, nuts, soy, cottonseed oil, intolerant to dairy, sulphurs, salicylates, and fructose, and coeliac. That dramatically changed one day in 2010 when they experienced healing through prayer. That was the day I realized I needed to change my beliefs about God and fully believe all the promises in the Bible and confess all my ‘false’ beliefs I had incorporated through my experience.
We find a definition of faith in Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” Faith is not believing what we can see but what we can’t yet see.
Do you have a cultural value of believing that anything is possible with God, not just believing it but actively pursuing it? “God can and will do anything, and that anything is possible with God” needs to be a core value whenever we want to see the supernatural become our natural lifestyle. Where are you currently at in believing for the impossible? Believing with such certainty, a total belief that God can and will do anything.
It is having an unshakeable belief in God and the promises of God that we read about in the Bible.
Romans 10:17 “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”
This is one reason it is vital to be consistently in the Word of God, reading and devouring His promises and learning more about God’s character, nature and abilities. The more we know about aspects of God, the greater our ‘picture’ of God and His capabilities.
If you need help in this area, I encourage you to choose a Bible verse from the list below and begin meditating on it. If you believe the Bible is the Word of God, then meditating on the Bible and verses from it will help align your mind to what God wants to do.
Bible verses:
- Job 42:1- 2 “Then Job replied to the Lord, ‘I know that you can do all things, no purpose of yours can be thwarted.’”
- Jeremiah 32:17 ‘Ah Sovereign Lord, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and your outstretched arm. Nothing is too hard for you.’
- Matthew 17:20 “Jesus replied, ‘Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.’”
- Matthew 19:26 “Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible but with God all things are possible.’”
- Mark 10:27 “Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.’”
- Mark 11:22-24 And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
- Luke 1:37 “For nothing is impossible with God.”
- Ephesians 3:20 “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.”
Turn these verses into a declaration that you can regularly declare eg “Thank you God that nothing is impossible for you. Thank you, God, that you say in your Word that whatever I ask for in prayer and believe that I have received, it will be mine. Father God, I now thank you for giving me (answer to my prayer) and believe that You will give it to me because nothing is impossible for you, Father God. Thank you, God.”
Hebrews 11:6 sheds light on the important of faith to God. “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” God expects us to have faith, to seek Him and to grow in our faith.
Thus, if you want to grow your faith:
1. Ask God for more faith.
2. Get into the Bible and align your mind with the mind of Christ. Meditate on the promises of God and use them as weapons for declaring God’s truth into your situation.
3. Obey God’s Word.
4. Ask God to show you if you have any ‘false’ beliefs about Him. If He reveals any to you, confess them and ask God to show you the truth.
Next week I will share further ways of helping you to grow your faith in God.
Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:
Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy! Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.
1. Children / Families Activation: Ask kids to ask God to show, tell or give them a sense of where God would be in a playground and also where they would be. Ask further questions such as why, what else is happening, what the weather’s like, anyone else around etc.
2. Group Activation: Get into pairs. Ask God to show you a book of the Bible that relates to your partner. Ask God further questions such as why that particular book, which verses in particular, is there a character that relates and why etc. Share this with your partner.
3. Beginner Activation: Ask God to show you a picture/character of Himself that is not common to your view of God. Ask Him how this attribute relates to you. Spend time with God meditating on that attribute/character/picture of God and seek a new revelation from God about Himself.
4. Intermediate Activation: Choose a service provider eg mailman or garbage collector. Ask God to show you a present you could buy for this person. Write a note about how the present prophetically relates to that person and ask God to show you a way to give it to that person.
5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to reveal to you an issue with something in the community planning department of your local council/shire/area. Pray and prophesy into that issue. Ask God if He requires you to do anything further about that issue.
Oh I loved this post Jane. I actually cut and paste a verse for a friend and sent it immediately to her for her situation she was talking to me this very day… thank you this is a great post.
Thank you so much Beth. How exciting that you could immediately use this to help someone and speak into their situation. Isn’t God good!!
Hi is it not possible for one to download the whole teaching to sit and do or go over the teaching word by word to study it.
Thank you.
Desmond
Hi Desmond, thank you for your question. Unfortunately, I haven’t yet finished writing the blog, so I can’t upload it all at once. I tend to write long blogposts, so I am trying to shorten them by dividing them into separate posts. With this blogpost on how to grow your faith, I wrote part 1 and will write part 2 this week and then upload it. I hope that makes sense. Thanks, Jane