Strengthening Our Faith Muscle
"And without faith, it is impossible to please God" - Hebrews 11:6
Do you regularly strengthen your "faith muscle"? All the time, we need strengthening of our faith. Just as it's healthy to go to the gym and build muscle mass, it's spiritually healthy for us to build our faith muscle. (And, it prevents the drying of our spiritual bones, A.K.A. DISCOURAGEMENT!) (Ezekiel 37:11)
But, sometimes in life our circumstances can get the better of us. When one negative thing after another happens we lose the ability to BELIEVE. When these times come, we need our brothers and sisters who do have faith for the situation to pray and believe for us. This will strengthen our faith -- even for the most discouraged soul. We need to continually stay in a place of faith in order to allow God to work. God cannot work in a situation where there is no faith. Faith is the precursor to God's action on our behalf. It is the fertile ground necessary for the miraculous to occur. It is in faith that we are "alive in Christ."
Gunnar Olsen, a Christian businessman in Sweden often tells a true tale called "The Plastic Bag Story." At one time he owned a packing business, and during this time he received a large order for some plastic bags. After receiving the shipment, the warehouse manager had informed Gunnar that the bags were sealed shut! On a Friday, they checked all the boxes of bags, and every one of them had melted together.
Well, as you can imagine, it caused quite a panic. Gunnar's brother who also worked with him became very upset and Gunnar asked him to go play golf. His brother was incredulous that Gunnar would ask him to leave in a moment of crisis, but Gunnar knew it would not be a good idea for him to be around. He needed to be filled with faith for the situation, and he knew his brother was afraid.
Gunnar and his family went to the warehouse that Saturday and stood in a circle praying together. After they had prayed his daughter spoke up. "I think we should pray for the boxes! God wouldn't want these bags to be sealed," she said. So they did. They laid hands on all 3,000 boxes and prayed. The following Monday, they checked the bags. They were unsealed, as if nothing had ever happened.
The enemy wants nothing more than to steal our seeds of faith. If he does that, he knows he can discourage us and make us completely ineffective for the kingdom. But, this is not what God wants for us! God wants us to be full of faith -- all the time! However, in order to have faith in our lives we must want it -- and we must learn to activate it. Are you strengthening your faith muscle today?
Related resource: Kingdom Heroes: Building a Strong Faith That Endures by Tony Evans
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