Substance of Faith
- beate77
- Feb 5, 2015
- 2 min read
I like to think that I have a good handle on faith. To me it's quite simple. Hebrews 11:1 tells us exactly what it is and that it has two parts, or two witnesses. One of them, evidence of the unseen, I know I understand well. I wrote about it in a previous blog.
But I must admit that for quite a while now I've struggled with understanding the other witness of faith, the substance of what we hope for. In this previous blog, I wrote the way my husband explained to me his understanding of it. Another analogy I've heard is that of a chair. When you walk into a room you don't examine a chair to make certain it'll hold together before you sit in it, even if it's an unfamiliar chair in an unfamiliar room. Why? Because chairs have always held together before.
I can now say I've heard an even better analogy, one that I think is a perfect example for substance of hope.
Daniel Duval, in his Thursday 29 January 2015 podcast, gave the example of a restaurant pager. When you put yourself on a waiting list at a restaurant, they often give you a buzzer. You carry that buzzer around, knowing that it's a good as having a future table. It hasn't happened yet, you're not sitting at it yet, but it's there, in the future, waiting you to catch up with it in the timestream. That buzzer is the substance of hope you have for and event that has not yet occurred.
What's more, Daniel points out that this buzzer is powered by something. It has a battery. This is representative of the power of God. If the substance you hold does not have the power of God, you'll never get what you're hoping for. You've misplaced your faith. I would go on to say that if you got that buzzer from a competitor restaurant, you'll never get the table you're hoping for. You've misplaced your faith.
Thus it is in life. If the substance you're holding onto came from a different source other than God, such as a false religion, or a manmade philosophy, you're not going to get what you're hoping for. You've misplaced your faith.
Make sure the substance you hold for your hope is truly from God. Then, coupled with the evidence of the unseen, your faith truly will grow, moving mountains out of your way in the process, just like a trees roots moving sidewalk blocks out of its way as it expands.
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