As a Christian we know we are supposed to walk by faith and we want to walk by faith but why is it so hard? I hope you will read this if you’ve never read anything I’ve ever shared. Please read this entirely. After some important words about faith below are 4 essentials to our walk of faith. 

We have more faith than we think. We had to have faith to believe. We believed when we accepted Jesus. By grace we have been saved through faith. So we believed by faith. Ephesians 2:8. We also have faith that we have eternal life and that Jesus will one day come again in glory. So we have faith in what happened long ago and in what is coming. It is the middle of all that where we may struggle some with our faith. 

After salvation we revert to a need to walk by sight even though we know we are supposed to walk by faith. In part it’s because we live in such a visual world today. Because we can see everything going on in the world, we keep up with everyone through photos and videos and it makes us need to see it to believe it. Keep in mind though that we are only seeing what they want us to see. We also get caught up in comparing ourselves and we want to see these things in our own lives. We don’t want to wait and have faith and pray about it. Our nature wants it right now and we get discouraged when we don’t. 

We forget that our focus should be on The Lord and His Will. Our focus should be on what He is calling us to do. One of the things that He has called us to do is to walk by faith. “For we walk by faith, not by sight” 2 Corinthians 5:7. What does this mean? We are always in a mode of waiting, hoping and praying for God to reveal the next step on the journey. To move in the heart of a loved one, to establish His plan, to heal, protect, restore, deliver. A walk of faith means that we can’t see the things we hope for, the things God has placed in our hearts and yet we believe. Like Noah Genesis 6:10-22; Hebrews 11:7 had never seen rain in his life but he built that ark. God said he was sending rain to flood the earth and Noah believed. Like Abraham who left his home in Methopotamia when God called him. Genesis 11; Hebrews 11:8-10. He didn’t know what he was going to do but by faith he followed God. 

Hebrews 1 gives us a definition of faith. “The assurance of things hoped for. The conviction of things not seen”. KJV says “The substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen”. We are supposed to have an assurance of the things hoped for. We’re not talking about any and everything we can dream up. We’re talking about Godly things we hope for. We are to have a conviction that God will establish it even though we can’t yet see it. Even when we start out in faith it dwindles and we drift easily to discouragement. Many if not most of us deal with this.  

Here are 4 essentials to help with this journey to walk by faith. 

1. Embrace the waiting. We want the instant miracle. We know God is able and we want him to snap his finger and do it. God is able and yes pray for those miracles but there’s waiting even before those miracles. The blind man healed by Jesus in John 9:1-7 was blind his entire life until that day he met Jesus. The woman with the issue of blood in Matthew 9:20-22 had it for 12 years before Jesus healed her. The lame man in John 5:5-9 had been waiting for a miracle at the pool of Bethesda for 38 years. In our Christian life we will always be waiting for one thing or another. We can stay discouraged or we can embrace the waiting. There is a purpose in the waiting. God is always at work and is always on time…His time not ours. He is also working on us, growing us, teaching us , inspiring us and drawing us closer to Him. Waiting should keep us looking to The Lord and building our trust in Him. Embrace waiting as your opportunity to seek and grow closer to The Lord. Our focus should always be on Him. 

1. Reject Fear and Doubt. Believe. We cannot walk by faith if we are plagued by fear and doubt. Having fear and doubt is at the opposite extreme of faith. Jesus said to Peter in Matthew 14:31 “Ye of little faith” why did he doubt? Jesus was right there in Peter’s sight and Peter allowed fear and doubt creep into his mind. Fear and doubt is the favorite poison of the enemy because they can dominate our lives. The result is then that we don’t have the assurance and because we don’t have the assurance we then don’t take the steps of faith we need to take. Even if just mentally, we don’t believe. If Noah had doubted when God spoke to him or feared looking foolish building that ark he and his family would have drowned with everyone else. If Abraham had feared leaving his home, if he had not had faith he would not have seen the promises of God in his life and in the lives of his descendants. Fear and doubt cause us to walk by sight. We come up with our own plan, our own solution. We see something that makes sense to our human minds. Walking by faith is so superior. It is seeing the power of God, the wisdom of God and the ways of God in action. By sight the door is closed, by faith we believe God will open it. We have to reject fear and doubt no matter how many times they rise up even when they are relentless. Run to God for protection. Ask Him to help us, to cast down those thoughts and to replace them with faith filled thoughts. We pray Lord help my unbelief. We are believers. God wants us to believe in the promises, in His word and in the things he has called us to do. He wants us to believe that He can heal, He can protect and that He can deliver. He is God. He knows it’s not easy for us to walk in faith so He gives us grace to do so. He’s given us His Spirit, The Holy Spirit. We have all we need. We have to believe that we have everything we need. 

1. Walk in Obedience. A walk of faith is a walk of obedience. I’m not talking about a perfect walk but when we know we have sin in our lives and we are unrepentant we put ourselves at a distance from God. We then open the door to all kinds of enemy influence. The fear and doubt for sure, confusion, deception. We will be assured of things we hope for and they will be all the wrong things.  Everything will be going on in our lives except for a walk of faith because we will be in the flesh and not in the spirit. God is gracious, full of compassion, mercy and He forgives. He will even give you grace to move to a place of repentance. Seek Him, ask Him to help you. I know this is not a feel good type of thing but the truth sets us free John 8:31-32. Sin weakens. Obedience brings power and blessings to your walk of faith.

1. Read Your Bible. I may be like a broken record in telling you to spend time reading your Bible. You have to.  There is absolutely NO way you can have a strong walk of faith without filling yourself up on The Word. I’m not talking about just doing a morning devotion from a book or looking up a motivational verse. I mean reading it regularly, growing in your understanding of who God is. What His Will is. How He works. Who you are in Christ and what He has already given you in Christ. These things build up our faith. Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith. Knowing Him is supreme. Paul in Philippians 3:7-11 “I count all things as loss compared to the surpassing excellence of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” To know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings and knowing that we are called to suffer for His sake is important. Because when the suffering comes we’re not as likely to get discouraged. We will keep moving by faith. Think of the life of Daniel who said “I’m going to pray to God whether you feed me to the lions or not” then God shut the mouths of the lions. That builds our faith. We see the apostles claiming the gospel of Jesus Christ with their very lives at risk, that builds our faith. The Bible gives us an eternal perspective to know this is not our home. This is temporary and there is a great glory yet to come. Death doesn’t even have a sting. We have the victory already. I’m not saying that you have to real all 66 books of the Bible before you have a walk of faith. No of course not. God meets us where we are. As we read. You may be a new believer and just getting started. What I’m saying is the The Word, The Holy Bible is Life. It is food. It is encouragement. It is grace. It is power. It is everything to us. Stay in the word, it will build up our faith. That is the most important thing you can do in life after accepting Jesus as your Savior. Read your Bible, keep our eyes fixed on the author and finisher of our faith