Your faith muscle. Romans 12.3

“Because of the privilege and auth

http://pastorwoman.com/index.aspxority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us.” measuring yourselves by the faith god has given us.

God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.

God has given a certain amount of faith to each one of us, and it is up to us to decide what we will do with that faith. Perhaps for a moment, we might symbolically think of faith like a bicep muscle. Of course, you have a bicep muscle; however, how big and how strong that muscle grows, depends on if and how much you exercise it. God gave Abraham a measure of faith . . . what he did with that faith, how he exercised it, caused him to be a man of great faith, and the patriarch of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.

Let’s go back…way back, like 4,000 years, and see if we can learn from Abraham. His father had been a moon worshipper, but rather than follow the moon, Abraham heard the voice of God, and he listened to it. He was every bit the renegade that Noah was, but instead of a big boat to show for it, he had a long journey to a far-off country, and a barren, elderly wife. He too must have been ridiculed, as he packed up to leave his home, livelihood, and people behind. But … “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” Indeed, the working out, the exercising of great faith often leads to great works!



Abraham wasn’t perfect; he sinned, just like you, just like me. But what set him apart from you and me was that he heard the voice of God—or understood the leading of God—and he obeyed. He responded in faith. God did not ask simple things of Abraham either: ‘pick up all you own and move way off yonder; and oh yeah, now that your 99-year-old wife gave birth to a son, tie him on the altar—sacrifice him, Abraham’. Really, God? Are you kidding me right now?? Yet, in both cases, Abraham responded in faith—great faith. It was not because of his great works that we talk of him . . . it was his great faith, which caused him to act.

Are you like Abraham? Do you take God at his word, trusting his promises to you? Does your faith direct your responsive actions, causing you to exercise your faith muscle, or would you more likely be labeled ‘nonresponsive’ to the voice of God? "What a man believes is the thing he does, not the thing he thinks."1

Scripture refers to Abraham as the ‘friend of God’ three different times. What a remarkable distinction! Jesus told his friends, ‘you are my friends if you obey me.’2 So it had to have been Abraham’s great faith that led him to be obedient to God.

George MacDonald was a Scottish poet, preacher, novelist who boiled all of life's truth into a simple two-step process: realizing who God is, then obeying Him. (you might want to read that again) "True faith, true belief, is not possible where there is not a daily doing of the things He says. They are what make faith take root and spring to life... obedience is not perfection, but making an effort." Realize who God is, then obey him. Ah, so for you and me, perhaps the first step in exercising our faith muscle is setting our resolve to obey that which we know to do.

Back to Jesus’ discourse with his disciples, when he said, ‘you are my friends if you obey me…’ Ah, so God must have called Abraham his friend because of his obedience, which caused him to step out in faith. His act of faith causes us to turn around now, and with the perspective of history, see his faith as great faith. O that God will call you and me his friends because we have obeyed him! Abraham-friend of God, John-friend of God, Ally-friend of God, Glen-friend of God, Judy-friend of God . . . for these children of God obeyed their Father. Ummmm . . . sweet.

God has given you a measure of faith, now have some guts, and step out in what he has called you to do, Man! Watch your faith muscle grow . . .

Christine

http://pastorwoman.com

1 George MacDonald

2 John 15.14