|
FAITH IS....acting on the Word
|
Dawn Fields
|
Jan 04, 2007 07:30 PST
|
God has placed it in my heart to teach, this year, regarding FAITH. The
reason you have not, in the past, seen the “miracles” manifesting in
your life is because you lack complete faith.
I subscribe to this newsletter called “There is Power in the Word” on
the web and came across this article written by a guy name Edward
Slusser. I don’t know him personally but I believe he is a minister. He
has posted several articles to this newsletter and I always read his
writing because they are so powerful. And although I normally write the
articles for this newsletter, I wanted to share this particular article
with you because it is dealing with FAITH and I don’t think I could have
said it any better. It’s pretty long but I guarantee you that you won't
be able to stop reading it until you've reached the end. Powerful stuff.
Read on.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FAITH IS...acting on the Word
Faith is acting on the Word. No matter how much you talk about how you
believe the Bible is the Word of God, No matter how much you may mouth
off about how you believe the Bible from Genesis to Revelations, No
matter how much you sing the praises of the Bible as the greatest story
ever told, No matter how often you repeat the oft quoted phrase "the
Bible is the world's best seller", you can say all that, and talk about
all that, but if you don't ACT on what the Bible says, then the promises
of the Bible and all declared therein will never do you any personal
good in your personal everyday existence.
It is not enough to believe the Bible is true. It is not enough to
believe the Bible is the Word of God. It is not enough to believe that
what is recorded on the pages of the Bible is truly inspired of God. It
will not do you any good personally in your everyday life until you
begin to ACT on that Word. Faith is acting on the Word of God.
The more I travel and minister along the lines of faith, the more I am
made aware that people do not really know what faith is. They don't know
how to appropriate the promises of God. They don't know how to move the
hand of God. Oh, they know how to sing and shout, how to make noise and
clap their hands and lift them. But they don't know how to move the hand
of God. They don't know how to exercise faith. They do not understand
it.
They haven't learned how to ACT on the Word. They quote scriptures. They
say, "Oh, I know that's in the Bible. I know the Bible says that." It
won't do you any good to KNOW it's in there; you have to learn how to
ACT on it. Faith is ACTING.
Faith is an action. You have to act on what you believe. You say you
believe the Bible, then DO what the Bible says. You say you believe the
Word of God, then DO the Word of God, ACT on it.
I was reading recently in the Gospel of Luke. I'd read Luke 21 times
before, but these scriptures jumped out at me. That's why the Bible says
to study to show yourself approved. (II Timothy 2:15).
Some people read it once and figure, "I know what the Bible says, I read
the Bible."
Reading it once, they don't even know where a period is. They read it
once and think they know it. They read the Bible like you'd read the
newspaper, like you'd read the sports section. And they think they know
it. They don't know squatdoodlely about the Bible. If they did they'd be
DOING it. Not talking about it, but DOING it.
"Oh, I know the Bible says this. And I know the Bible says that."
DO IT then. DO IT. If you don't do it, you don't know it. You may think
you know it, but if you knew it, you'd do it.
If somebody gave you a bottle of poison and said "Drink this," but right
on the label it said, "POISON," and you said, "Oh I know this is
poison," would you drink it? No! You wouldn't DO IT, would you?
That works in reverse. If you know what TO DO, you're supposed TO DO IT.
If you're not doing it, you don't really believe it. If that label had
the skull and crossbones on it and said POISON, and you said, "Hummm, I
don't think that's really poison," and you drank it down it would kill
you just the same.
As I said, though I'd read the Gospel of Luke 21 times before, the
Spirit of God brought this scripture to my attention in a new and living
way. It jumped off the page at me. I saw it in a new light. Not that the
truth changed, but there was an amplification of truth. I saw the truth
in a new way and I want to share it with you.
LUKE 5:4-7
4. Now when he (Jesus) had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out
into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.
5. And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the
night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down
the net.
6. And when they had this done, they enclosed a great multitude of
fishes: and their net brake.
7. And they beckoned unto their partners, which were in the other ship,
that they should come and help them. And they came, and filled both the
ships, so that they began to sink.
Here's where we miss it. We miss God because we look at things in the
natural. We're dominated by sense-knowledge, what we can see, what we
can feel, what we can taste, what we can touch, what we can hear. And we
are not governed by, or operating by, what the Word of God declares.
Peter could have said, "Lord, we've fished all night long. You're a
carpenter. You just came out of Nazareth from a carpenter's shop. We've
been out here on the lake fishing for years. This is our job. This is
our livelihood. This is what we do for a living. If anybody knows where
the fish are, and when to fish, and how to catch them, we know it.
You're going to tell us how to fish and you're a carpenter?"
That's how we do God. "What does God know about my problems? Has He ever
had a nagging husband or a nagging wife? What does He know about this
situation? Has He ever had kids that are driving Him up the wall? What
does God know about this? Has He ever suffered? Has He ever been sick?
What does God know? He's telling me to believe I'm healed and I know I'm
not. I still have the pain."
But instead, Peter said, "We've toiled all night. We've fished all
night, and have caught nothing." I know what Peter was talking about.
I've done that myself, fished a whole cotton-pickin' day and didn't even
get a nibble.
But then Peter said, "...nevertheless at thy word I will let down the
net." There's the secret of faith! There it is right there, at thy Word.
At THY WORD! Not at my experience. Not at what I see. Not at what we
have already done and failed in. But AT YOUR WORD, I'll let down the
net.
Many times God in His Word tells us to do things which in the natural
seem ridiculous. They seem impossible. They defy logic. Yet God says to
do it.
You look at that thing in the context of the natural and you say, "Man,
that's impossible. How can I do that? How can you love somebody when
they just spit on you? He said, 'Love your enemies.' Man, that's crazy.
He ain't never had nobody spit on Him like that. Man, it's hard to take
when somebody tells all kinds of lies about you. What does God know
about that? He tells me to love them anyhow. That ain't gonna work. I'll
tell you what I'm gonna do, and eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
That's what I'm gonna do. Love 'em? Turn the other cheek? That's for
fools."
Is it? "We've toiled all night, and have taken nothing, nevertheless AT
THY WORD I'll let down the net."
Here was a situation where it seemed absolutely impossible anything
could come from it. These men were experienced fishermen. They did this
every day of their lives. It was their job. They knew where the schools
of fish were, when the fish were running, when the tide was up, when the
winds were blowing, when to put the nets down. And they had toiled all
night and had taken nothing.
Here comes Jesus, a carpenter, and says, "Let down your nets for a
draught."
Peter says, "We've toiled all night, and have taken nothing,
nevertheless at thy WORD, just because you said it, for no other reason,
I have no other evidence to go on, but you said it, I'll let down the
net."
What happened?
"And when they had this done, they enclosed a great multitude of fishes:
and their net brake." All night they couldn't catch a thing. Jesus said,
"Drop your net right there," and the net began to break. They brought
another boat and both boats were sinking because they had so many fish.
How did it all come about? By ACTING on the Word of God.
Do YOU do that? Do you ACT on God's Word?
It's simply abandoning all of your philosophical reasoning’s, abandoning
all of your logical mental processes, and merely exercising faith in
doing what His word says.
Jesus said, "Let down your nets."
Peter said, "We've toiled all night and taken nothing, NEVERTHELESS AT
THY WORD..."
FAITH IN ACTION...at Jericho
JOSHUA 6:1-2
1.Now Jericho was straitly shut up because of the children of Israel:
none went out, and none came in.
2. And the Lord said unto Joshua, See, I have given into thine hand
Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour.
This is the way God operates. God operates and speaks as though the
thing had already happened, even though in the natural it hasn't
happened yet. Joshua and the children of Israel were outside the walls
of Jericho. The city was shut up. The gates were locked. The men of
Jericho were on the battlements ready for battle because they were
afraid of Israel. They had heard how God brought them through the
wilderness and the Red Sea, and they were scared to death of these
people of God.
God said to Israel before they ever went into the city, "I HAVE GIVEN
INTO THINE HAND...." Not, I'm going to give it to you. I have given it
to you. That's past tense, brother. I have means it's already done. Yet
they're standing outside the walls!
God says, "I have already supplied your needs," and you're whining and
crying and belly-aching because you can't pay the rent. That's because
you don't believe the Word.
"Oh yes, I believe the Bible from Genesis to Revelation."
Yes, but you're not ACTING on it. You're repudiating what you believe
about the Bible when you say, "I can't pay my rent. I don't have money
to do this. I don't have money to do that." You're saying you don't have
it when God says your needs are met.
"Yes, but that don't make sense."
You’re right. It doesn't. It's not sense. It's FAITH. Faith is not
sense, and sense is not faith. Dogs are not cats, and cats are not dogs.
Dogs are dogs, and cats are cats. Faith is faith, and sense is sense.
It's just that simple.
God said, "I have given it to you." For you see the Bible says that God
calleth those things which be not as though they were. (Romans 4:17)
That's what faith does.
"That don't make sense."
You're right. It doesn't. But follow on.
JOSHUA 6:3-4
3. And ye shall compass the city, all ye men of war, and go round about
the city once. Thus shalt thou do six days.
4. And seven priest shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of rams'
horns: and the seventh day we shall compass the city seven times, and
the priest shall blow with the trumpets
"Those are the most ridiculous instructions I ever heard anybody give
anybody else. Isn't that the dumbest thing you ever heard of, everyday
go around the walls of this city one time, blow some trumpets, then go
back to camp for six days, then on the seventh day walk around the walls
seven times and blow on the trumpets? Man, that doesn't make sense."
You're right. It doesn't. But follow on.
JOSHUA 6:5a
5. And it shall come to pass, that when they make a long blast with the
ram's horn, and when ye hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people
shall shout with a great shout;...
"Man, this is really ridiculous. Blowing the horns was bad enough, but
now He wants us to shout."
We've toiled all night and taken nothing, nevertheless at thy Word we'll
let down the net.
You say you believe the Bible, then you'll do it. You say you believe
the Word, then do it. If you don't do it, you don't believe it. And if
you don't do it, you won't get the benefits and results of it. It's just
that simple.
JOSHUA 6:5b
5. ...and the wall of the city shall fall down flat, and the people
shall ascend up every man straight before him.
"These are the most ridiculous instructions I've ever heard of.
Illogical. Nonsensical. Stupid. Dumb. Unreasonable. And any other
negative you can think of."
But God said, "I have given it to you."
You see, we miss God because we try to put it through the computer of
the little pea which sits between our shoulder blades. We try to figure
it out in our head when all God expects us to do is to act on His Word.
Then the understanding comes. We want to understand first, and then
we'll do it. But that's not faith. It's not until you act in faith that
your understanding will really be enlightened as it ought to be. In
matters of faith and matters of the spirit understanding comes after
action.
In the natural we want to know everything and then do it. But even in
the natural we exercise the same principle of faith every day of our
lives and never give it a question. Yet when it comes to things of God,
who created the universe and sustains the action of the stars, we want
to question Him about the authenticity of what He tells us to do. Every
day we do a thousand and one things not knowing how, or why, or having
rhyme or reason of how the thing works. We just accept it.
I use a tape recorder almost every day. I have yet to figure out how in
the world my voice gets on a piece of tape. Maybe you understand it, but
I don't. I cannot understand how I can talk into a little microphone,
and it runs through a wire, is put on a little piece of flimsy plastic
tape, and I can take that tape and play it back on a machine and hear my
voice again saying the very same thing. I don't understand that. But I
just put that tape on there and play it. It doesn't make me any
difference whether I understand it or not. It works! What do I care if I
know how a tape recorder works. It works and I get results. Isn't that
what you want?
Do you know how television works? Do you know how a little box in your
house picks a picture up out of the sky? In color? Suppose you had to
understand that before you could turn on your set. None of us would ever
look at television, would we?
The other day I talked to a man up in Seattle, Washington. He's up in
Seattle, and I'm in Akron, Ohio. And he's talking to me just like he was
in the next room. Just by dialing some numbers, blam! There he was! I
don't understand how that works. How my voice can travel all those
miles. But I don't have to understand to dial a number and talk to the
man and get the information I want. I don't have to know that, do I?
Yet when it comes to the things of God, we want a blueprint, a schematic
diagram. We want to submit it to a computer, have it analyzed,
spectrographed, and the whole bit, before we're ready to act.
We've toiled all night and have taken nothing, nevertheless at thy Word.
In the natural, the instructions God gave Israel were ridiculous.
"I mean, what a way to go. Why don't you just walk right on up to the
door, knock it down, and let us go on in and get the thing on? Why waste
seven days?"
Yes, but that's God's way.
Who are you, speck of dust, to say to God, "Why?" Who are you,
insignificant worm, to question God?
That's like Job running off at the mouth about what shouldn't have
happened, his mother and father shouldn't have come together and all
that kind of junk. God finally shut your mouth, gird yourself up, and
answer these questions. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the
world? Answer me if you can. Where were you when the sons of God shouted
for joy and the morning stars sang together?"
Where were you, Big Mouth? And you're going to tell God how to do it?
See how silly that is. We're going to tell God.
Who are you?
JOSHUA 6:6-11
6. And Joshua the son of Nun called the priest, and said unto them, Take
up the ark of the covenant, and let seven priest bear seven trumpets of
rams' horns before the ark of the LORD.
7. And he said unto the people, Pass on, and compass the city, and let
him that is armed pass on before the ark of the LORD.
8. And it came to pass, when Joshua had spoken unto the people, that the
seven priests bearing the seven trumpets of rams' horns passed on before
the LORD, and blew with the trumpets: and the ark of the covenant of the
LORD followed them.
9. And the armed men went before the priest that blew with the trumpets,
and the rearward came after the ark, the priest going on, and blowing
with the trumpets.
10. And Joshua had commanded the people, saying, Ye shall not shout, nor
make any noise with your voice neither shall any word proceed out of
your mouth, until the day I bid you shout; then shall ye shout.
11. So the ark of the LORD compassed the city, going about it once: and
they came into the camp, and lodged in the camp.
I can imagine the people of Jericho looking out over the walls saying,
"That's the dumbest bunch of people we've ever seen. What are they doing
down there? Look at those idiots. They walked around the wall, blew the
trumpets, and then went back to their camp. Can you understand that? I
don't understand what they're doing."
I can imagine the news media out there with television cameras trying to
figure out what in the world is going on. The TV reporter covering the
story would report, "They come up to the walls. They march around them
in battle array. Their priests walk around the wall and blow their
trumpets. Then they go back to their camp." I can imagine the news
analysts trying to figure it all out.
We've toiled all night and caught nothing, nevertheless at thy Word.
JOSHUA 6:12-16
12. And Joshua rose early in the morning, and the priest took up the ark
of the LORD,
13. And seven priests bearing seven trumpets of rams' horns before the
ark of the LORD went on continually, and blew with the trumpets: and the
armed men went before them; but the rearward came after the ark of the
LORD, the priest going on, and blowing with the trumpets.
14. And the second day they compassed the city once, and returned into
the camp: so they did six days.
15. And it came to pass on the seventh day that they rose early about
the dawning of the day, and compassed the city after the same manner
seven times: only on that day they compassed the city seven times.
16. And it came to pass at the seventh time, when the priest blew with
the trumpets, Joshua said unto the people Shout; for the LORD hath given
you the city...
20. So the people shouted when the priests blew with the trumpets: and
it came to pass, when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the
people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat, so that
the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and
they took the city.
It may not have fit logic. It may not have been reasonable. But it
worked! They took the city!
"Yes, but why did God go through all that?"
I don't know. But what difference does it make? They took the city!
If somebody wants to give you a million dollars are you going to
squabble about whether you get it in tens or twenties? Man, give me the
million dollars. I'll take it in pennies. And I'll have a glorious time
counting those pennies.
What difference does it make whether they got the city in one day or
seven? The point is when they were obedient to the Word of God, when
they acted, when they did the Word, results came! And not until then!
We've toiled all night and have taken nothing, nevertheless AT THY WORD.
What is the Word of God saying to us? Many things! Are we DOING them?
The Bible says, "Be careful (anxious) for nothing...." (Philippians
4:6). Yet when I minister people come up to me who are nervous, afraid,
and fearful. It's easy to show them the problem. They're not ACTING on
the Word.
"Oh, I believe it from Genesis to Revelation."
But they're not doing it. And because they don't do it, it doesn't work
on their behalf. If you'll believe that Word and do it, you'll never be
afraid of anything. Brother they can bring Rodan through the door and it
won't make any difference, even King Kong and all his boys.
"Yes, I believe the Bible."
Well the Bible tells you to be anxious for nothing. The Amplified
translation of Philippians 4:6 reads, "Do not fret or have any anxiety
about anything..." It means we're not to take any care or fret over
anything.
Yet how many fret over bills, over money, over husbands or wives, over
jobs, etc., while they say they believe the Word. That's why it doesn't
work for them. It won't work until you do what the Word says.
With God's Love
dwrd-@yahoo.com
Edward Slusser
Well, that’s it for this week, Folks.
Nevertheless, at they WORD….
Powerful stuff.
This year we will all walk by faith and not by sight. Make that your
goal for 2007. For when you walk in faith and in the word, you will
truly begin to manifest all of your desires.
Remember, as always, I’m here for you. Drop me a note at
da-@dawnfields.com.
Have a blessed and wonderful week.
LADIES, if you haven’t already done so, be sure to go to
www.success-seminars.org and sign up for my new members only site for
woman. This is going to be a powerful, powerful site, dedicated to
helping woman empower themselves for greatness.
Take care and God bless!
Dawn Fields
No God!
No Peace!
Know God!
Know Peace!
|
|
 |
|
