Beloved, let us be decided, for it is impossible for us to grasp at things “before” and “behind” too. Were we “pressing forward towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus;” were we “reaching forth unto these things which are before,” we must be forgetting those behind; were we looking up, gazing with the eye of faith on our portion above, could we be groping in the dirt of this world for what we might find there? Could we be making a god of business, pleasure, riches, or reputation?
Faith is an anticipating grace. Faith is a substantial reliance on the verities of God, such as makes its possessor count all things else but dross and dung for Christ and the things above.
Dear reader, either give up professing to be guided by the Bible, or act as if you believed it. There is such a thing as the “obedience of faith;” and if we don’t obey, our religion is all pretense and unreality.