“Have faith in God,” dear young Christians! Faith for the thing; of the day, faith for the intervention of God in the difficulties and trials of life, and faith in God for the things which concern His own glory. Prayer is too often formal, not from the heart; it lacks faith, and so obtains no answer.
All true Christians have faith in God, in the sense that they believe God gave His Son to die that sinners might live, and they believe Christ, their Savior. We may say that all true Christians have faith in God for their eternal good, even should their faith be at times clouded by doubts, but How few have steady faith in God for their present good!
Indeed, some are quite astonished when they hear what and how God works for those who trust Him for the day – the record reads to them like a fable, or a tale of bygone times.
Let us borrow an illustration concerning faith from our daily life. A faithful father makes a promise to his little child. That father will all anything in his power rather than allow his promise to fail, and thereby his child to doubt his word; he will inconvenience himself in any kind of way, rather than be the means of one single hesitation as to his faithfulness springing up in the mind of his little child. That father feels that he is the guardian of his child’s confidence, and he knows well that absolute trust in his word is of the utmost importance for the present moral well-being, and for the future of his child. The character of the father thus becomes the ground of the confidence of the child, who thinks thus: “My father will do what he says,” not, “Can my father do what he has promised?” nor, “Will he do it?”
Our faith in God depends greatly upon our acquaintance with Him.
If we walk with God, we shall learn daily to walk in faith. “Walking” is the general demeanor and conduct of the soul, and is governed by what governs the heart. “Have faith in God.” which is an exhortation of our dear Lord to His followers, leads us right unto God Himself in His absolute faithfulness. We cannot have faith in one of whom we know nothing, and we have small faith in those of whom we know but little but God has made Himself fully known to us in and by His Son, and Jesus bids us have faith in God, who is our Father.
If any of our readers should ask, “Where shall I draw the line, and cease bringing things to God?” and many do so inquire, thinking that only great things may be brought to Him, and that we must not, as it were, intrude our trifles upon The Almighty – we reply, “Be like a little child who has no reserve whatever in his heart, and who brings all his cares and pleasures to his father.” A little child will run to his father with a cut finger, or a broken toy, and the father is only too pleased to listen to the little one’s troubles expressed in speech almost too infantile to be clearly understood.
We want to be more child-like with our God and Father, dear Christian reader, and to bring everything to Him, and to have faith in Him for all things, all the moments of our life.
Now mark what our Lord says about our hearts as to faith – “Shall not doubt in his heart.” If we doubt in our hearts, we are mistrusting God. A little child would not doubt his faithful father, he would credit him. Those who are most simple in their faith, receive the reward of faith. Faith is a reality, and if we do not doubt in our hearts, but believe that those things which we say to God in respect of the difficulties which are the subject of our prayer shall come to pass, we shall have whatsoever we ask. “Therefore say unto you, What things soever Ye desire when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them” (Mark 11:2424Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them. (Mark 11:24)). “Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shad say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive” (Matt. 22:21-2221They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's. 22When they had heard these words, they marvelled, and left him, and went their way. (Matthew 22:21‑22)).