Total Pageviews

Monday, September 5, 2016

Increase Our Faith

Increase Our Faith????
                                       
                                                                                    Return to Main Menu
                                                 To follow A Daily Thought click>>>


Romans 12:3
3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.



As it states above, Faith is a gift of God and it is amazing how our faith does not need to be increased or "super-sized".  My strong mustard seed of faith is just fine.  Oh, over my years, at times I thought I wanted more faith, but I have learned that Trusting the faith God has measured out (given) to me was all I really needed to do.  A baseball size faith is of little consequence if  we do not fully and completely Trust Him.


The Romans 12:3* verse about how our faith is measured out to us from God has not bothered me for most of my years and always; as I studied this verse, it gave me abundant hope. But what has bothered me is when people, especially preachers, talk about us "growing our faith".  Simply stated, talk of "increasing"* our faith bothers me and goes against what Jesus taught (Luke 17:5,6*).  As people, how can we increase the faith God has given us.  In His perfection, our imperfection shines bright when we think we can improve on the blessings and gifts God gives us.  Today, I still see and feel we cannot grow, super-size, or "increase our faith" (Luke 17:5*) by ourselves  because
                      God measures out to us our faith.  And,
I am old enough and experienced enough to know and understand that--
     In His Perfection, what God gives us is sufficient for our needs! 


I have learned that
  in using our faith,
      in depending on our faith daily, and
            in holding on to our dependence on Him forever,
                     especially in our low times,
then
      in and by our Trusting God and Jesus
              we change not the size of our faith,
but rather,

      we  change 
because
      He leads us to be and to feel stronger in our Relationship with Him and
therefore,

      We trust God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and our faith even more.

 Mainly, we just have to be prepared
     to Trust His results and His answers to our faith, our Relationship with Him.

Faith- our Relationship with God is similar to a muscle in our body.  It is there and in the beginning it is weak, but with exercise the muscle gets stronger.  Similarly, when we exercise our faith, our God-desired Relationship with Him likewise gets stronger.  Then, if we cease to exercise, it shrinks, and can return to its earlier 
weakness. Now, I understand that a muscle gets bigger, but it is just as plants in "my" garden.  In my garden, after I have nourished the soil, planted the seed, and kept out the sin (weeds) in my garden, it is God that grows the plants and its fruit, and it is the same way our muscles may get bigger, but it is God who grows them.  If we withdraw the water and allow the weeds (sin) to flourish, the plants will die, and in the same way our muscles and faith will wither.  Stronger strengthened faith is a God activity in our lives due to our exercise, and a stronger Relationship with Him develops as long as we exercise the faith seed He gives us.  Just remember, it is Holy Scripture, Luke 17:5,6* that explains we do not need more faith and it is our exercising our faith that makes that seed of faith stronger.

Truly in our low times of trusting God,
      we feel renewed and strengthened
            in the faith God has measured out to us.  



Sometimes gifts of God come in unexpected ways.  Recently in some low troubling times of my heart, I found in some simple work at church involving small, unexpected challenges that surfaced, and some troubling thoughts were displaced for awhile and I was lead to write this Testimony.

    The Glory of life's low times is that in Faith- our Relationship with Him,
 we can look up and know the Good times are ahead and better understand the Glory in our Faith as it, our faith, is strengthened. .

The Glory of FAITH:
 In life we all face Trials.
      
In our Trials,

            they become just a Test or
            perhaps even a Temptation;

but
      In Trusting our God given Faith,
           the troubling temptation is silenced,
           the Test is conquered and
           the trial becomes a victorious Triumph,
     then

           in triumph we are driven to Testimony, and
              in Testimony we strive and thrive in sharing our Faith--
                  our Relationship with God, and

                     of 
His Glorious work in and through our lives.

 The more we daily Trust The Six T's in Faithful Living
   the stronger our faith becomes.

Thanks be to God.

blessings
lonnie

John 14:   Jesus talking to the Apostles:
  
1 "Do not let your hearts be troubled.
          Trust in God. Trust also in me."

Luke 17:5,6
5 And the apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." 

6 So the Lord said, "If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, 'Be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea,' and it would obey you. 







© lonnie coggins


Please Join 'A Daily Thought Group' on Facebook.  
It is designed to be an uncluttered library of only ‘A Daily Thought’ postings.  

 Thanks and God Bless.



EMAIL?  If you would like to receive an email notification when add a new post to Facebook, about twice a week, send me your email to adailythought@yahoo.com and I will add you to the list in a blind copy.  It will only be used to send you the links to what I publish.




==============================



Sharing these messages



Trusting Faith is a great resource to living a faithful life.  But, do you really need a "super-sized" faith?  Here are some thoughts.

 You are welcome to share these messages.  You can send the links to your friends,  copy and insert the link on FB or you can print the message and share it with your friends.


You can print the message including this sharing message only for your friends and for non-profit.  You MUST copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins        source- Facebook "A Daily Thought Group"
ldcoggins@gmail.com              www.adailythought.NET

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

Please email me if you find any broken links in this message.


lonnie

Publication  0219


intro

 Our Faith, our "Divine Persuasion" of a Loving God gives us Hope regardless of our troubled times.  We have faith in many things, but have you allowed "Divine persuasion" to fill your life in a Relationship with God. Or, do you just want your faith "supersized"?  Here are some thoughts.
 Please share the message on your Fb page as you like, and if you like, click the FB 'Follow' button to have notifications of these publications.  For other messages like this, visit my FB page, or on FB visit-"A Daily Thought Group".

http://lonnieadailythought.blogspot.com/2016/09/increase-our-faith.html


No comments:

Post a Comment