With regard to the natural order of development of faith, its birth, growth and strengthening, it is important to be clear that faith is not the result of the normal thought processes of the human being; people do not have faith just because their thought process led them to the conclusion that they have faith. Faith is a gift of God and is of a spiritual nature, and is given to man as a key for him to approach God, to believe in Him and to recover the benefits of the essence of the image and likeness of God with which he was formed.
Faith is ‘believing’ in the Essence of God, but it has nothing to do with rational ‘believing’ by which man ‘accepts’ the existence of the knowledge of something;
faith believes in a reality even if the knowledge of that reality is an absurdity according to the laws of reason, or there is simply no precedent that testifies to its benefit.
In the same way, faith also cannot be evaluated according to the way of feeling, in principle, because faith is absolute as to what we believe, feelings allow variation and can be corrupted under states of oppression; in general terms, faith does not awaken any type of feeling or sensation in the person when he or she acts for it, sometimes even those who live by faith are not aware of the times when they acted for it, if it were not for the evidences in the results they would never realize the activation of their faith.
Thus, regarding the birth, development and strengthening of faith, the normal processes of thought or feeling of the person have nothing to do with it; a faith where thoughts actively intervene, faith constitutes itself in positive thinking, but it is not faith; in the same way, a faith where feelings actively intervene, faith constitutes itself in reflexology, or something similar, but it is not faith;
Faith is of a spiritual character and develops from the disposition to act in accordance with the teachings of the Gospel.
This is not to say that thought and feeling processes are alien to the growth and strengthening of faith, it is not our teaching purpose to establish such a proposition; it is our mission to establish that if thoughts and feelings are not subjected to walk in accordance with the teachings of the Gospel, thought and feeling processes can hinder the growth of faith, including distorting it, and even stifling it.
Faith demands that the person who wants to walk by it understands that it is necessary to ‘transform’ the way of thinking and feeling, and to accommodate the normal processes of thinking and feeling to the doctrinal teaching of the Gospel, otherwise, faith does not grow or develop. The basic problem, as far as faith is concerned, is not that people cannot have faith, or that it is not a virtue for our times; the basic problem is that people want to ‘subject’ faith to their own way of thinking or feeling, and that does not go with faith. Faith has to be established on the foundation of the doctrinal teaching of the Gospel, that requires that the person who wants to walk by it allows the Gospel to ‘teach’ him how to have faith.
Although of a spiritual character, faith is a teachable virtue, but not in the same way as all academic knowledge is taught; faith is teachable because God Himself progressively reveals Himself to the heart of the man and woman of faith, and teaches them about His mysteries; men and women learn to walk in faith when they seek to do God’s Will.[1]
Faith is following instructions, but it does not tolerate interpretation, it is practically invalidated by doing so;[2] faith consists of and is validated by following the instructions that are set forth in the Word by the Spirit of Truth; an altered teaching will only bring about ritualistic actions, and possibly a feeling of accomplishment, but it does not establish the spiritual power to transcend to the plane of the supernatural.
Faith is the essence of life in Christ Jesus, and life in Christ is wisdom from above.
In his first epistle to the Corinthian community of faith, Paul introduces the theme that those sanctified in Christ Jesus have the ‘mind’ of Christ;[3] therein the apostle stresses that faith is not founded on the wisdom of men (ver. 2:5), but in the wisdom of God in mystery, the hidden wisdom; such wisdom, the apostle concludes, God predestined from before the ages for our glory (ver. 2:7); according to this teaching of the apostle Paul, faith is Revealed by the Spirit of Truth (ver. 2:9-10).
Faith, according to this teaching, cannot be understood by anyone who has not first made the decision to want to be taught; faith is teachable, but it requires that those who want to walk in it be willing to submit to the processes of teaching. It is the Spirit of Truth who determines the processes, and does so on the foundation of the doctrinal Word of the Gospel. In his teaching to the Corinthian community of faith, the apostle states that the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned (ver. 2:14); the natural man is the carnal man,[4] that is, the man subject to his own natural thoughts.[5]
Thus, then, the first task facing the man and woman born according to the faith of Jesus, is to understand that the structures of thought and feeling that they carry as sediment of their former way of life are vitiated according to sin, and that therefore, in order to grow and live by the faith of Jesus it is necessary to ‘renew’ their way of thinking and feeling.
Without a genuine renewal of the structures of thought and feeling, a believer will be able to reason that Jesus is God manifested in flesh, but he will hardly be able to transcend in the faith of the virtue of what such a statement means for reconciliation with the Creator.[6]
The ‘mind’ of Christ is not religious formulations, it is the spiritual way of judging and discerning actions within the Kingdom of Heaven, it is the knowledge of God by which those sanctified in Christ Jesus can move in the Will of God according to the operations of His Grace.
Scripture quotations are taken from the Authorized King James Version, 1909 (AKJV).
Pastor Pedro Montoya
[1] Hebrews 11:6:But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
[2] Mark 7:9:And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.
[3] 1st. Corinthians 2:16:For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
[4] 1st. Corinthians 3:1:And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.
[5] Ephesians 2:3:among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
[6] Romans 3:23:for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
Treasure in Earthen Vessels 