Faith is a much misunderstood word

Someone says that he has faith that God will do something for him, and another says he does not have enough faith for something. The implication is that it is their faith that is going to make something happen. That cannot be what Jesus meant when He told a woman that her faith had healed her (Mk.5:34). We know this because we know we have no supernatural abilities to make things happen. Then we can see that what Jesus meant could be that it was because He saw her faith that He did this miracle for her.

If we get this wrong, we will try to prepare enough 'faith' in our mind so that we can make what we want to happen. We try to make ourselves believe that it will happen, by keeping away doubts from our mind and keeping away from people who can cause us doubts, by repeating to ourselves that it is going to happen, by holding on tenaciously to some verse in the Bible that seems to show that God will give us what we want, etc. It is this process that makes us conclude that we have enough faith for certain things and not for others.

Instead of connecting faith with what we want to happen, if we think of it as trusting in God, will that not make a huge difference in our life? We trust God when we get to know Him as who He is and His character, and then know that we can rely on Him and His word. He is not only almighty, but He loves us and His wisdom is sufficient to deal with everything in our life. Then we become willing to obey what He says and also to leave decisions to Him. Then instead of making our plans or deciding what we need, we are willing to learn from His word which things are pleasing to Him and which not. In any given situation, we can ask Him what we should do, and also for help to do it. God may guide us in different ways, and sometimes He knows that we have enough understanding to make our decision, and then watches us to see what we will do (Ps.32:9).

Growing in faith is not to increase the quantity of our faith to do more difficult things, but to learn to trust God in all our situations. Faith is to be in God, as a Person, instead of in the quantity of our so-called faith. We can think of how as children we have held on to our father's finger and let him lead us. We trusted our father and knew that he knew what he was doing and where he was taking us. None of us would have thought of our 'faith' as for getting things from him.

What would be the result if our understanding of faith is not correct when it comes to salvation through faith? Is our confidence in Jesus as our Saviour, or in our faith? Is it in our knowledge of the story of His life, death and resurrection as if believing that will be acceptable to God? Or, have we come face to face with Jesus, seen His holiness and His love for us, seen ourselves as sinners before Him, turned away from our sinful lives and placed our trust in Him to be our Saviour? Salvation is personal, and takes place through this relationship with Jesus.