The Happen Stance

How to Make Things Happen In Your Christian Life

K. Neill Foster

MOST CHRISTIANS ARE AWARE of the existence of the shield of faith mentioned in Ephesians 6:16. "Above all, taking the shield of faith wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked."

But not so many of our Lord's children remember that "by faith the walls of Jericho fell down" (Heb. 11:30).

In fact, the whole "faith chapter" (Heb. 11) is nothing less than a magnificent rehearsal of the offensive exploits of the faith heroes of the Bible. It would be wrong to suggest that faith is not sometimes protective, even passive, within our hearts. But it will also take the offense. Faith will speak to the mountain and the mountain will move. Faith triggers events. The man of faith will often make things happen; in a positive sense, he can control events.

Regardless of what you face, Jesus says to you, "Be not faithless, but believing."

A DEFINITION

A passive definition of faith is this: to believe, to be persuaded of, to have confidence in, to trust in, to rely upon, to have entire dependence upon with assurance. To so define faith is good, but not good enough. A full description and definition of faith can only be gained by a study of the Scriptures. And while this book cannot be exhaustive because of its nature and scope, we will focus on the Scriptures which reveal the do-power of faith.

The Christian life begins with an act of faith. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. . ." (Acts 16:31). "For by grace are ye saved, through faith. . ." (Eph. 2:8).

To start to define it, we say that faith is the understanding of authority, accompanied by the willingness to act or rely upon it. The centurion who witnessed Jesus' healing ministry (Matt. 8:5-10) readily caught what many others had been oblivious to: Jesus healed through the function of authority. Being a military man himself, he was used to commands and instant obedience. Christ's ministry of healing and deliverance was not especially a prayer ministry. It was, instead, a ministry of authority, laced with commands.

Perhaps today, too, the ministry of healing (I speak only of that which is biblical and Christ-adorning) would be far different if authority and faith were properly linked.

HEALING EVANGELISTS

The only people who come close to applying this practice are some of those who could be called the healing evangelists. They often simply pray and then command people to be healed. I am familiar with their work, especially in Latin America.

One of the most prominent of these healing evangelists visited Guatemala a number of years ago. A mission leader of fundamentalist persuasion, who was anything but pro-Pentecostal, nevertheless gave this account. When the evangelist preached, very large crowds gathered, and a large pile of crutches from those who were healed accumulated under the platform. From that campaign on, evangelical Christianity grew until it penetrated the whole country. Significantly, all types of evangelicalism benefited.

I know all too well the abuses which have been associated with this kind of ministry. I know too that healing ability does not prove that a man is a man of God, or even that he is a true Christian. But still the principle used in many of the open-air healing crusades is a biblical one. Faith is understanding authority and acting upon it.

Faith also has some opposites: doubt, fear, unbelief. "Why are ye fearful, 0 ye of little faith?" (Matt. 8:26). That was the kind of question Jesus asked.

MEASURES OF FAITH

The Bible also affirms that there are measures of faith. All men have faith - I speak of a basic human ability to believe. But such faith does not save anyone. Then there is saving faith. Some have great faith; some have little faith. Jesus suggested that faith no greater than a mustard seed could move mountains. Stephen was a man "full of faith." And Paul discussed the "proportion of faith."

The exciting thing, however, about all this is that faith can increase and does. Our faith can grow. "For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, the just shall live by faith" (Rom. 1:17). "Not boasting of things without our measure, that is, of other men's labours; but having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you according to our rule abundantly" (2 Cor. 10:15). "We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth" (2 Thess. 1:3).

And the means of its growth is clear also. "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (Rom. 10:17).

Actually, the growth concept, relating to faith or any other princi pIe, is one of the most exhilarating in the Word of God. No matter where we are in the Christian life, no matter what God has already done for us, there is more.

I recall hearing the late Dr. R. R. Brown of Omaha, Nebraska, speak at a convention in Winnipeg, Canada. What he said, I cannot recall. But for the first time in my Christian life, the growth concept fastened itself to my heart. I knew finally in my heart what I had known intellectually for a long time: there is always more with Jesus. And the jubilation in my heart was overwhelming.

Y HAY MÁS

In more recent years, I served as an interpreter for a Spanish Bible teacher from Argentina. His messages were profound and the blessing was great. But there was a recurring theme. Again and again he would say, Y hay más! ("And there's more!") Canadians were blessed by his ministry - and they even learned a little Spanish!

Y hay más! And there's more! And there's more!

So it is with faith. God's plan is that it should increase - magnificently!

Faith also is affected by the adverse currents of unbelief. The disciples found themselves powerless to cast out a demon because of their unbelief (Matt. 17:19,20). When Jesus was about to heal a blind man (Mark 8:22-26), He took him outside the city. Some think it was to escape the unbelief in the city.

Jesus Christ, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Omnipotent God, the author and finisher of our faith, on one occasion could do no mighty miracles because of the unbelief of the people.

Faith also has some vicarious characteristics. It can be exercised on behalf of others. When Jesus saw the faith of four men who had lowered their paralytic friend through the roof, He was moved to forgive and heal their comrade (Mark 2:5). The elders of the church, too, are able to offer prayers for the sick (James 5:15), and their faith results in healing.

I remember especially the first healing I was allowed to see in the ministry. An elderly shop-keeper was deeply burdened for his wife who was sick in a city more than 200 miles away. We slipped into a storage room and prayed together for his wife's deliverance. And she was healed! I was amazed. Sometimes I still am when God responds to faith.

FAITH YOU CAN CATCH

Another characteristic of faith is that it is communicable. It is contagious, if you will. Part of Paul's rejoicing over Philemon (Philem. 5,6) was that his faith was communicable.

One of the little understood factors about spiritual phenomena is that they are all contagious. The friendly assembly can easily turn into a frenzied mob when a spirit of riot invades the crowd. Hate, fear, lust, alcoholism, and homosexuality are not communicable diseases. But they are communicable spiritually. Occultism and spiritualism pass from generation to generation because they are spiritually transferrable.

Charismatic phenomena (a more pronounced presence in the church in recent years) are also communicable - both true and false ones.

In revivalistic and evangelistic movements there are rarely single conversions or renewals. More often in the kingdom of God there is a continuing chain of spiritual events. One things always leads to another in the spiritual realm.

On the clearly positive side, faith is communicable. It is a spiritual intangible which can be both transferred and shared among people.

Frankly, most - if not all - of us must admit the faith in our hearts right now may well have come to us through spiritual contact with other followers of Christ.

Thank God for the household of faith! And away with unbelief!

FAITH CAN DETERIORATE

Faith can fail (Luke 22:23). Faith can be ship-wrecked (1 Tim. 1:19). Faith must be built, maintained, and strengthened continually.

Dr. Duane T. Gish, in debating for creation and against evolution, stresses the second law of thermodynamics (that all things are gradually running down or decaying) to test the evolutionary and creationist models. Man is very complex, says the professor, but when he dies he decays. To reverse this process, outside energy is needed. Plants grow by obtaining energy from the sun, but they require a complex energy conversion system. Dr. Gish also points out that the fossil records, instead of showing a gradual evolvement from the simple to the complex, show that "all systems change from the organized to the less organized."⁹ If all things deteriorate, evolution cannot be right.

Faith, too, tends to deteriorate. And that gives reason enough for Christians to opt continually for the Word of God, which builds faith, and for Jesus Christ, who is the source and terminus of faith.

IMPORTUNITY - SOMETIMES

Another of the manifestations of faith is surely importunity. The Canaanite woman's daughter was healed because Jesus could not ignore her persistence and importunity (Matt. 15:21-28). And our Lord told her, "O woman, great is thy faith."

As is so often the case with scriptural truth, there are two sides to the coin. Sometimes one must simply ask God for what His Word promises and then believe. A layman in the Church of the Nazarene tells of receiving prayer for healing as a lad. Then he relates, "For several days I rolled on the floor with pain. I don't know what the pain was, but I knew God had healed my ulcers. When they had prayed for me, I was healed. Finally the pain stopped too." Nearly thirty years later he is well and vigorous, without ulcers. "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark 11:24). To believe is to receive. And for some, to pray a second time for something already requested is an act of unbelief.

At the same time, there are occasions when persistence and importunity will bring results which single prayers cannot. "So I tell you, keep on asking, and the gift will be given you; keep on seeking, and you will find; keep on knocking, and the door will open to you. For everyone who keeps on asking, receives; and the one who keeps on seeking, finds; and to the one who keeps on knocking, the door will open." (Luke 11:9-10, Williams) The context of this Scripture is importunity. And the Greek tenses of the text bear out the context - the key is keeping on.

In that notable and well documented case referred to earlier, Pastor Blumhardt warred against demons for two whole years before Gottlieben Dittus was delivered.

George Mueller persisted in prayer for a whole lifetime, but it was not until after Mueller's death that some of his prayers were answered.

Faith, then, is sometimes evidenced in importunity. Great faith is never a stranger to importunity.

SOMETIMES IT IS VERBAL

Faith must sometimes be verbal. Faith will speak before it sees. Testimony speaks afterward. Faith just speaks to the mountain. Jesus said, "If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you" (Matt. 17:20).

In a similar passage (Mark 11:23-24), saying is equated with believing. And Jesus clearly says, ". . . he shall have whatsoever he saith."

When Dorcas died (Acts 9:40) Peter did not lay hands upon the body, nor did he anoint it with oil. Instead he "spoke to the mountain." And Dorcas was raised. Similarly, when Peter and John met the crippled man at the gate of the Temple, they neither prayed nor anointed. Instead, the spoken word was used - "ln the name of Jesus of Nazareth rise up and walk" (Acts 3:6). The results were overwhelming. The mountain moved.

Sometimes the principle of verbalized faith can be applied to some very practical things. The ministry of our Christian newspaper is maintained very largely through the sale of books. During the writing of this volume we felt that one month we should ask for sales of $4,000. We talked about it publicly also. We verbalized our faith. By the end of the month the sales were $6,000.

The believer who knows he confronts a demon and dares to verbalize his faith will say, "You spirit, come out in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ!" He also will be much more successful than the believer who knows he confronts a demon but cannot bring himself to speak to it. All too often such a wavering believer asks the Lord in prayer to do something he himself has been commissioned to do (Mark 16:17).

Faith speaks. It speaks to the mountain. The principle is as old as creation. Elohim (the triune

God) spoke and the worlds sprang into existence. Words spoken in perfect faith created the universe around us.

THE DISCIPLINE OF SILENCE

But faith does not always speak. There are times when a man of God does not say all he knows. Instead, he maintains a discipline of silence. To betray that silence sometimes means that the faith is dissipated. It is as if God's confidence has been betrayed. Once you have seen that faith speaks, do not be so naive as to suppose that the Holy Spirit always works in the same way. "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him. . ." (Ps. 25:14).

Faith is action, too. When the ten lepers came to Jesus, He instructed them, "Go show yourselves unto the priests" (Luke 17:14). And as they went, they were cleansed. Faith, in their case, produced action and in the process of the act of obedience, deliverance came. So faith sometimes is action.

One author suggests that faith demonstrates itself in four ways. First it speaks, then it does, then it receives, then it tells! The biblical examples he employs bear him out.¹⁰

The Syrophoenician woman said, "If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole" (Mark 5:28). She did it. She received healing. And she told others.

Of Goliath, David said, "I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied" (1 Sam. 17:45). David did it, too. He ran to meet Goliath. He hurled the stones; he cut off the giant's head. He received. And others told it. "Saul has slain his thousands, but David has slain his ten thousands."

The prodigal son said, "1 will arise and go to my father" (Luke 15:18). He did it, too. He received forgiveness. And the onlookers told it. So well did they tell it, that the elder brother got angry and upset.

ULTIMATELY IT IS JESUS

Any discussion of faith must ultimately focus on Jesus Christ. He is the author of it. And its finisher of it (Heb.12:2). Whatever your needs are, they are met in Jesus Christ. Whatever the impossibility you face, our Savior is the full and adequate answer. His promises are enough. "For all the promises of God . . . are yea, and in him Amen. . ." (2 Cor. 1:20). "But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus" (Phil. 4:19).

Faith could be described almost indefinitely, but this is not a book about faith. It is enough to remember that Jesus said, ". . . all things are possible to him that believeth" (Mark 9:23).

Someday somebody somewhere is going to really believe that Scripture. That man or woman will change the world.

Chapter 10