(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

The part of the chapter I wanted to look at was in verse 27 where the Bible said, And when Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying and saying, Thou son of David, have mercy on us. And when he was coming to the house, the blind men came to him. And Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, Yea, Lord, then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you. And their eyes were opened, and Jesus straitly charged them, saying, See that no man knoweth. But they, when they were departed, spread abroad his fame in all that country. And the title of my sermon tonight is, According to your faith, according to your faith. Now I was going to give you a little illustration, imagine you were to sit down with your father. Imagine your dad called you and he brought you into the house and he said, Son, daughter, I have a lot of stuff. I have acquired a lot of things and I was thinking about getting rid of them because it just doesn't, I just don't need them anymore. I don't want them. And so whatever you want that's mine, just ask me now and I'll give it to you. And I mean just kind of think for a moment. Maybe your dad doesn't have a lot of stuff, maybe he has a lot of stuff. But if you were going to sit there and think, what would be some of the things that I might ask for? What would it be that I would, you know, if he sat me down and he said, look, you can have anything I own, I'm trying to just get rid of it, what would you want? Now I know back home my parents had this really nice big grand piano, like it's like all black, it's just really nice. And I mean if I could have something, you know, anything he's asking for, I was like, that sounds like a pretty cool thing to have. I mean a big grand piano, it sounds really good, it was really expensive. You know, I don't have a place to put it right now, but I would try to get it. But I mean, you know, maybe you're thinking, but you know, your dad has like a big truck. Maybe he has, you know, something really nice, some really cool thing that you grow up with. But when you start thinking of this idea, it's pretty easy, it's pretty common for you to think of the best thing. It's pretty easy to think of something big, something of high value. You know, you're thinking, wow, you got that $60,000 truck in the driveway, that looks pretty good. You know, I mean it doesn't take a lot of imagination for us to just think of, just go right to that big thing. Just go right to that big item or go to something of great value or ask for something big. I mean he's playing it out, hey, whatever you want, you know, are you thinking like, well, you got some old chips in the cupboard, you know, I was thinking maybe I could get those from you. I mean you're not really, your mind's not even anywhere near that. You're thinking of the big stuff, you're thinking of the cool things, you're thinking of the baseball signed by some baseball player, or you're thinking about some cool watch that he's, that your dad has, you're thinking of something of value. Very easy to think of that. Imagine again, you know, your parents see down before you, they're like, look, we came here, we wanted to visit you, and we want to just take you out to dinner. We want to take you out somewhere nice, just, it's on us, you just pick. You go wherever you want to go, let's go to the best place you want to go, let's go to your favorite place. And so you're kind of sitting there thinking, I mean, most of us it's pretty easy, you know, you think like, man, I'm thinking like a really nice steak house, or I'm thinking somewhere, you know, like the cheesecake factory or something. I mean nobody's just like, let's go to McDonald's, you know, I mean, let's go to Wendy's, let's just go to the taco shop down in the corner. But how come a lot of times as Christians, when we have, you know, the guy that's got all the riches, he owns everything, and he's just asking us, he's just saying, hey, whatever you want, just ask me, and you know, most of the time we just think of the small things. We just think of, you know, well, just daily bread, you know, just, you know, just like, just my clothes and just whatever. Obviously Jesus Christ instructed us to have that type of a prayer, to have that type of an attitude to be humble. But do you think God wants us to just go through life and just never ask him for anything big? Never ask him for anything, you know, really large in our lives? I mean, he likes to show himself that he's great, that he can do big things, that he can bless you with great gifts. He was talking, Jesus Christ was talking about, a parable is saying, how can you being evil know how to good give gifts, or good gifts unto your children? You know, if your son asks for an egg, are you going to give him a scorpion? And you're like, how much more does, you know, God want to bless you with good gifts? Obviously the best gift is eternal life. You know, the free gift of going, I mean, is that a small gift? Is that just a little, I mean, just eternal life? He just bought and paid for all of it. He just took all the humility and shame and, you know, he went down into hell for three days. I mean, this was a pretty big gift, right? Do you think God's just like, well, that was a big one, but now I just want to give you knickknacks? No, God wants to give you big gifts, and just as easy as it is for us in the carnal, you know, sense to just think of a big gift, I mean, if our dad was like, whatever you want, I mean, it's pretty easier to think of the big things. We should be the same way with God. We should have the same attitude of thinking, you know what, God wants to bless me with something. Why don't I just think of the biggest thing that I can think of? Why don't I ask God for something big, for something huge? We know that it happens, wow, according to your faith, right? So let's go to Hebrews chapter 11. The first point that I kind of want to lay down is the idea of what is faith? What is it to have faith? Now when you're talking about those situations, can you really ask your dad for that big, you know, truck or that big watch or that grand piano if you don't even know he owns it? I mean, if you just didn't, can you even ask for something that you didn't know existed? I mean, of course, you're only going to ask for things that you know your father has, right? How about with restaurants? I mean, are you going to pick a restaurant that you've never heard of? A restaurant that you've never visited, you don't even know anything about it? Obviously, you're going to pick somewhere that you know of, somewhere that you've heard of, something that you've seen. I mean, you can't ask for something that you haven't. The same thing is with faith, according to the Bible. You're only going to have faith in something that you've seen, something that you've heard, something, I mean, you're not going to have faith, faith is not voodoo, faith is not just some blind idea, well, you know what, we're just going to drive five miles this direction and just eat there. He's like, well, what's that? I have no idea. We're just going to drive down the road five miles and wherever we're at, we're just going to eat. I mean, that's not faith. That's just stupid. And the same thing is with the Christian life, where you say, well, where are you headed? Where do you want to be in five years? I don't know. I'm just going to go five years straight ahead and just see what happens, just see where I'm at, see what, what, what takes place. Now, why don't you have an idea? Why don't you ask for something big for God to do so you can know where you're going, so you can have something to look forward to. Look at Hebrews chapter 11 verse 1 says, now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Now we heard this verse a lot of different times. We hear people kind of talk about this verse, but what does it really mean to say that faith is the substance of things hoped for or the evidence of things not seen? I was thinking about it this way. Imagine there, you know, there's a Super Bowl coming up, I guess, in football. There's two teams. I don't really follow that much, but imagine, you know, in Vegas, they do what they do. They bet on the game, you know, they bet on which team they think will win and they give certain odds based on how people bet. So if everybody, you know, 50 people bet on one team and 50 people bet on the other, the odds are just even, right? So imagine you're standing there, and you should never game, but imagine they were going to set the odds and the odds were 100 to 1. I mean, the odds were every single person bet on this one team. Every single person said, we believe that this team is going to win. Now they do that before the game starts, obviously, otherwise, I mean, you can't make a bet on a team after the game because that would be, you know, I know who won. So they have to make a decision who they think is going to win before. They have to put their faith or they have to put their belief in somebody. Now imagine every single person and, you know, that ever bet just put it all on this one team. Now when you are standing there, imagine you are deciding who you thought was going to win the game. Well, who do you think is going to win the game? If every single person is like, well, this team is just definitely going to win, I mean, and they put their money on it. Faith is the evidence of things not seen. You can have a good idea that the one team is way better than the other. That you know, hey, these guys must be the best team. They must definitely going to have to win. Why? You can see that their faith by putting their money on this team is the evidence of the fact that they think they are going to win. So imagine someone were standing at the door and you are like, hey, you want to go to heaven or hell? You want to put all your faith on the Lord Jesus Christ? You say, look, I put all of my faith on them. I put a hundred percent of all my faith. The only reason I think I am going to heaven is because of what Jesus did. That's going to be the evidence of things not seen. They can see your faith and say, hey, that's something real. Hey, that's something that I can believe in. When nobody else is believing it. I mean, that's how these false religions, you know, they don't work. Because somebody comes up and they say, well, you know, there's only a little bit of us and we kind of go to this one church and you got to do all these works. They don't see anything. They don't see their faith. That person is not saying I put all of my faith in Joseph Smith to save me or some, you know, weird thing. The Bible makes it clear that faith, you know, can be seen by what you invest in, by what you put your trust in. Imagine I am going on a trip, you know, later tonight, okay? So imagine I told my wife, I said, hey, honey, I need you to pack my entire suitcase before I get home. And as soon as I get home, we are just going to leave, all right? And then imagine I came home and I had like bought a whole bunch of clothes and bought a suitcase and I was like, all right, let's go, I've got my suitcase and clothes. Now would you say that I believed in her to make my suitcase for me? No. I was nervous. I was like, she's not going to do it. I better go get my own suitcase and fill it with some clothes. Now imagine I come home and I don't have anything, just the clothes on my back and I'm like, let's go. I have all my faith and trust in her to do it for me, right? The same thing with the Lord Jesus Christ. There's so many analogies that you can illustrate to people to say, look, what does it mean to put all your faith in somebody? It means you're not going to go out and do it yourself. So that's why I'm not going to go out and see how many people I get saved just as well, you know, I know that I put trust in Christ to save me, but I want a lot of souls to cry, so I know I'm going to heaven. Or I know I go to church three times a week, that's how I'm going to get to heaven. Or I mean you can't have two plans, you're either trusting Christ alone to save you or you don't think that's enough, so you got to do something else. Well I'm going to make sure to get baptized. Well I'm going to make sure to read my Bible every day. That's not belief in the Lord Jesus Christ, right? I mean we try to illustrate this point with different people, but I think it's a perfect illustration to say, hey, if you ask somebody to do something for you and you don't let them do it, you didn't believe in them. If Jesus Christ said I'll save you if you put your faith in me, and you decide you still got to go, oh I still got to go to church, I still got to do this, you never believed in him. You didn't let it happen. You tried to go out and fulfill something. You tried to do something for him. So now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. So it's evident that I have trust in Jesus Christ, you know, when I testify the fact that there's nothing that's going to save me. I mean, if I come home and I don't have anything with me to take on the trip, that's evidence of the fact that I believed my wife would take care of me, right? Or I was just stupid. I mean, it's one of the two situations, right? But if she told me that, then I believed in her, right? Now imagine the second idea, okay? Imagine I'm going to go on this trip and I don't tell my wife to pack a bag for me. And then I just show up and I say, let's go, where's my bag? Now is that faith? No, because she never promised me anything. That's just stupid again. You have to have somebody tell you something or you have to have seen something to put your trust in it or to believe in it. That's not faith to just make stuff up. To just say, well, I think there's aliens out there. So I just believe that. What do you believe that? Oh, I just have faith. You don't have faith. You just made it up because you didn't hear anything. You didn't see anything. You didn't have anything to believe in. We have the Bible to believe in. How do I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? By believing what this book said. You have to have some kind of foundation to have faith. That's why an atheist has 10 times more faith than I do. I mean, but it's not faith. That's the reality. It's just making stuff up because they have nothing to believe in. They have nothing to put their foundation on. They maybe have to believe in like some textbook or some professor, but that's ultimately where their trust is. And so if you're asking them, hey, where do you get your faith from? They would have to say, well, Professor Fatbottom. You know, he told me that we all came from rocks thousands of years ago and I just believe what that guy said. Can you imagine how is that a better witness than this King James Bible that's been around for 400 years? If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater. So what is faith? Faith is believing something that you've seen or heard. You have to have a starting point. Faith isn't just making something up. So we have to make that clear distinction. And we see that when people decide to trust in something, when they decide to put their money on it or to put their soul on it or to put their vacation on it, whatever it is, that's evidence of what you believe in. That's evidence of your faith. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Okay, so let's look at verse 4. It says, by faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts. And by it he being dead yet speaketh. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death and was not found because God had translated him. For before his translation he had this testimony that he pleased God. So the Bible's saying that there's two men that had great faith. And we can understand that the reason why they were successful is they were doing what God said. That was the only way they could have faith. And we have a little bit better illustrations. Look at verse 7. Let's look at verse 7. By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness, which is by faith. So we see that Noah, he's going to build this ark and he's going to build this boat and he's going to do it by faith. Now in order to do it by faith, did he just come up with the idea ad lib? Did he just decide one day, you know, I think I should just build a boat. That just sounds like a good idea. No, God told him to build a boat. God told him, you know, to take the gopher wood and to make thee of an ark. But you know, it sounds pretty crazy. I mean, can you imagine if God told you to come down and he says, look, you and your eight family members, I need you all to build a boat. Okay. Cause there's going to be a flood and you're going to be destroyed. Now the thing I was thinking about this is we were kind of talking about faith and asking for something big. Now imagine God just came down and he told you, look, I need you to build a boat for you and your family. How big do you think you'd make it? I mean, if you're like, okay, we got to make a boat. There's eight of us. I don't know about the size of this room, but imagine 300 cubits. I mean, this is a big boat and he doesn't immediately tell him that he's going to gather all the animals. So Noah has to by faith build a big boat. He has to do something big. He has to do something huge and he doesn't really know what's going to happen. He doesn't know that he's going to have all these animals on the ark, that they're going to be on the ark for a year. I mean, he could have thought, well, let's just cram in for, you know, who knows, maybe a week. I mean, he doesn't know what's going to happen, but guess what? He just follows God's instructions perfectly. And when you think about it, he was building a huge boat. So think about some of the things that God wants us to do. They're big things. They're things that maybe you don't completely understand. I mean, how about reading this whole Bible? That's a big book. There's a lot of instructions. He told the king to read it all the days of his life. Every single day. That's a big order. I mean, that's not a small thing, but you know, we can't always comprehend if God's asking us to do something big, how much we need that, how much we need, you know, the command that he's giving us. So whether or not it's small or big in our frame of mind of what we think, we need to just do by faith what God called us to do. He said in Genesis 6, you don't have to turn there, I'll read for you. He said, Mark, make thee an ark of gopher wood, room shalt thou make in the ark and shall pitch it within and without with pitch. And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of. The length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, the breadth of it 50 cubits, and the height of it 30 cubits. So he first gives them instructions to build this just huge boat. Now what would have happened if Noah had just built like a third size of the ark? He just said, you know what, 300 cubits is really big. I mean, me and my family, we don't need that big of a boat. And so what if he had just built it a third of the size? How would the, how would the story have gone? I mean, they might not even have saved themselves. They might have all perished in the water. Or maybe we would have lost some of the animals, or maybe we would have lost some of his family, or maybe God would have used somebody else, who knows? But when God tells us to do something, no matter how big, we got to do it. Look at verse 8 in Hebrews, it says, by faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he after received for an inheritance, obeyed, and he went out, not knowing whither he went. So again we have another man. I mean Hebrews chapter 11 is just big faith after big faith after big faith. We have Abraham. He's told to go into a strange land. And the Bible says he didn't know where he was going, but he was following God's commandment. And even with Noah, Noah didn't really know what was going to happen. He didn't know that the entire earth was going to be flooded in the way that it was, and that he was going to be on this boat for over a year, and that every single person was going to die other than his family. I mean he couldn't, he couldn't necessarily know all the details of what that situation was going to happen, but he knew that he needed a boat, and he knew that he needed to be saved by this boat. And we see that Abraham, God's just like, you need to get into a different country. I will show you a different country, and he just goes. So sometimes faith doesn't always necessarily know the destination. But imagine, you know, your dad said, hey, where do you want to go to dinner? And you're kind of like, eh, I don't know, and he's like, I know a place. It's really good. Why don't you just follow me? Now you have to just trust him, you say, okay, I don't know where we're going, but I'm just going to trust him that he's going to take me to this place. Again, you have to follow the instruction that's been given. You can't just make it up as you go. If he says, hey, just follow me, and then you just start heading in the other direction, it's never going to work out. You're not going to find him. So you have to do what God's saying. So what is faith? It's when you hear something, and you believe that. Or you give some, God gives you some kind of instruction, and you do it, no matter, you know, whether you understand it all, whether you know exactly where you're going. So faith can be different in a lot of circumstances. Sometimes faith, you do know where you're going. Sometimes God will tell you exactly where you're going to go. He's going to tell you exactly what to do. Sometimes you don't know. But the core component of faith is following some type of instruction. It's following something that you've seen, something that you've heard. But unfortunately, a lot of churches today, they don't teach that, just plain truth. The fact that faith is following something that you heard. So people, they have this weird idea of what faith is, they think it's just some kind of voodoo. You just kind of make something up, and then say, oh, I have faith in the Lord. I have faith that he's going to do this. What could be something like that? It'd be like a new car. You know, you're just like, well, I just, I saw this really nice, brand new, you know, Mercedes, and I just have faith that God's going to give me that car. You're like, well, where did you see that in the Bible? Well, you know, I, I just have faith. I mean, I just, you know, I just know that that's what God wants me to drive, because I saw it. It looked so pretty, and it was so nice. I mean, I just saw this really cool boat, this, you know, speed boat, and it's so pretty, and I just, I'm just going to have faith that God's going to give me that boat if I just pray hard enough, if I just, you know, ask him. And of course, we are supposed to ask. You have not, because you ask not. But you ask, and you receive not, because you ask a misc that you may as consume it upon your lust. Right. There's so many Christians out there asking for dumb stuff. I mean, they're just asking to be rich. They're asking to be famous. They're asking for things that God's like, I don't want you to be rich. I don't want you to be famous. I don't want you to have that boat, because then your heart's going to turn away from you. And then on Sunday morning, you're going to say, well, I could go to church, but maybe I'll just go boating this, you know, really nice out. I mean, God doesn't necessarily a lot of times want us to have certain blessings in this life because it'll turn our heart away from. Imagine, you know, a father and a son. The father many times knows what's best for his children. And faith is not just making something up that you want and hoping for that. So let's look at Hebrews 10 verse 6. Let's keep here in, I'm sorry, in 11, I'm sorry, say where you are in the chapter. Look at verse 6. But without faith, it is impossible to please him, for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him. So the Bible's saying the only way to please God is by faith. So it's a core component of the fact that God wants us to follow his instructions, that's faith. But the Bible's saying without faith, you could never please him. So if you're just following his instructions, but you don't really, you know, believe in it, you don't have any faith in it, it's not pleasing unto God. And we see sometimes in the Bible, people were doing what God said, or they were following some of his commandments, but they didn't really have any faith in the Lord. They didn't really trust in him, they weren't, you know, they were just kind of going through the motions. And God wasn't blessing them. Because it's not just following commandments that God wants, no he wants your heart. No he wants you to want to do it. No he wants you to ask for something in faith. He wants you to ask for something big. He wants to bless you, but it's according to your faith. And as we were reading in Matthew chapter 9, we see all these people coming unto God, and they want to be healed. They want that healing. They want the Lord to touch them. They say, man, if I just see, touch this garment, I know I'll be healed. And as Christians, anything that we want in this life, if we just have a big enough faith, if we would just ask God for it, he'll bless us. But without faith, it's impossible to please him. Turn to Matthew chapter 13. Flip to Matthew, keep your finger there in Hebrews. In 2 Thessalonians 3 the Bible says, Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified, even as it is with you, and that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men. For all men have not faith, but the Lord is faithful, who shall establish you and keep you from evil. So in 2 Thessalonians 3, Paul is telling us that there are people in this world that have no faith. I mean, they just don't believe in anything. They're just not, all the things that they've heard and they've seen, they just kind of reject it. They have no faith in the Lord. They have no faith in this Bible. They don't believe that there's a God. They don't want to believe. They just want to reject everything, and the Bible says they're unreasonable and wicked men. It's unreasonable to not have faith in the Lord when he's done everything for you. It's unreasonable for someone to say, Hey, the free gift of salvation is by faith, and then just reject it. Because if you have no faith, then you're not even saved. You can't get saved without faith. Faith is everything. Faith is how you get saved. Faith is how you get delivered from hell. Faith is how you get the free gift of eternal life. Faith is how you get the new man. Faith is how you get everything. Faith is how you get sight. So once we do that, once we have the faith, at least the grain the size of mustard seed, and we get saved, does faith just fall off the map? Is it over? I mean, is God just like, Well, at least you got saved. Now, no, your whole life is faith. Your whole life is just following God's commandments. The first commandment was to get saved. The second commandment was to get baptized. What's the third commandment? I mean, he's saying, you know, to fulfill the first love in Revelation chapter 2. Go out and preach the gospel. I mean, there's a lot of different commandments in the Bible, but we got to do them all by faith. But there's certain men that have no faith. Look at Matthew chapter 13 verse 54. The Bible says, And when he was coming to his own country, he taught them in their synagogue, in so much that they were astonished and said, Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary, and his brethren James and Joses and Simon and Judas and his sisters? Are they not all with us? Whence then had this man all these things? And they were offended in him. But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honor, save in his own country and in his own house. And he did not many works there because of their unbelief. We see all through the gospel, all through Jesus Christ's ministry, when he would heal somebody, it was according to their faith. When he didn't do any miracle, it's because of their unbelief. When the disciples were healing people, it's because they had faith. When the disciples weren't healing people, because they had the hardness in their heart, they didn't believe. So you say, Man, I'm just not doing big things for God. It's because you don't have any faith, because you got to get more faith, because you got to put more belief in the Lord Jesus Christ and his promises and what he has for you. And there are men that have no faith. They can't do anything to please God. And even a Christian, someone who believes on the Lord Jesus Christ today and decides to forget it tomorrow or lose faith. I mean, you can't lose a salvation, but we know that that man is not pleasing God. It's impossible for him to please God. Think about everything that you do in your life. Are you doing it with faith? Are you doing it with complete trust in God? Because without it, you can't please him. He's not going to do any big things for you. You say, Oh God, I want you to heal me. Do you have any faith? Well, no, I don't really think it's going to happen. I just want to do the same. I just want to give him lip service. Oh, man, I can't get a job. I can't make ends meet. So I'll just ask God, Hey, God, can you give me a job? Well, do you really believe God can bless you with a good job? Well, I don't know. He's not going to if you don't have any faith. You say I need something from God, then get on some faith to get what his promises said. So it's the first point. Well, you got to read something or see something and believe God has a lot of promises in this book. You say, Oh, man, I want this. Well, is it biblical? There's your first step. And then if it is, why don't you get a big faith and say, you know what, I believe that I believe what God's telling me. I'm going to put all my faith in that and I'm going to ask him in faith. But without faith, it's impossible to please him. And when there's not any faith, when there's not any belief, God's not going to do a mighty work. He's just going to depart. He's just going to go on and he's going to find someone that has a big faith. He's going to find someone that has strong beliefs. Go to Acts chapter 19. So we see that it's firstly important to understand what is faith. Faith is believing something that you've seen or heard, something that God's written in his word, something that he's told you, one of his promises. And it's impossible without that faith to have to be pleasing unto God, to get anything from him. Look at Acts chapter 19 verse 13, then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took upon them to call over them, which had evil spirits. The name of the Lord Jesus saying, we adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth. And there were seven sons of one Sceva, a Jew, the chief of the priests, which did so. And the evil spirit entered and said, Jesus I know and Paul I know, but who are ye? And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them and overcame them and prevailed against them so that they fled out of the house naked and wounded. And this was known to all the Jews and Greeks also dwelling in Ephesus and fear fell on them all. And the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. So we see a group of guys, you know, if they say, hey, we can do this, but guess what? They didn't have any faith. They didn't have faith and they just go, hey, let's just cast out some demons. Guess what? The demon cast himself on them and they were wounded and naked. And that's what's going to happen. You're going to be ashamed if you try to do anything in God without faith. You say, you know what, I want to be a great evangelist, but I'm not sure it's going to work out. So you're just going to fall flat. Oh, I want to go out and start a church, but I don't have faith that God's going to carry me all the way. You're just going to fall flat and sink. What about Peter? He stepped out in the water. He's so excited. Oh, I'm going to walk with Jesus on water. Then he lost his faith. What happened? He sank. He started sinking in the water. You got to have the faith or you're not going to please him. You're not going to do anything big for God. You got to match your works with your faith. Without faith, you know, works is dead. I mean, you know, I mean they say faith without works is dead. Hey, you can't do any works without faith either. Go to Mark chapter nine, flip over to Mark chapter nine. Look at verse 23. Jesus said unto him, if thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believe it. And straightway, the father of the child cried out and said with tears, Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief. But Jesus saw that the people came running together. He rebuked the foul spirit saying unto him, thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of it and enter no more into him. And the spirit cried and ran sore and came out of it. And he was as one dead, insomuch that many said, he is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up and he arose. So we see again, a father, he's coming into the Jesus. He's asking a big thing. He said, get this demon out of my son. He says, do you believe? He's like, I believe, help mine unbelief. So this guy, we see, you know, he might not have had a big faith. He might not have had just, you know, he'd been the most confident person that's ever come to Jesus, but he decided to put all his faith on Jesus. He said, you know what? This is the, this is my one chance. And you know, a lot of people in Jesus day, they didn't get to see Jesus come through their town a bunch. He was coming the one time, the train's coming, you have your chance. Are you going to put all your faith in Jesus? Are you going to get the big miracle? Are you going to get the big thing? And sometimes in our life, you know, there's certain opportunities, there's certain circumstances that are going to come in your life and you're going to have that once in a lifetime opportunity and you have a choice. Hey, am I going to put all my trust in Jesus and do this big thing or am I just going to let it pass by? Am I just going to let it go? Or hey, I have a chance here. Jesus is saying, do you believe? He's asking him, Lord, help mine unbelief. Sometimes we might struggle with things. Sometimes it might be difficult. Sometimes we might be faced with something big and God makes it clear that all he requires of us is all of our faith in any circumstance, whether that's salvation, whether that's just some big thing across the country. Maybe you want to go on a big missions trip. Maybe you want to start a church someday. Maybe you just have some life of it. Maybe you're going to get married one day. Maybe you have a family situation. Maybe you need something from God. Whatever it is, God just wants you to put all your faith on him. Just all of it and say, Lord, help my unbelief. You know what? I put all of my trust in you. Why don't you help me with my unbelief too? Turn to Exodus chapter four, go all the way back to the end of your Bible. If we read a little bit further in Mark chapter nine, it says that when he was coming to the house, the disciples asked him privately, why could not we cast him out? And he said to them, this kind can come forth by nothing but prayer and fasting. The reason why his disciples couldn't cast out the demons is they didn't have enough faith. And if they read God's word and said, you know what? We need to get on our knees and pray. We need to do more fasting. We need to put more faith in what God said because we know we can deliver him. God would have delivered. God would have, you know, cast out the demon by the hands of the disciples, but they didn't have much faith. They just kind of walked up and were like, uh, don't come out. It didn't work out. And instead of deciding, you know what? God's promises are true. I know at the name of Jesus Christ, this demon's going to come out. So I better just get on my knees and start praying more. I better start fasting because I know that Jesus Christ is able. So why don't I just put more faith in the Bible? They were kind of like, what's going on? You know, I mean, we, we tried to cast them out in your name and didn't work out. They didn't have enough faith. The first, the first sign of trouble, they just stopped. They gave up. They didn't keep pressing forward. And sometimes in our life, maybe that big thing, you might stumble at first. You might struggle a little bit. You might have some tribulation, but faith is going to persevere. But faith is going to keep going. You say, well, you know, I don't know if I can do this big thing. I struggle with stuff. Sometimes people are going to try and destroy your faith. We kind of saw there's men that have no faith. Sometimes they like to just tear other people down. And there's been a lot of times in my life where I had somebody say something that kind of just, you know, tore me down a little bit or decided, you know, kind of hurt my feelings or hurt my faith in certain things. I remember I was playing golf in college and I was kind of struggling a little bit. I was pretty good, but I was struggling and I was kind of making the traveling team. Sometimes I wasn't. And at this particular time I played well enough to make the traveling team. So I was on the team. I was going. We were playing in this tournament. We had a new coach and we get to the course and he puts me in kind of the fifth position. So there's five guys that go. So I was in the fifth position and not a lot of pressure, but we tee off and we're walking down and he decides to come up and give me a pep talk. He's going to try and encourage me, you know. So he comes up and he says, hey, I just wanted to give you a little bit of advice before you go. You know, no one really thought that you were going to make the team this week. You know, nobody really had any confidence that you were going to be on the traveling team. So don't really worry about playing good today. It's not really a big deal. Nobody has really any confidence in you. We're not really trusting that you're going to put the big score up. So just go out there and have fun. Now, I mean, is that really the best way to instill faith into somebody? To get them real fired up and excited. I mean, what was even the point of that? I mean, it kind of hurt, I'll be honest. I was just kind of like, okay, I guess he just doesn't care about me at all or if I play. I mean, I was just like, wow, how do I play good after this? You know, there's even times where with my family, I struggled as a child to read out loud. I would stumble over my words. I would stammer. I would read things, you know, wrong. I would mispronounce words. I just couldn't read very well out loud. And I remember one time we were talking about it and I was like, you know, I think it'd be cool to be like a public speaker or be a pastor or do something like that. I think that would be really awesome. And they just all laughed at me. They just said, you could never be a pastor because you can't even speak right. You can't even read out loud. And that really, when I said, I mean, I didn't let them know, but that really hurt me. You know, and the thing is, is if I can be a good public speaker, anybody can, because I could not read well at all. It was just a common thing. I would sit there and I would study the card and I would just mess up the words every single time. And sometimes I still mess up when reading, but if you just keep persistent, God can do anything. And it's not by my power. It's not by my might. It's just by the word of God. Why does he want you to read over and over? Why does he want you to read out loud? So that you can preach well. Look at Exodus chapter four, it says in verse 10, and Moses said unto the Lord, Oh my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant. But I am slow of speech and of a slow tongue. And the Lord said unto him, who hath made man's mouth or who maketh the dumb or deaf or the seen or the blind? Have not I the Lord? Now therefore go and I will be with thy mouth and teach thee what thou shalt say. So God says, hey, why don't you go out and preach my word? Moses is like, well, I, I'm not great at speaking, I'm pretty slow of speech. I'm not eloquent. I'm not some great speaker and God's like, you know, who made man's mouth? I did. I'll teach you how to speak. I'll give you the words. You know, if God wants you to do something big for him, he's going to prepare the way. He's going to give you the giftings. He's going to give you the ability. If we do what he said, if we have faith in him, God can do something big and mighty. And in Acts chapter seven, when it talked about Moses, it said, and Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was mighty in words and in deeds. So when Moses was done, the Holy Ghost said, hey, Moses was mighty in words and deeds. So even somebody that was like, well, I don't have much confidence in myself. I'm not that great. If you put your faith and trust in the Lord, he can teach you and he not that any man teach you, but does the same anointing teach you of all things and it's truth and it's no lie. The Bible says that God will teach you the Bible, the Holy Spirit will teach you the Bible. He'll give you the speech. And even in Isaiah it says, excuse me, for with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people. Sometimes God's not even going to pick somebody mighty, he's not going to pick somebody that's great. He's just going to pick the guy that's willing, the guy that has a big faith. And even Paul, when he was writing in his letters, he was like, you know, I might be mighty in the letters, but when I'm in present, I'm weak. I mean, when you looked at Paul, it wasn't like some big burly guy coming in, just preaching. I mean, he was weak in the flesh. They didn't look at him and think there's anything special, but when he opened his mouth, it was the power of God because he was preaching what God said, because he had faith in the Lord. I mean, who had more faith than Paul? I mean, he's got to be one of the greatest guys of faith in the Bible. Turn to James chapter one and I'll read for you in Psalms, it says, I have more understanding than all my teachers for thy testimonies are thy meditation. You say, Oh, I could never be pastor Anderson. I could never be Roger Jimenez. I could never be Donnie Romero. No, you could be greater if you study his word more, if it's more your meditation, there's no limit. Why don't you think something big for your life? Why don't you think something amazing? You say, Oh man, there's this great evangelist. I can never be as good as him. No, why don't you think you could do greater works? Why don't you think you could do something bigger? God wants a man that has a big faith, that's ready to do big works, that's ready to conquer the world. He just wants somebody that gets excited, that wants to do his word, that wants to read it, that wants to preach it and God's going to get behind you and if God's for you, who can be against you? God wants somebody big, but without faith, it's impossible to please him. You say, Oh, I'm going to do this big work for God, but I'm just not sure if every, you know, I mean, he told me to read my Bible every day. I'm not sure if that's really going to help. I'm not really sure if I should preach the whole Bible because you know, so there's some really negative parts, there's some really unpopular parts. You know, I don't know if we should do soul winning like a lot, that might get people worn out. They might not want to come to the church anymore. I don't know if we should do soul winning when it's cold outside. I don't know if we should do soul winning when it's dark. I don't know if we should do this. Look, don't lean on your own understanding, just if I want to do something big for God, put more faith in his book, put more faith in what he said, put more faith in the things of God. You might not know where you're going to go. You might not know how it's going to work out, but if you put a big faith into this book, you're going to have big results. Look at James chapter one verse five. It says, if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and abraighteth not and it shall be given to him, but let him ask in faith nothing wavering for he that wavereth is like a wave with the sea driven with the wind and tossed for let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. So again, God's saying, look, I want to give you all the wisdom in this book. I want to give you all the wisdom that I can possibly give you, but how are you going to get it? By faith. Oh, I want a bunch of wisdom, God, but you know, I'm not really sure that I'm the smartest tool in the shed. I don't know if I can be, you know, be as smart as the theologian. You can be way smarter than these. The Bible says he gives wisdom under the simple. He'll make the simple wise. How? By his book. By asking him. God wants you to get on your knees and begging for wisdom. Who was the wisest man according to the Bible? Solomon. How did he get there? God came down and he said, Solomon, I want to give you whatever you want. Just ask whatever you want and I'll give you. What did he ask for? You know what? I think that God's asking that to every man. I don't think that's just Solomon. I think God today and tomorrow and every day, he's saying, what do you want? What do you want? I will give it to you. Why don't you ask him for some wisdom? Why don't you ask him for something big? God's looking for men that have faith so that he can give it unto them. You say, oh man, I want to be the wis- I want to have wisdom. I want to know where to go in this life. I want to know what to say. I want to know what to do. Have a big faith in God and he'll give it to you. He'll say, oh, I'm not the specialist guy, I'm not the greatest guy, it's not as important for me. Well, guess what? God's not going to give it to you then. Because if you're wavering, if you're not sure, look, one of the things that I ask for God every day is wisdom. Why? Because it makes it so clear. There's so many great promises in the Bible and if we put a big faith in it and say, you know what, I know I can have wisdom, not because I'm special, not because there's something great about me, not because I grew up and I was super smart or my parents were super smart, no, because God just said if I ask, he gives it liberally. He wants to just give it out. He's ready. He's got his money, his money's hot, he's ready to spend it. He wants to spend it on you. But if you have faith. So I have a few points. The last point is that if you ask for something big, God will give it to you. The first point is what is faith? Believing what he said. He's believing a promise that he gave us, something he wrote down. The second point was that without the faith, it's impossible to please him. The third point is that there's a lot of promises in the Bible that we should be asking for, that we should be seeking through faith. So the first point there I thought was just wisdom. I mean, wisdom's a great thing to ask for. It's the one thing Solomon asked for and he got everything else. He didn't ask for money. He didn't ask for riches and wealth and peace and all this stuff. God said I'll just give that to you extra because you got wisdom. And if you have wisdom, guess what, you're going to get a lot of extra stuff with it because wisdom just helps you go on the right path. It helps you acquire the right things. I was thinking of something that's faith is child raising. Now the interesting thing about child raising is it's one of the perfect illustrations of not knowing where you're going. I mean, when you're a parent, you have no idea what this little kid is going to grow up and be like. You have no idea how he's going to turn out, what he's going to do. So you have to make a decision. Am I going to decide to raise that child based on God's promises, God's word, God's instruction, or am I going to make my own instruction? Do I really believe that spanking my child often and early is going to make him a good kid or do I not? Well however much faith you have in this book is going to determine how you raise your kid. And guess what? The more you believe this book, the more success you're going to have raising your kids. You know, he that spared the rod hated the son is what the Bible says. And I believe that. It says in Proverbs 23, withhold not correction from the child, for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell. Well if I believe that, then I'm going to want to beat my kids into heaven. I don't want to deal with hell. You know, I don't want to just leave him alone to himself. A child left to himself will bring his mother shame. We don't want to just, you know, well, I know God said that, but I mean, do I really want to beat my kid? Because guess what? It's hard to discipline your kid sometimes. It's hard to want to get him, get your kid that he loves, that you cherish, that gives you that smile to just beat him with the rod sometimes. Sometimes it's easy. You know, sometimes it's like, come here, but a lot of times it's difficult to want to discipline your kids like that, but you kind of learn, hey, this is good for them. Hey, this is what they need. Hey, the Bible's true that the day is long and I'm going to put my big faith in raising my kids according to this book. I don't know how it's going to turn out. I don't know where it's going to go, but I know they're going to turn out right because the Bible says he that trained the child in the way he should go, when he is old, he will not depart from it. And I believe that a hundred percent, hundred and ten percent, if you train your child in this book, he can be righteous and you can have trust in that. You can have the promise of God, but I'm going to have a big faith in what he said. I'm not going to just decide, well, I'll just spank him every once in a while cause it sounds good. You know, it sounds like right. Sometimes when I get angry, it's easy. So I'll just do it then. Now the Bible says to do it, you know, betimes, meaning early. We should do it when every time the child needs it, not just when I feel like it. That's how I'm going to get a good child. So the first one was like wisdom, you know, I thought it was a good promise of the Bible. Child raising. That's a big one, a big one that we can put our faith in what God said. And you know, it's not me just making stuff up and deciding that that's how I raise my child. That's faith. No, my faith is if I follow what God said that I believe he's going to turn out to be a good kid. But if I don't do what he said, I can't have faith that he's going to be a good kid. I'm just going to have to, I'm just going to have to get lucky. I hope it works out. How about the third point that I had, go to Matthew six would be receiving a reward, receiving a reward. In Proverbs chapter 13 the Bible says, who so despises the word shall be destroyed, but he that feared the commandment shall be rewarded. God says, if you follow his commandments, if you do what he says, you'll have rewards. But without faith it's impossible to please him. Look at Hebrews or Matthew six one, take heed that you do not your alms before men to be seen of them. Otherwise you have no reward of your father, which is in heaven. Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward, but when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be in secret and thy father, which seeth in secret himself, shall reward thee openly. Now this to me is one that's a big, big faith marker. I mean God wants you, if you're going to give alms to somebody, to do it in complete secrecy that no man knows. So you say, well, what, how am I going to get any reward? I mean, how am I going to get somebody to come up and be like, man, you're really generous. Way to go, buddy. I mean, you're just a good guy because you gave some money to these. I mean, that's basically the only reward I can think of. These people really get it. They just kind of look at it and they're like, oh, this guy's really good because he gave, you know, a million dollars to this charity last year. I know he makes 10 billion, but you know, that million was just went a really long way. And I know he used it as a tax write off only. And I know that he doesn't care about this charity at all. And I know that, you know, he doesn't even know where the money goes. And I know that, you know, a 90% of the money just goes into one of his employees that he hired to run the charity. But he's just a good guy. I mean, he gave a million dollars to this fund, this, you know, find about cancer fund or whatever. We just, we do research. It's in this book. Why don't you research this book? But it takes a lot of faith to decide, hey, if I give secret, if I give my alms in secret, God will reward me. That's faith. That's faith when you know, hey, if I do this, God's going to reward me. But if I do it in front of men, no reward. So you have to make a decision. Am I going to trust in what God said? Am I going to trust God's promise? Am I going to trust God's word or am I going to go with my own ideas, my own imagination? I mean, because carnally, you say there is no way I'm getting any reward if nobody sees me. I mean, it's just me throwing money out of my account. It's not helping me any. It's not really doing anything for me. But we know that God will reward me openly if you have faith in him, if you have faith to give the, give the alms unto the poor. Let's finish with this last point. Let's go to Proverbs. I was thinking about when we go soul winning. Sometimes when I knock on somebody's door, they say, oh man, it's really dangerous out here. You know, I mean, do you know, do you know what kind of doors you're knocking on? Do you know what kind of people you're talking to when we were out in Minneapolis? I mean, I was talking to this girl on the street. I was giving her the gospel. She was really receptive. She got saved. And then right after she's like, where are you headed? And I was like, oh, we're just on this street kind of. And she's like, what's your direction? And I was like, we'll probably go back this way. And she's like, good. Don't go that way. And I just kind of thought to myself, I was like, maybe I should go that way. I mean, maybe there's more people that need the gospel over here. It doesn't bother me for one second when I go out soul winning. I'm not worried for my life. Look at Proverbs chapter two verse seven. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous. He is a buckler to them that walk uprightly. Look at verse 21, for the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it. Flip over to Proverbs 11, flip a couple chapters over. Proverbs 28, 18 says, whoso walketh uprightly shall be saved, but he that is perverse in his ways shall fall at once. Look at verse six and 11, the righteousness of the upright shall deliver them, but transgressors shall be taken in their own naughtiness. God has promised after promise after promise in the Bible that he's going to preserve the upright, that he's going to deliver the upright, that he's going to save the upright. If I go out and I preach the gospel, if I'm doing what God said, he's going to be a buckler. He's going to be a shield. I feel more confident, more safe out soul winning in the most dangerous neighborhood than staying home on my butt doing nothing and deciding to disregard God's commandment to go for soul winning. I'm way safer out there preaching God's word to some gangster than I am sitting at home in the comfort of my home doing nothing. Why? Because when you follow God's commandments, when you have faith in him, he'll preserve you. He'll keep you safe. But that's because you have to have a big faith. You have to decide, you know what? I'm not worried about men on this earth. I'm worried about God. I'm worried about what he thinks. I'm worried about him disciplining me. I'm worried about his wrath coming upon me. And woe is me if I preach not the gospel. Let's go to Mark 16, last place. If I want to be a pastor one day, I got to put my promises, I got to put my trust in God that he'll build the church, not in my own wisdom. In Matthew 16, Jesus said that thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I need to put trust in the fact that God will build the church, not me. Not my wisdom, not my smoothness, not how good I look, not how well I speak, no, God will build the church. If I do what he said, if I put my faith in him, Colossians 1 23 said, if you continue in the faith, ground and settle and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you have heard and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven. I have you turn to Mark 16, famous verse, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. And Paul said, look, it was preached to every creature. Why don't you get a big vision and say, you know what, I want to preach the gospel to every creature on this planet. Is that a small thing or a big thing? That's a huge thing. But if we have a big faith in God, if we just like, you know what, I don't know if I'm going to get there, I don't know if I'm going to accomplish it, but I trust that God can lead me all the way. He's not going to give me a promise like this if he doesn't want me to do it. He's not going to tell me to go out and preach the gospel to every creature if I can't. He wants me to go out and preach the gospel to every creature and that's what I'm going to do. Let's bow our heads in prayer. Thank you God for your word. Thank you God for your promises. Thank you God that you'll give us everything that we want if we'll just ask according to your promises and according to your word. I pray that we would all just get your promises and your word on our hearts so that we could know by faith that if we believe those things we can receive them. That we can receive them because you're good and you just want to bless your children. Thank you for everyone in this room. I pray that we would just have a big faith and that everyone in this room could do a big thing for God. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.