Introduction
Faith is not the product of reason.
Faith is not something you can conjure up. It is not a New Age version of mind over matter. Faith is simply believing God and taking Him at His WORD. Whatever He says He’ll do in His WORD, He will do, regardless of what it looks like, what situations may arise, or what philosophies become popular. Faith says, “God’s WORD is the only authority that matters.”
God says: “My word, which comes from my mouth, is like the rain and snow. It will not come back to me without results. It will accomplish whatever I want and achieve whatever I send it to do.” (Isaiah 55:11 GW)
Not Mental Reasoning
In Matthew 16:6 Jesus told His men to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. They could not understand what He meant, and He asked, “Why do you reason among yourselves?” Reading from the Mark’s rendition, it was more explicit:
“Jesus knew what they were saying, so he said, “… Don’t you know or understand even yet? Are your hearts too hard to take it in? ‘You have eyes—can’t you see? You have ears—can’t you hear?’ Don’t you remember anything at all? … “Don’t you understand yet?” he asked them.” (Mark 8:17-18, 21)
They missed what He was saying by trying to figure it out mentally. They were reasoning. Believers are not led by logic, or even by good sense, I have had my “sense” changed around to where it is good, but what the world calls good sense is not good at all. It is bad sense corrupted by Satan, the god of this world. If you want to find out what God thinks, take what the world thinks and reverse it. For example, the world says, “Seeing is believing.” God says, “Believing is seeing.”
Logic is the product of reasoning through what you can hear, taste, see, feel, and smell. Reasoning is based on the world’s system, something perverted by Satan. Faith is the product of God’s WORD revealed by His Spirit and is based on the success of our heavenly Father.
Unreasonable Circumstances
The ministry of Jesus was never governed by logic or reason. In Mark 5, Jairus fell at the feet of Jesus and said, “My little daughter lieth at the point of death…come and lay thy hands on her… and she shall live” (verse 23). Reason would have said, “I’m sorry. I wish there was something I could do.” Reason operates under the handicap of having no answer to critical needs or seek only natural remedies. The requests of this man were unreasonable, but Jesus answered him not a word and started toward his house.
On the way Jairus’ house, he met another unreasonable person – the little woman with the issue of blood. She had been to many physicians but continued to grow worse. The doctors had reasoned that she was sick, but their logic had no cure to stop the flow of blood. (Understand that I am not criticising doctors. Doctors are fighting the same destroyer we are. They are operating in the realm of the physical; we are operating in the realm of the spirit. They treat disease; we go to the root of the problem and deal with the enemy who causes disease.)
This little woman said, “If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole” (verse 28). There is no logic in that, is there? It just does not make good sense. Reason would have answered, “Hey lady, what is the matter with you? There is a little girl dying down here. I have to go see her. Let go of My clothes.”
If Jesus had ruled by common sense, as most of the Church has been in the past, He would have said, “Folks, let’s back off here a minute. We haven’t had the morning devotion. We haven’t sung hymn number 246 or 391. Nobody has taken up the offering yet. Turn loose of My clothes, lady, for goodness’ sake! We can’t fool with you now. After all, you have already been to the doctor, and he said there was no hope. What can I do for you? Go on.” Common sense will keep you bound when it is time to act on God’s WORD!
Look at Jesus. He was not led by logic. He was not led by the mind. He stopped and asked, “Who touched me?” (verse 31). Power had gone out of Him to heal and dry up the issue of blood – not reasoning power, but spiritual power. He said “Daughter, your faith has made you whole.” Her faith caused the power of God to flow into her body and make her whole. That healing was not the product of reason but the product of faith. Common sense religion will tell you not to get your hopes up. “God heals some people, but it might not be His will to heal you.” That sounds reasonable, but it never gets results. You will always be the one whom it is not His will to heal. This approach to healing will not work because it is contrary to what the WORD of God says.
We are talking about being led by the Spirit, not by the common-sense world, not by the logical world. The Holy Spirit will turn you in the opposite direction from the way the world is going but thank God, He will lead you in the direction God is going. All you a have to do is be like old Jairus. He didn’t care what anyone thought. In fact, a man came and told him, “Your little daughter is dead” (verse 35), he didn’t say a word. He had already said what he had to say: “Lay your hands on my daughter and she will live” (verse 23). Jesus turned and said to him, “Just believe.” Jairus refused to be moved by what he heard – his sense of hearing. There was someone giving him the news that his daughter was dead, but in his heart, there was a presence of a power stronger than the bad report. Something in his heart was saying, I don’t care what they say. This is so. I know it is so. I just know what I know! I refuse to give up. That something in his heart was faith.
The Force of Faith
What was controlling the ministry of Jesus? The force of faith. And it was not entirely the force of His own faith. His own faith responded to the faith of the people. (It still does.)
In Nazareth He could do no mighty works because of unbelief (Mark 10). The people refused to believe. But on the other hand, the little woman’s faith stopped Him in His tracks. Jairus’ faith moved Him, and Jesus used faith to raise Jairus’ little girl. What was the result of Jarius’ faith? He received his daughter back again from the dead. Unreasonable! Illogical! But that is victory of the highest order.
When you need more than just common-sense results, faith is the only way you will get them.
The Bible does not say, “Come, let us reason together, men.” It does say, “Come and let us reason together, saith the LORD” (Isaiah 1:18). Reasoning with God is different than reasoning with men. God says, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5). When men reason together, it is based on fear. Reasoning outside the WORD is always based on fear. Reasoning from men’s minds, men’s emotions and men’s feelings is determined by fear because the world we live in is operating on the force of fear. The LORD spoke to me once and said, the definition of reasoning outside The WORD is “worry.” When you begin to reason outside God’s WORD, you automatically begin to worry.
“What if that happens?” “What if this happens?” “What if it does not go well?” “What if I am just wasting my time waiting”? “What am I going to do?” The big I. That is selfishness. The root of selfishness is fear, not faith. As we begin this journey into faith, settle it in your heart that faith is not the product of reason but of the reborn human spirit. It’s not the product of the mind but of the heart. Faith is a power force. It is tangible, conductive force. It will move things. Faith will change things. Faith will change the human body. It will change the human mind and heart. faith will change your circumstances.
Questions:
How does God’s faith differ from the world’s “faith”?
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Have you underdeveloped your faith because of reason or common-sense? How?
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What can you learn from Jairus’ example? Is this different from the way you have related to The LORD in the past? How?
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What other lessons have you taken from this study?
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