Walk By Faith

6/21/2010 - The Faith walk

“We live by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7 NIV


Why is it so scary to walk by faith? And I mean truly walk by faith. Walking down a path where you have never been and don’t know what lies ahead. That is scary. At least it is to me. In most things on life, we take journeys that at least have some familiarity to them. We can use our past experiences to base our decisions in the new experience. We have probably all experienced this when we shift from one job to the next. We can use our experiences to build on top of one another. We can confidently rest in the fact that although this is a new situation, we have had previous situations that have given us the experience to handle this new one. And so we do and we win. Yet the faith walk is not based on what we have done but what God has done.

It is our past experience in God that has to be the confidence builder in our lives. A faith walk means that regardless of what we have experienced in the past or what our accomplishments have meant, our trust is in God, not ourselves. It doesn’t matter what we have done, all that matters is what God has done and is able to do. When you find yourself in a place you have never been because God has lead you there, you have to trust in who He says He is and what He has done to get you through it.

This is why the faith walk is so scary. It is totally out of control. I don’t know too many of us who like to be out of control without choosing to be. Sure we ride roller-coasters and can become carried away by music or caught up in the rapture of love. Yet in a way, these are things that we have chosen to be out of control in and feel like we have the power to get in and out of it when we want.

But when we deal with people and addictions, these are people who are out of control and don’t like it. Something else has power over them and they are drawn to it and hate it at the same time. They don’t like feeling like that forever. You feel powerless. You feel hopeless. Something else is governing your life and you just want that power back. We don’t like not being in control.

When I walk by faith, I am choosing to blind myself to what I see in order to see what I don’t see. When I walk by faith I am giving up control and trusting in the one to who I have given control. When I walk by faith I don’t know exactly what is ahead of me, but I know that I am being guided by the good shepherd who has nothing but my best interest at heart. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” I will lack no good thing. I will be maneuvered around harmful obstacles. I will be given instructions for where I am to go. I become addicted to God.

I don’t have to have control of my own way if I trust the one who is guiding. When I doubt the one who guides me, I may panic in the middle of my journey and not know how to get to where I am going because I don’t know how I got where I am. Once you decide for faith, stay decisive. Don’t give up in the middle of your faith walk. You won’t know where you are or how to get where you are going in the first place. We have to learn to make one decision in life. Decide for faith. Once we do, all other decisions come from knowing the one who guides.

We all have some measure of faith. We are all guided by something in life. Something helps us make decisions. Many times it may be the faith of what we have done. It could be the faith in what we think we are going to be. It could be faith in what we have accumulated. Or you can choose to have faith in God. All other things will prove to fail you. The past is a terrible guide without God to clarify that journey. The future is a terrible guide because it is not promised. Our possessions are a terrible guide because they are temporal. God is the only true guide that can be trusted. Walk by faith and not by sight.