Today’s message: A Faith That Works!
Why am I teaching this series of messages about the power of the Faith?
1- Because Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. By hearing your faith will be challenged and you will grow in Faith, you will believe and you will be used by God to heal people and perform miracles.
2 -Because we want to be a “Living Church”, the church where miracles come “naturally” and people are drawn to Jesus and are saved and Jesus receives all Glory.
3- Because miracles can be performed by any born-again Christian. The Bible is a book full of miracles and if you don’t believe in miracles, you don’t believe in the word of God.
Since I was born again I have seen many miracles and God has used me to perform many miracles in Brazil and in many nations where I have preached the gospel. Miracles have to be something natural that happens in the life of the church.
Miracles happen when you use the faith you have! Many people have enough faith to be saved, they believe in Jesus, but they have no faith for miracles.
I want to share another miracle that happened to my mother.
My mother is a very simple woman, uneducated and almost illiterate! But she has a great faith and has received many miracles with her simple faith. Years ago she found that a lump started swelling up in her hand; it began getting pretty big and it would hurt quite a lot! She went to see a doctor and he said it was a bone abnormality and she should have surgery to saw this bone. I was at her house at the time and she asked me, Marcio can Jesus heal bones? I told her, Jesus said all things are possible for those who believe. I guess bones are included in “all things”. So I prayed for her, anointed her hand with oil, and you know what happened? Nothing happened!
But she left saying, little bone, you will be gone by the name of Jesus!
This happened on a Saturday evening; Sunday morning at 8 my mother wakes me up screaming: Marcio, my bone disappeared overnight! I was healed!
Faith is to believe in what God says and don’t give attention to what you see !
I want to start by reading Hebrews 13:8
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” Hebrews 13:8
I believe that God has never changed, the Word of God will never change and everything that is written in the Bible is still relevant for us today.
We are a church that believes in the power of the Holy Spirit, we believe in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, we believe that healing and miracles were not only a thing of Jesus and the apostles’ time but today we can experience the same miracles.
“I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father.” John 14:12
I also believe that all that Jesus has accomplished, and everything He taught and everything He did, can also be performed by you through His Name, because Jesus is not a liar, He said: I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done !
Faith works in a very simple way: you believe, you pray, and you keeping confessing even you don’t see!
Last week we learned that the righteous, (the one who is born again) must Live by faith!
According to Hebrews 11:1 Faith is the confidence of things that are not seen! We need to see beyond what our eyes see.
What you see, destroys your faith. What you see will often fight against your faith.
But the Bible is teaching us that we have to stop paying attention to the things we see and listen to what God says! For it is the word of God that will produce faith in your life. Faith comes by hearing, hearing the word of God.
God called you to be an agent of transformation, but no one is able to give what they don’t yet have! No one can be an agent of change if they are not transformed themselves.
The 12 apostles of Jesus were spectators of the power of God for 3.5 years by simply watching the life of Jesus. They saw people who were blind gaining sight, they saw dead people rise again, they saw paralytics walk, they saw storms calm down, they saw the sick being healed, they saw Jesus preach the Gospel with power. Bu they were only witnesses.
One day Jesus came to them and said:
“You are witnesses of all these things. “And now I will send the Holy Spirit, just as my Father promised. But stay here in the city until the Holy Spirit comes and fills you with power from heaven.” Luke 24:48-49
After Jesus’ death, all his disciples hid in a room with fear for their future without their master.
But once the disciples were baptised by the Holy Spirit , they were transformed.
Simon was transformed into Peter. Simon was a leader full of potential, but fearful. But he was turned into Peter, who was firm as a rock.
There are many people today who are just spectators of the power of God, but God wants to transform you from a spectator into an agent, an instrument of the power of God!
Do you believe it? Do you believe that God wants to use you?
Not all people I prayed for were healed! But I didn’t stop praying! I prayed for people who died, but I didn’t give up praying!
I have no obligation to heal people, but I have an obligation to use my faith and pray!
Will you dare to use your faith? Cast your fears away and say: I will be used by God.
You will lay your hand on people and they will be healed and be set free in Jesus’ name.
Do you believe it?
We need to have a faith that works, you have to use your faith because Jesus came to this earth, died for you and asked: Have faith in me!
He who believes in me will do the works that I have done and even greater!
“Assuredly, I say to you, among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist; but he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” Matthew 11:11-12
Jesus said that the kingdom of God is advancing because some Christians have a violent faith.
You are in a spiritual war against darkness, against Satan, and you need to have a violent faith, we need to use our faith. Jesus says that the Kingdom of Heaven is taken by force! And those who use this force will take it.
What force is it that Jesus is talking about? It’s The Power of Faith, that’s why we’re teaching about faith!
With the last message we learned that people who have this kind of faith never take no for an answer!
The Greek woman (syrophenician) received a no from Jesus. Jesus said: I came to the people of Israel, you have no right to receive a miracle. But she insisted and used her faith. Jesus praised her faith and she received her blessing, her daughter was healed.
People of faith are those who don’t give up, they impress and thrill God.
To the Greek woman Jesus said: “Woman, you have GREAT FAITH ! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.” Matthew 15:28
To a centurion Jesus said: “Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such Great Faith.” Matthew 8:10
But to his own disciples he said: “You of LITTLE FAITH , why are you so afraid?” Matthew 8:26
If Jesus looked at you today, what would He say about your faith? Great is your faith or people of little faith?
Let’s see how important it is to persevere in faith.
“Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’ “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’ ” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” Luke 18:1-8
Jesus tells a parable of a bad and evil judge. One day a widow, who represents someone feeble, goes to this judge and asks Him to judge her cause and he doesn’t listen to her. But she didn’t give up. She continues bothering the judge every day. He eventually says: I will judge her cause because she doesn’t give up.
Jesus uses this parable to teach us about faith and prayer!
If a bad judge answered the cry of a poor widow, will not God, who is your Father and Lord, answer his children who cry out to Him day and night!
Here Jesus teaches about an insistent faith! It’s not about you praying for it once, or for a week! He will hear those who cry out to Him day and night.
Jesus taught us not to take “no” for an answer!
Do you know why the church does not see miracles today? Because believers don’t pray! Do you know why they don’t pray? Because they do not believe!
It’s easier to say: God doesn’t want to give me this than to keep praying and fasting and crying out day and night!
Look at your prayer time and you will know the size of your faith!
Jesus said: If an evil judge answered the widow’s cry, how much more will your Heavenly Father!
God gave a promise to Abraham that he would have a child and he continued on believing for 25 years until he finally had his son!
“Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God,” Romans 4:18-20 NIV
He didn’t take his “dead body” into account, he didn’t pay attention to what he saw! He did not doubt and for 25 years he waited on his promise and by faith he was strengthened, giving glory to God.
God is thrilled and impressed by people of faith, people who don’t give up!
Jesus said that the Kingdom of God will be established by people who have a violent faith, who know how to fight.
Beloved, many areas of your life, your career, your family, our city are in the hands of Satan and they will only be freed by people who know how to fight, people who know how to use their faith. We need to use the authority from the Name of Jesus.
“Fight the good fight of faith.”I Timothy 6:12 NKJV
The Bible says we have to fight the good fight of faith! Faith works for those who believe and fight for the faith!
You will not have any victories without a fight. You cannot be a winner without being a fighter. There are many things that don’t happen in the lives of Christians because they don’t fight! Christians that do not use their faith!
They are believers who say: If God wills it He will give it to me! They say, I don’t deserve anything, or everything is in by the will of God.
Remember: miracles are not for those who deserve it, miracles are not for those who need it, miracle are for those who have faith and fight the battle of faith!
We need to have an active faith and not a passive faith!
I want to challenge you to believe in the impossible and in the supernatural, because our God is a God of miracles.
Not everyone that I pray for is healed, but I have seen more results day by day. Some miracles happened right after my prayer, but the majority of miracles happened many days after, or even months or years later, but I never gave up.
I only give up when God asks me to stop trying.
“You do not have because you do not ask God.” James 4:2 NIV
I will keep on growing and fighting for my faith and this is what you need to do too.
I want to challenge you to use your faith! Even if it’s small!
Battle for your faith! Believe in the supernatural! Believe in miracles! Believe in Jesus’s Words.
Even if you have failed, even if things did not work.
What is faith? Faith is an attitude, faith is a decision. Believing is a verb – a verb in every language is an action!
If you believe you make a decision!
To have faith, to believe, is not just positive thinking! If you believe you are able to rest, you are not worried, and when you believe, you praise God!
May the Lord bless you and see you next week with the third message of the series: The Power of Faith.