You Live By Faith

You Live By Faith

By Apostle Felix

17  This gospel unveils a continual revelation of God’s righteousness—a perfect righteousness given to us when we believe. And it moves us from receiving life through faith, to the power of living by faith. This is what the Scripture means when it says: “We are right with God through life-giving faith!”

Romans 1: 17

The gospel of Christ unveils your real position in God. It informs you of God’s intent and plan for your life. The gospel is the good news of God’s plan for you. This plan is not new but has been the plan God had from the beginning. And the plan is to be a Father to man.  God created man to be His family. And the family God created was meant to live by faith and not by sight. This is because, God cannot be contacted in the sensual realm, but in the spiritual realm. Faith is not necessarily positivism. Neither is it good works. Faith anchors in the finished work of Christ. Without Christ and His finished, faith is baseless.

16  we know full well that we don’t receive God’s perfect righteousness as a reward for keeping the law, but by the faith of Jesus, the Messiah! His faithfulness, not ours, has saved us, and we have received God’s perfect righteousness. Now we know that God accepts no one by the keeping of religious laws! 

Romans 2: 16

Our faith is not anchored in what we do, such as keeping the law or doing good works. Our faith is anchored in the faith of Jesus Christ. What is the faith of Jesus then? The faith of Jesus is His birth, death and resurrection. Jesus, the Word of God incarnated in the flesh, took our place of condemnation and died our death as a condemned criminal. He was a righteous man dying for the unrighteous. He became a curse and an out cast. He was humiliated before His own creation. He became sin. He did all that so that you and me can go free. Our freedom is not predicated on how good we are, but on our faith in His finished work. He was the only man who ever lived in the flesh that never sinned and never broke the law. But yet decided to die for the law breakers, such as you and me. He died so that we can be saved from eternal damnation. So, our faith rests in what Jesus did, and not in what we do. Our deeds are full of shortcomings. Will often hear people boast of been blessed as the result of their works. That’s carnality. You are not blessed because of anything good you have done. No, it’s not your giving money to a particular person or ministry that has invoked the blessing. No. Giving is as the result of the work of Christ in our lives. We are already blessed because of what Christ has done for us, and then we give to others. But someone may be asking, but what about James 2: 14 – 18, that tells us about faith without works is dead. James addressed the manifestation of faith of Jesus in our lives. When you have been saved by grace through faith, Ephesians 2: 8, then the effect of salvation will be seen through our good works. It is not the good works that qualify us to be  children of God. Is giving of God? You cannot be born of God, and remain a stingy person. What spirit are born born of? If it is the Spirit of God, then you ought to give. God, who is your Father is a giving God. Giving is a demonstration of our faith in God. Giving is a statement of faith that I have been blessed of God. faith is not feeling, or something you have to seen before you believe. Faith is believing in what Christ has already done for us. He has set us free from the curse, therefore we do not have to behave as though we are living under a curse.

13  Yet, Christ paid the full price to set us free from the curse of the law. He absorbed it completely as he became a curse in our place. For it is written: “Everyone who is hung upon a tree is doubly cursed.” 
14  Jesus, our Messiah, was cursed in our place and in so doing, dissolved the curse from our lives, so that all the blessings of Abraham can be poured out upon even non-Jewish believers. And now God gives us the promise of the wonderful Holy Spirit who lives within us when we believe in him. 

Galatians 3: 13, 14