Faith is a substance.  Faith is a communicable dis-ease with the status quo.  Faith makes a way where there seems to be no way, and calls those things that are not as though they are.  Faith looks beyond the facts, and sees God’s Truth, what He has said.  Faith hopes beyond all hope, and is righteousness to God.

When one hears a Word of the Kingdom and doesn’t understand it, the evil one comes and snatches it away.  This is the word of the Kingdom.  This is the Word of Faith, which we speak.

1 Corinthians 13:13 says that these three remain:  faith, hope, and love.  Hope is what we wait with expectancy to happen.  Faith is the substance of that, now.  We might hope for a piece of bread to eat, but Faith is to have the substance of that, despite my natural hand still being empty.

Faith for deliverance is the same.  Hope is to believe that some day, I will be set free.  Faith is to know that the word of God says, “He bore my shame”, and to have the substance of it, its proof.  It is as good as evidence in a court case.  To have the faith is to have the real thing, whether or not the natural manifestation of the object delays or not.  Faith is never wrong, for to have the substance of it is to have it.

Faith is the connection to the Kingdom, and the apprehending of the promise.  You cannot please God without faith, and you cannot consistently walk in the Kingdom without it.  The children of Israel perished, not mixing their promises with Faith.  The man walking in Faith in the Kingdom is most happy, because he knows that God on his side.

Faith raised Jairus’ daughter and Lazarus from the dead.  Faith withered the fig tree from the root immediately.  Faith saw the joy set before, and endured the cross, despising the shame.  Faith crossed over, mixed with the promise, and became the world.

Faith crossed the Red Sea, and it continues to today.

If I have the faith of a mustard seed, and do not doubt in my heart, I can say unto anything, even a mountain, to be plucked up, and cast into the sea, and it will be done for me.  This is the word of Jesus.  You either accept Him as the truth, you you call Him a liar and false prophet .  Or will you, like seed on rocky ground, back off when the going gets tough???  Let God be true, and every man a liar.

Faith sees with the eyes of the heart.  Faith sees and hears in the Spirit, and ascertains what belongs to God.  Faith requires us to rely upon that which we cannot grasp with our natural eyes or mind, and yet is as substantive as the thing we seek.

The true test of faith is whether it happens.  Faith is beyond a mental assurance, beyond simply hope, but is the possession of the underlying reality of the thing hoped for.  It is that absolute knowing, no matter how small, that makes the difference.

The plight of carnal man is this:  By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” (Genesis 3:19).  But in the New Covenant, we are told “[T]hat no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is evident: for, The just shall live by faith.” (Galatians 3:11).  Where natural, fallen man had to live by the sweat of his brow, the JUST live by Faith.

Jesus said, Seek first the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, and [your natural needs] will be given to you (Matthew 6:33).  He said the Kingdom was worth losing all for (Matthew 13:44).  Faith, true faith, can see that which is losing one’s life for, for it can see with the eyes set on Eternity, into the realm of the Beyond, and into the abode of God (1 Corinthians 2:10)–every deep thing.  Why settle for a lesser thing?  Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated!  This world has nothing for you.  There is no fellowship between the Spirit of Christ and the spirit of Belial.  Set your minds on things above, not on Earthly things.  Don’t use Spiritual principles to obtain earthly goods, that is perverse!  They will come, but where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.  He who loves the world and its things does not have His love.  It is the spirit of unbelief to settle for believing for the Earth, when Heaven is available, and it makes you unfruitful, UNprepared for every good work.

Faith is that which sees and apprehends the invisible, intangible, yet very real, and agrees with it greater than that which the eye of dust can see.  In the Holy Spirit, one Word of the Kingdom is worth more than any other, for it was but the spoken word of God that caused the entirety of the universe to spring forth into being.  “Light Be!”, and there was light.  And God saw the light, that it was good.  And God divided the light from the darkness.  And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night.  And there was evening and morning, the first day. (Genesis 1:3-5).

When Elisha needed water in the desert to water an army, God provided a way by digging ditches.  When Moses needed water to feed a people, he hit a rock.  When Namaan the Syrian needed cleansing, God provided a muddy Jordan.  Just when there seems to be no hope, God told Moses to lift up His staff, and the Red Sea split.  God is there, and He works on behalf of His servants.  The word finds good soil, and sprouts down deep, unhindered by the movements of this world.

Faith is not “risk”, when studied out, although it may feel that way to the mind of flesh.  Faith is definite, assured, and certain in Heaven, even if every walk of faith you ever take is different.  Faith is the very present, albeit invisible, reality of a thing, because it really is here, in the Spirit.

The angel Gabriel told Mary, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35).  And, “[N]othing is impossible with God.”  Better to have been translated, “No freshly spoken word from God is without the self-inherent power to fulfill itself.”  Faith connects you to that power.  It sprouts upward, and grows, spreading leaves, until the full head of grain.

Mary denotes herself here with this admonition in Luke 1:45:

Most happy is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!

It produces a yield of fruit, maybe thirty, maybe forty, maybe sixty, maybe even a hundred fold times as much as itself.

He who has ears, let him hear.”

Matthew 13:9