And this is the way to have eternal life—to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth. John 17:3

 

What is faith? Many people talk about faith as believing with all your heart, but it’s more than that.

 

The Bible describes faith as believing in the greatness and goodness of God, despite threats, circumstances, and hardships. There’s an entire chapter of the Bible, Hebrews 11, that contains a “Faithful Peoples Hall of Fame.” There you’ll find imperfect people including warriors, judges, kings, mothers, and a woman with a past. When trouble came, like infertility, attack, torture, flood, a death decree, all kept on believing God to be trustworthy to do what He promised. Though they couldn’t see, they believed God because they knew God and knew His loving nature.

 

When our personal worlds are torn apart, we too, can have this bedrock type of faith because we can know God and His love ourselves. “And this is the way to eternal life,” Scripture says, “to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth” (John 17:3). Knowing God is more than knowing about Him—it’s an experience of the heart. A pastor from the 19th century described that while he was talking with God in prayer, “Almost every week, and sometimes every day, a pressure of His great love comes down upon my heart with the light of his radiance presence. The inner spot of my heart has been touched and its flintiness have been melted in the presence of love divine.”[1]

 

Feeling uncertain, fearful and faithless today? Remember that God, the lover of your soul has said, “For the mountains may move and the hills disappear, but even then my faithful love for you will remain” (Isaiah 54:10).

 

[1] Steele, Daniel. “Five Years with the Indwelling Christ.” Craigadams.com, https://www.craigladams.com/Steele/page80/page106/.