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The Daily Word of Righteousness
Actual Salvation, #9
And the LORD said unto Joshua, Fear them not: for I have delivered them into thine hand; there shall not a man of them stand before thee. Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. (Joshua 10:8,12)
This was not an instance of man getting his desires by speaking the "word of faith" but of a servant of the Lord working with the Lord in the fulfillment of God's promises to the Israelites concerning their land of promise. It was the Lord's program, not Joshua's.
When we are walking with the Lord and performing His will there are times when we are to proceed boldly in faith. It is true also that the Lord may give us a promise of Scripture and we are to stand on it through every kind of adversity. But by no means are we to walk after the desires of our own soul and then attempt to manipulate the supernatural realm by "speaking the word of faith." To do so is to move into the camp of the False Prophet.
There are other incorrect or incomplete assumptions and approaches to fulfilling the vision of the Divine salvation. For example:
We can fulfill the promises if we try hard enough.
As we think about Noah, Abraham, Moses, we can see that they did not strive to bring into existence the Divine promises. Noah worked hard to prepare an ark but not to bring down rain. He merely obeyed God.
Abraham did attempt to help God out but the result was Ishmael. God has ignored Ishmael as far as His promises to Abraham are concerned.
Moses obeyed God but he was quite reluctant at first. The plagues, the Passover, and the exodus did not come about through the wisdom and strength of Moses and Aaron. They came from God. Moses and Aaron demonstrated their faith by being obedient to the Lord.
A study of the men and women of Hebrews, Chapter 11 does not reveal people of adventurous faith who "did big things for God," who "stepped out in faith" and then challenged God to help them fulfill their dreams. One would suppose, after being exposed to today's preaching, that this is how the heroes of faith operated. But the concept of "stepping out in faith" does not appear in the Scriptures to our knowledge, except in the instance where Satan tempted Jesus to step off the gable of the temple.
The saints of the eleventh chapter of Hebrews were ordinary, doubting people just like you and me. They primarily were involved in surviving personally as the Lord brought them through various tests and challenges to their faith.
The work of restoration was accomplished through them. The eternal testimony they bore did not proceed from their own plans and strivings. Rather their contributions flowed from them as naturally as trees bear fruit, being incidental to their day by day obedience to the Lord.
To be continued.