The Importance of Obedience

Spiritual foundation must come first

We have made it to Week 7 of some amazing spiritual truths from the Word of God that are equipping us to have victory in our finances. This will also be the final week for the Spiritual Foundation introductory posts before moving into topics more directly related to finances and wealth accumulation. I know I may sound like a broken record, but these first seven weeks have been necessary to establish the spiritual foundation on which to build the remaining knowledge, understanding, and insight we will acquire relating to wealth, income, expenses, investments, money, debt, asset protection, retirement, and all other ancillary topics relating to personal finances. The final topic we are discussing before moving forward is the importance of obedience with respect to God’s word. Obedience is a critical part of the spiritual foundation required for the full manifestation of God’s promises for wealth. Why is that? Because obedience is an integral part of faith and faith is the currency of God’s Kingdom. Faith in God cannot exist without obedience and obedience to God cannot exist without faith.

Your spiritual foundation will allow you to be able to examine all financial and wealth-related topics through a spiritual lens of truth rather than looking only through a natural lens. The natural lens is founded upon emotions, will, and reasoning, which often filter out the truth of God’s unchanging Word. As Christians, God requires us to see and understand His promises and provision through His spiritual lens in order to truly experience the full extent of His blessings and unfailing love (I Corinthians 2:9-11).

Understanding the difference between “knowledge” and “understanding”

The Bible admonishes us to get wisdom and understanding above everything else (Proverbs 4:7). While understanding and knowledge are very similar, there are some distinctions of which Christians ought to take notice. Knowledge of a subject helps you gain better understanding, but too much knowledge can lead you into a reliance on the power of your knowledge rather than God’s omniscient (i.e. all-knowing) power. This is why the Bible teaches us that knowledge “puffs up” (I Corinthians 8:1), metaphorically showing that it creates an inflated state that can easily be deflated. If not careful, knowledge along with an ungodly seeking and reliance on the same can become a form of idolatry in a person’s life. How so? One habitually puts “faith” in his or her knowledge and becomes “devoted” to the pursuit of it. He or she may even boast about the level of knowledge achieved, all the while not really reverencing God. Such regard of knowledge with a simultaneous disregard of God the Father makes knowledge an idol god in one’s life. Jeremiah 9:23-24 specifies what we should really be boasting about:

This is what the Lord says: “Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or the strong boast of their strength or the rich boast of their riches, but let the one who boasts boast about this: that they have the understanding to know me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the Lord. – Jeremiah 9:23-24 (NIV)

Don’t get me wrong—pursuit of knowledge should not be considered a negative thing at all. When one, however, exalts the pursuit of knowledge above the pursuit of God’s wisdom and understanding of His ways, it inevitably can become a bad thing—specifically for believers. God is a jealous God (Exodus 34:14). While He desires us to be knowledgeable in many things including areas of our expertise, skills, and talents, He does not desire for us to rely on such knowledge above Him.

The case stated above is the fallacy of the world. Rather than turn to God, the world relies on its own knowledge of how things should work as opposed to the supreme wisdom of God. To help prevent us from succumbing to this same fallacy, it was imperative to establish a firm spiritual foundation of God’s Kingdom and the spiritual realm before discussing any financial insights directly.

Foolishness to the world

Another reason the spiritual foundation has been emphasized so fervently is because acting on God’s Word requires faith. Faith has its basis in the spiritual realm, not the natural realm where knowledge resides. It is hard to live by faith when knowledge is your god. Knowledge is built on logic, reasoning, and scientific conclusions drawn from observations and experiments within the physical/natural world. Knowledge is based on senses. Faith is based on God’s Word. Faith allows the invisible to become visible and the unseen to become seen. This notion of faith is completely counterintuitive to the knowledge realm which is built on what you can see, feel, hear, and smell with your natural senses. This is why faith doesn’t make sense, but neither does sense make faith. Operating only in sense, logic, and reasoning is confining your experiencing of the truth of God’s Word to the natural realm (i.e. physical and soul realm). But this contradicts how He operates which is exclusively in the spiritual realm. The natural realm is secondary to the spiritual realm as discussed in Week 2. As a believer, you should live according to the spirit. Spiritual things are considered foolishness to the world (I Corinthians 2:14).

It is important that your default mode of thinking be transformed from the world’s programming to the Kingdom’s. It is not a dismissal of understanding the world, but a higher thinking as it concerns relating to natural things of the world. As a believer, you have to be faith-conscious that everything you can see, feel, touch, taste, and smell in the physical world was preceded by and came into existence because of God’s Word (John 1:1-3 & Hebrews 11:3). That means the world is subject to the Word and this higher mode of thinking which we are developing and growing in day by day. As we put the spiritual truth of God’s Word into practice, faith will begin to dictate what we have and experience.

Challenges to being obedient

We, Christians, often find it challenging to be consistently willing to do things God’s way. I am including myself in this generalization as well, so please don’t let this statement be offensive. Obedience was never intended to be easy on the front-end because it is used to validate our faith. It is easy to say you have faith, but when it comes to showing you have faith, more is required. Without the accompanying obedience to God’s instructions, (whether given generally through His Word or specifically through the Holy Spirit leading you), faith is dead. James 2:17 provides insight about obeying of instruction when it states that faith without “action” is dead (NIV) or faith without “works” is dead (KJV). Below are three reasons why obeying God’s instructions and acting according to faith may be challenging.

3 reasons why obedience is challenging

REASON 1: One reason it is challenging is because God’s way is perceived as foolish to the world, so to exhibit authentic faith, we have to be ready to face scorn and ridicule of the world. Remember the story of Jairus’ daughter in Mark Chapter 5? Jairus, a synagogue leader, came pleading to Jesus for him to heal his dying daughter. Jesus agreed, but while they all were on the way, some people from Jairus’ house met them to inform Jairus his daughter had already died. When Jesus arrived at the house, He spoke by faith saying, “…the child is not dead but asleep” (Mark 5:39-40). The people stopped crying and wailing in mourning to literally laugh at Him. Talk about ridicule! Jesus saying the girl was asleep seemed foolish to everyone standing around because it was so contrary to what they were observing physically. If you continue to read to the end of the story, you see that Jesus’ words manifested and the girl got up and began walking around. This is the power of faith though—to supersede the natural and bring into fruition things hoped for and things not seen (or contrary to what is seen). Accepting the challenge to live by faith can mean accepting the possibility of being ridiculed by the world, but by faith, you will have the last laugh.

REASON 2: A second reason we find it challenging to be obedient and act according to faith is because doing things God’s way, which is centered on faith, is so counterintuitive to the way our natural minds think. It goes against the normal logic and understanding we have been taught to use since birth. God’s ways are so different from our own. In His omniscience, omnipotence, and greatness, He is able to accomplish things in ways beyond our comprehension; therefore, His thinking is on a much more advanced plane than our natural minds can fathom. But to grow us in obedience, He challenges the thoughts and reasoning of our natural minds by often instructing us to do something that is counterintuitive from a natural perspective.

Imagine what Abraham must have been thinking when God instructed him to sacrifice his son Isaac in Genesis 22:1-2:

“You mean you want me sacrifice the one son I still have with me as hard as it was to conceive him in the first place? And you’re saying you’re going to make my descendants as numerous as the stars? That doesn’t make sense, God!”

Now, the Bible does not actually provide a narrative of what Abraham was thinking when he received the instruction. It just says he got up the next morning to carry them out. But we know from a natural perspective this would have been an extremely difficult task for Abraham because it was his own son whom he loved. Nevertheless, Abraham overcame the challenge to be obedient to God’s instruction which authenticated his faith. Look at how his obedience led to his natural descendants ultimately becoming the great nation of Israel. Furthermore, as the father of faith, look at the innumerable descendants adopted into the blessing of Abraham through Christ.

If Abraham had solely followed the programming and rationale of his natural mind, he may have refused to carry out God’s instruction and the promise may have never come into fruition—at least not through him. It is difficult to undo the world’s programming without being willing to follow God’s unconventional ways. Now, I am not saying God is going to instruct you to sacrifice your child. He will, however, give instructions that are relevant to today and also relevant to where you are in your faith walk. If you are not trained to operate in the spiritual realm, faith is a less attractive and less preferred alternative because it involves approaches with which we are unfamiliar.

(A personal story related to “REASON 2”)

After graduating with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering, I worked for a start-up company for close to two years selling medical equipment supplies not doing engineering work. After all the time, energy, and effort to attain the EE degree, I was working a “non-engineering” job. This happened to be around 2005 to 2006 at a time when the economy was not doing well because of the subprime mortgage crisis (which was yet another consequence of the world’s flawed system, but another topic for another day).

I was thankful to be working any job providing income rather than no job at all since I was out on my own and away from home. About 18 months into the job, however, the Holy Spirit led me to completely resign and start looking for a job in engineering. This was a challenging instruction to obey because it would mean foregoing my main source of income for an indefinite amount of time with no guarantee that it would be replaced any time soon. My parents were not close by nor in a great position to help me financially if this did not go well, so there was no safety net. I had to completely trust God if I was going to obey these instructions. Well, I did and within about an 8-week period, I had three job offers and was able to accept my first engineering position. A year later after working in that position, I had another offer from the company where I am currently employed that allowed me to move back closer to my family and work a job I enjoy showing up to everyday. When God gives you instruction and you make the choice to trust Him and obey, there is a manifestation of His promise and provision waiting to be revealed on the other side of that decision.

REASON 3: The world’s system has many people programmed to select alternatives that will yield the fastest results, appeasing our subconscious desire for instant gratification—like buying that new Apple Watch on credit for example, instead of saving to pay cash for it (side note: that was just an example—I am not opposed to Apple watches nor credit cards).

While God is building up our faith, however, He may allow us to go through situations that test our patience and our willingness to wait on Him. In our faith walk, we will inevitably be faced with a choice to do something our way or God’s way. Thinking solely in the natural, our way will seem quicker and more straightforward while God’s way will seem longer, less direct, and perhaps even less certain. If we follow the world’s programming, our inclination will be to choose our own way as the default preference every time. This is also satan’s preference for us. He understands that choosing God’s way is going to require, and thus strengthen, our faith. Strong faith makes us a force to be reckoned with against his worldly kingdom. God wants to train us all to select His way as our preference and grow stronger and stronger in our faith.

Overcoming challenges to grow in faith

For all of the above reasons, being obedient to God’s word as it pertains to operating by faith can feel like an uphill challenge for Christians. Yet faith is the currency needed to transact with God’s Kingdom. Faith is required in order to be able to please God (Hebrews 11:6). There is no shortcut around it—we have to grow in faith. The LORD is so gracious and faithful that He places us in circumstances that will grow our faith. He wants us to graduate to higher and higher levels of faith and obedience to His Word so that we reach a level where we can start seeing even more awesome manifestations of His glorious power. But all of this happens by faith and true faith is not authenticated without obedience.

So how do we grow in faith? By growing in obedience. God teaches us to be faithful in the small things and graduates us to the greater things by teaching us to be obedient in the small things before graduating us to greater. I heard Joyce Meyer share a story about how the Holy Spirit would always instruct her to put the shopping cart back in its designated place when she finished shopping, yet she ignored it for years. Then she realized the LORD was trying to train her to be obedient in something small before taking her to a greater assignment that would require greater obedience. Her delay in obedience regarding something that seemed insignificant and inconvenient delayed her next assignment and blessing by the time it took her to learn obedience in the small, seemingly insignificant thing.

As followers of Christ, it is expedient for us to learn to be obedient to God’s instruction. He gives instruction for us to follow all throughout the Bible. By God’s grace given through Jesus Christ, we will be able to carry it out, and when we do, we bring God’s Kingdom to earth. Even though you are saved, choosing to carry out God’s instruction His way is a choice. This is how we show that Jesus is truly Lord of our lives. Jesus said Himself, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?” (Luke 6:46).

Instructions may come from the Bible as you read and study His Word, it may come from a preacher, teacher, or random sharer of the Word as you come across various Biblically-based insights (like this blog, for example), or it may come from the Holy Spirit giving you specific, individual instruction. In either of the aforementioned cases, your obedience to God’s instructions is a choice—a choice that authenticates your faith. The choice to obey some of the more advanced instructions often come with the challenges as just outlined, but when you spiritually believe, these challenges shrink to nothing. We already talked about Abraham’s challenging choice to be obedient regarding Isaac, but below are some other examples from the Bible where there was a choice to trust and obey God or not. Read through each story at your convenience. You will see where obedience to the LORD’s instructions had challenges for one reason or another, but eventually the choice to obey authenticated faith that produced a powerful manifestation of God’s provision or promise in a miraculous way.

1) WIDOW AT ZAREPHATH (I Kings 17:7-16)

Why the instructions were a challenge: Elijah came to the widow in the middle of a drought-induced famine and requested that she bring him some water and bread first before making bread for her and her son. She barely had enough flour and oil for her and her son, so in the natural, making bread for Elijah first would mean even less for her own household.

Manifestation of God’s power, provision, or promise: Notwithstanding the challenging circumstances, the widow obeyed the instructions of the man of God, Elijah. As a result, her jar of flour and jug of oil lasted throughout the entire period of drought and she was able to feed her household everyday and Elijah too.

2) TEN LEPERS (Luke 17:11-19)

Why the instructions were a challenge: The lepers faced an interesting dilemma. The Levitical law required that they remain outside the camp until their leprosy was healed as they were considered ‘unclean’ (Leviticus 13:46). Jesus instructed them to go show themselves to the priest before the healing of their leprosy had actually manifested (i.e. became outwardly apparent). Going before the priests with leprosy in direct violation of the law could mean punishment.

Manifestation of God’s power, provision, or promise: The lepers obeyed Jesus’ instruction and started heading to show themselves to the priest. The Bible says “as they went, they were cleansed.” The miraculous healing occurred when they showed authentic faith and obeyed what Jesus had told them to do, in spite of the possible consequences of their actions.

3) BLIND MAN AT POOL OF SILOAM (John 9:1-11)

Why the instructions were a challenge: The man in this story had been blind since birth. For his healing, Jesus placed mud on the man’s eyes and then gave him a specific location to go wash it off. Now, the story does not say, but I can imagine there were more convenient, quicker places to go wash the mud away other than the Pool of Siloam. Furthermore, someone could have brought water to the man to wash it off with—he was already blind, right…why make it harder?

Manifestation of God’s power, provision, or promise: Despite the inconvenience or the challenge to navigate to this location as a blind person, the man obeyed Jesus’ instruction, and after he finished washing, he was able to see. Glory to God!

These stories are amazing examples of God’s power at work. Our natural minds will try to make us feel like they were just for that time period and God does not work miraculously like that now. Remember, God does not change: the same God who performed miracles then, will perform miracles now! The key to see such miracles is faith and the key to authentic faith is obedience.

Consequences of disobedience

Satan knows faith and obedience go hand in hand. He also knows that when our faith has matured, we release the power of heaven in the earth—this applies to all categories of our lives, not just wealth and finances. To try to mitigate the threat we pose as strong, faith-walking followers of Jesus Christ, he sets up snares to negatively influence our willingness to obey God’s instructions and the Holy Spirit’s direction. By trying to stop our obedience, he is aiming to kill our faith. The Bible says in Isaiah 1:19 that “If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land.” If we flip this statement to the inverse, we could say “If you are unwilling and disobedient, you will not eat the good things of the land…” (if you even eat at all). Whether you are thinking about this metaphorically or literally, do you see what satan aims to do to God’s people by deceiving us to not obey and exhibit faith? He wants us unable to eat. If you cannot eat, you will eventually starve. If he could have it his way, we would be starving to the point of desperation where we are forced to be slaves in his system to just to “eat”. The devil is a liar!

If he could, satan would remove the Word of God from the earth because faith, which intimidates him, comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17). As those who study God’s Word, we should immediately recognize it is impossible to completely remove the Word of God from the earth because the power of God’s word created everything in the earth (Hebrews 11:3). His next tactical option then is to stop the word from being heard, being preached, and being taught as a strategy to stop it from being believed. This is why he targets churches. Think about the numerous active shooter incidents at houses of worship in recent years, the controversies surrounding topics like same-sex marriages in churches and church leadership that divide congregations, and even some of the frivolous issues that may have plagued your own local church. All of these attacks and snares work against the preaching and teaching of the Word of God. I am not bringing these topics up to glorify satan by any means. I bring them up just so we are fully aware of his schemes and therefore he is not able to “outwit us” (II Corinthians 2:11). We cancel his attacks in the name of Jesus Christ: they shall not prosper and a standard is lifted against him (Isaiah 54:17 & Isaiah 59:19b)!

In addition to trying to stop the word from being spread, satan will also try to take any reverence for the LORD and the Word out of society. We see this with the Bible being taken out of schools and the removal of prayer at public gatherings. Even now, he may be enthralled by the fact that people are restricted from gathering in houses of worship. But recall, God can always take things satan intends for evil and use them for good. For instance, many churches have united even more during this pandemic although physically distant. People who previously could not or did not attend Bible study in person are now able to participate remotely. By watching services online, Christians across the nation are more united than ever under one faith, one LORD, and one baptism as they hear the Word of God.

The inception of this blog to share spiritual truths of God’s word related to finances also came as a result of stay-at-home restrictions predicated by the COVID-19 pandemic. I fully understand that satan does not like what we are doing with the ST4WA blog. We are coming against his kingdom with empowerment to break his systemic cycles. As a result, I do not take anything being shared here lightly. I know it is God’s true word. It has power to break cycles of wealth lack and bring deliverance from dependency on the world’s ungodly system, releasing God’s promises and provision in lives of believers willing to do things God’s way.

Fear, doubt, distraction, & guilt (snares satan uses to try to kill faith)

Fear: In the body of Christ, we often consider fear to be the antithesis of faith. I am not sure where or when it was created or by whom, but the acronym “F.E.A.R.” which stands for False Evidence Appearing Real is a clever way to define what fear is from a Christian perspective and how it affects us as believers. Fear, however, is just one of several culprits satan uses to try to keep our faith from becoming stronger and more mature. Why is fear effective? It deals with the fact that faith has two distinct but inseparable components—belief and works—and fear targets the first component.

The Bible tells us in II Timothy 1:7 that God did not give us “the spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.” Our power comes from Jesus Christ working in us through the Word. You must first believe that the Word of God is true. Belief in His word should then govern your actions and cause you to act on your belief in some way. The Bible describes this in James 2:17 where it states that faith without works is “dead.” Fear negatively impacts what you believe. Even if the evidence that your fear is based on is false, fear shakes and can even stop your belief. Once you stop believing, your willingness to act by faith goes out the window. So satan has used fear to kill your faith. Without your willingness to act, your faith is dead.

This is where the truth of God’s word stops satan in his tracks. Fear is usually based on false evidence. The truth of God’s word can dispel, disprove, and negate any false evidence satan presents to incite fear. He presents the false evidence expecting to stop our belief. Recall that faith in God’s word is the evidence of things not seen. When you accept God’s word as true above anything your natural eyes may see, you have excercised half of the definition of authentic faith—belief. The other half of authentic faith is works (i.e. action/obedience to instruction) carried out based on your belief. You have to be willing to act on your faith. Even when we are able to talk a good faith game and recite all the catch-phrases and cliches about faith and fear, failure to act on our belief and God’s Word makes our faith unauthentic. This is why obedience is inherently tied to faith. If we hear the word of God but do not understand how to apply it or are not inspired to actuallly apply it, our faith is not truly alive. It is dead, useless, and ineffective. As believers, we must use the truth of God’s word to combat fear so satan can no longer stop our willingness to obey God’s instructions. Never forget: obedience is a choice.

Doubt: Just as seen with fear, doubt is used by satan to negatively affect our believing, which in turn can nullify our willingness to act on our belief. Doubt may piggyback on fear or vice-versa, but satan’s end goal is to try to stop us from being willing to act which in essence kills faith.

Distractions: Similarly to fear, satan will use distractions to try and accomplish the same objective—prevention or delaying of our obedience. However, where fear is aimed at our believing to prevent us from being willing to act, distractions primarily affect our actions directly. What makes distractions even more tricky is the fact that the distraction, itself, might not be bad. In other words, the thing that might be creating the distraction could be a good idea or a necessary part of God’s ordained plan, but it might not be the priority in that moment or that season. The keys to recognizing distractions are testing them against God’s Word and being keen at being led by the Spirit.

Distractions outside of God’s will are a bit easier to recognize. When you compare their outcome, effect, impact, and/or results to God’s word, it becomes clear whether it is an integral part of His will or a distraction. A simple example of this could be seen in the time you may have set aside for studying the Word. If you find yourself watching TV or checking social media during this time instead of reading the Word, you are most likely succumbing to distractions. An example pertinent to current events are the riots and looting spawning from the peaceful protests of the George Floyd murder. The peaceful protesting has a Godly purpose—bringing attention to police brutality, classism, and systemic racism embedded in society. But the violence and looting is distracting from the real issue. The frustration and anger that motivates the vandalism and looting is not born out of faith or anything good. It is born out of emotions, ungodliness, and worldly thinking. Rather than helping to uproot the root problem, it is adding to the problem.

The other side to the distraction snare that makes it tricky is when the thing that draws our attention is beneficial for God’s purpose, but it is not the top priority at that given time. I personally experience this a lot. The Spirit will always nudge you when you begin to get off focus from the priority for that moment or that season. The key is recognizing the nudge and not tuning out that still, small inner-voice that is trying to get you back focused.

Guilt: God’s word assures us that “…there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit” (Romans 8:1). This spiritual truth does not stop satan from trying to present the lie that guilt and shame of our past disqualifies us from the blessings of God. He uses this snare of guilt on the saved and unsaved. He relentlessly presents the lie that we are unworthy of anything from God. The truth of God’s word assures us, however, that whom the son has “set free is free indeed” which means free from condemnation, guilt, and punishment (John 8:36). If you are unaware of satan’s schemes and unaware of how to combat his lies with the truth of God’s Word, you will believe you are disqualified and stop living by faith. Instead of realizing you are saved by grace, you will live trying to earn salvation and God’s promises through your own righteousness which you can never do. Only Christ’s righteousness is acceptable to God and we receive that by grace through faith.

The believers’ counter-attack

This next spiritual truth is probably one of the most important things that will be said regarding the snares against our faith. If we grasp the following insight, we will realize just how powerless satan is against the truth of God’s Word which we have access to through Christ Jesus.

God is omnipresent and omniscient which means He is everywhere and He knows everything. Satan is neither omnipresent nor omniscient, so he does not have the power nor capability to actively perpetuate his lies that are so deeply embedded around us and throughout the world. This is why he creates them to be self-perpetuating by embedding them in society and in the ungodly systems of the world. So guess who he uses to perpetuate his lies? This is how they become embedded in our lives, in our minds, in our hearts, and in our spirits. Once we expose his lies, however, in our own lives and uproot them through the power of Jesus Christ and truth of God’s word, we end those lies’ ability to self-perpetuate in us. The truth of God’s Word sets us free from bondage, vicious cycles, and generational curses caused by those lies. Glory to God!

As believers, we have a mighty weapon against doubt, fear, and guilt which is the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17 & II Corinthians 10:4). We can go to II Corinthians 1:20 to be assured that the promises of God are “yes” and “Amen” which means whatever He has spoken, He is able to fulfill it. We can go to Philippians 4:19 to be assured that God will supply all of our needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. We can go to Psalm 103:3 to be assured that God forgives all of our sins and heals all our diseases. We can go to Psalm 37:25 to be assured that the righteous will never be forsaken nor their children begging for bread. These are just a few of the many scriptures that can be used to come against satan’s lies and release the power of God’s Word to work in our lives. The Bible is filled with many assuring promises such as these that will slay all doubts and fears that satan presents. Knowing how to eliminate fear, doubt, distraction, and guilt in our lives will clear the path for us to walk fully by faith.

Shifting to obedience

So we know why it can be challenging to be obedient, we know what effects disobedience has on our faith, and we know how to counter-attack satan’s tactics to deter our willingness to obey. Now we are going to discuss tools we can use to make walking in obedience (i.e. authentic faith) easier.

Insight for being obedient

First, we have to seek a revelation of God’s word pertinent to the specific area we are dealing with, whether that is in our finances, health, marriage, family, job, etc.. Once you have a revelation of the truth of God’s word, you have something specific to stand on, something to believe and therefore something to act on. You also have a specific word of truth to combat the fear and doubt satan will bring to attack your faith.

As believers, we must meditate on, know, and understand that God’s Word is true. He cannot lie (Numbers 23:19). Grounding your faith upon His word and being ready to act on it makes a lot of spiritual sense once you get revelation that His word is the most reliable thing on which there is to stand and build.

The enemy uses fear, doubt, and guilt to stop your willingness to be obedient to God’s word. But what does he use to invoke fear and doubt? Lies! He is the father of lies and there is no truth in him (John 8:44) Since the Word of God is true, it is an adequate weapon to combat and extinguish any fiery dart and lie the enemy attacks with.

Where should I start?

If you are not used to operating by faith, you may be wondering “where do I even start?” The Bible provides basic instructions that we should be living by as believers. This is a good starting point. We need to learn to be obedient in these areas as we grow in faith—things like loving our neighbors as ourselves, turning the other cheek, giving cheerfully, tithing. We do not have to wait on anything to start with these things. The more we obey them, the stronger we grow in obedience and thus faith. As we become more trained in the basics, we can begin to learn obedience in the more advanced levels.

P. S. A. by faith

Praying by faith: The Bible teaches us that effectual fervent prayer of the righteous availeth much (James 5:16b). We can learn to pray by faiththat will produce results. This involves praying the Word of God. When we pray His Word, we are making supplication based on something He has already spoken. He is going to be accountable to bringing it to past because He cannot lie. Once we grasp this, it changes how we pray, how we believe, and how we speak. The Bible also instructs us to pray without ceasing (I Thessalonians 5:17). If we learn to pray this way over all areas of our lives including finances in a perpetual fashion, our faith will grow and so will the manifestation of the results.

Speaking by faith: Proverbs 18:21 says, “The tongue has the power of life and death and those who love it will eat its fruit.” As we grow in faith, we will learn to speak by faith. Too often we speak on the side of death as it relates to the above scripture. We will say what can’t happen and what we can’t do. It is usually a by-product of fear, doubt, or guilt that induces wrong believing. The truth of God’s word, on the other hand, produces right believing. When we believe, we are able to speak according to our belief (II Corinthians 4:13).

Acting by faith: When we learn to pray by faith, and speak by faith, acting by faith comes a little bit easier (as the first two are forms of action in themselves). Knowing God’s Word is true and His promises are sure allows us to walk in a righteous boldness and confidence. The Holy Spirit may lead or give us instruction based on what we have been praying and speaking according to a seed of the Word of God in us. If that seed has produced faith and has been effectively strengthened, we are able to obey and act on our faith even when it seems irrational or counterintuitive to our natural thinking. This is the level of authentic faith that, like Peter, will allow us to “walk on water”. Moreover, we can learn from Peter to stay above water by coming against fear, distraction, and doubt presented by the “wind and the waves” with the spiritual truth of God’s word. Even if we do start to sink, Jesus is there to pull us back up. This is the level of faith we need for our nation right now as we claim victory over all the spiritual attacks that our country is facing.

Summary

As we start to grow in obedience, our faith will grow and we will see good things starting to happen in our lives. Be mindful, however, that God is always seeking to take us to higher and higher levels of faith. This is accomplished by His often leading us to do something we have never done. If obedience came automatically, none of the above info would be necessary. Unfortunately, it does not come automatically—obedience to God’s instruction is a choice. Each of us must individually choose to trust and obey God. Below are the key takeaways from this post to help us grow in obedience:

Takeaways

Faith in God cannot exist without obedience and obedience to God cannot exist without faith.
Faith is completely counterintuitive to the knowledge realm which is based on what you can see, feel, hear, and smell with your natural senses. This is why faith doesn’t make sense, but sense doesn’t make faith.
The world is subject to the Word of God. As we put the spiritual truth of God’s Word into practice, faith will begin to dictate what we have and experience.
Without the accompanying obedience to God’s word, faith is dead.
Faith can supersede the natural and bring into fruition things hoped for and things not seen (or contrary to what is seen).
God will give instructions that are relevant to today and also relevant to where you are in your faith walk.
When God gives you instruction and you make the choice to trust Him and obey, there is a manifestation of His promise and provision waiting to be revealed on the other side of that decision.
Strong faith makes us a force to be reckoned with against satan’s worldly kingdom.
You grow in faith by growing in obedience.
Your obedience to God’s instruction is a choice—a choice that authenticates your faith.
Knowing how to eliminate fear, doubt, distraction, and guilt in our lives will clear the path for us to walk fully by faith.
The following tools will make walking in obedience (i.e. authentic faith) easier: getting a revelation of God’s word specific to your situation, meditating on the fact that God’s Word is true and He cannot lie, and using the Word of God as your counter-attack against fear, doubt, and guilt.

Calls-to-action

Read the three stories of Biblical examples of obedience to instruction and resulting miracles. In each story, determine what it was that allowed the recipient(s) to overcome their challenges to be obedient to the instruction. Is this something you can use to overcome your own challenge to be obedient?
Sometimes the Holy Spirit will lead us to do something that seems small, insignificant, or inconvenient, but this is God trying to teach us obedience before taking us to another level. Can you think of something that a still, small inner-voice has been instructing you to do, but you have been tuning it out or ignoring it? What would it take for you to obey this instruction?

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