I am calling this website “Learning to Live by Faith” because that is what God is teaching me daily how to do. In this world, we are supposed to “walk by faith, not by sight.” (2 Cor. 5:7) But what is faith?

There are a lot of definitions of faith and a lot of things to think about. So I’m going to be writing about faith over time in separate posts. One really good resource for learning about faith is Charles Spurgeon’s sermon “Faith: What is it? How can it be Obtained?” Here is a link to the full sermon: The Spurgeon Library | Faith: What is it? How Can It Be Obtained?. If you have a chance to listen to it, it is very helpful. I will try to summarize the main points of the first part of the sermon in this post.

Spurgeon explains that faith is made up of 3 things – knowledge, belief, and trust.

Knowledge

Knowledge comes first. People cannot believe what they do not know. They must hear about it and obtain some knowledge of it first. Romans 10:14 says, “And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard?” People must first hear, in order that they may know what is to be believed.  They must be informed of a fact before they can possibly believe it.  “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” (Rom. 10:17)

So then, faith begins with knowledge of the truths of God revealed in the Bible.  Then the mind goes on to believe that these things are true.

Belief

Spurgeon says that, “Faith is believing that Christ is what He is said to be, and that He will do what He has promised to do, and then to expect this of Him.”

What you believe determines how you answer the questions: What is the meaning of life? Why are we here? What is this world? How did it get here?

As Christians, we have faith in what God says in the Bible. We believe it to be true. That is what Spurgeon was talking about. We believe that God is what He is said to be in the Bible. We believe He is the God of the universe and that He created the world and sustains it by His power. We believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that He died on the cross to save us from our sins. And if we believe in Him, we have eternal life.

When we look around at the earth, we believe that God lovingly created it as a habitation for man. When we look up to the skies, we believe that God is on His throne in the heavenly realms and that because we are saved by grace, we will get to go live in heaven with Him forever at the end of this earthly life.

So, faith begins with knowledge. Then the mind goes on to believe that this knowledge is true. And the last ingredient is trust.

Trust

Trust is the life-blood of faith: there is no saving faith without it.

Faith ventures its all upon the truth of God.

Once you believe in Jesus, you must commit yourself to Him. You must place your trust in Him as your Savior. In the sermon, Spurgeon explains that, “Jesus is what he is said to be, Jesus will do what he says he will do; therefore we must each one trust him, saying, ‘He will be to me what he says he is, and he will do to me what he has promised to do; I leave myself in the hands of him who is appointed to save, that he may save me. I rest upon his promise that he will do even as he has said.’ This is a saving faith, and he that hath it hath everlasting life.”

So, faith begins with knowledge. Then the mind goes on to believe that this knowledge is true. Then we place our trust in Jesus as our Savior.