What is Faith?

For many people in the world, faith often means a factual belief in the existence of something. I think this is on the right track, but the thought still remains incomplete.

In movies, stories, and religion, faith is often presented as something for which there could be no possible proof or otherwise it wouldn't be considered faith. This implies that faith has nothing to do with reality. I don't understand this view. If something is true, there must be some real evidence of it.

Some see faith as the opposite of reason or intelligence, suggesting that intelligent people cannot have the ability to believe, making faith something of a privilege for those with less intelligence or vivid imaginations.
People who accept this definition, particularly those who favor an atheist worldview, may even take pride in it. They do not believe ( hmm... ) that anyone who accepts the truth of an invisible reality can think intelligently.

Although a vivid imagination can serve as a helpful factor in faith, it is still not faith itself. Imagination is a feature of the soul, and emphasizing it does not equate to growing faith. It would mainly make us more soulful. I view imagination as a factory that produces material—ideas—that faith can utilize.

In this writing, I will set aside natural faith, which every person in the world has. This includes having faith in things like expecting the sun to rise the next day or assuming a chair designed for sitting will most likely support the person who sits on it.
I will focus on the faith that comes from God, which I describe in its simplest form as follows:

Faith is a supernatural attribute from God
that enables a person to break through their natural senses
(sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste) and operate outside of them.

The Bible expresses this concept as follows:

“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”
Hebrews. 11:1 (NIV)

When reading the Bible, pay attention to how often the concept of “certainty” is mentioned. You will notice that the Bible speaks of faith as something that is characterized by certainty about something, rather than uncertainty about something.

The origin of Faith

The source of faith literally comes from Jesus:

“…let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.”
Hebrews. 12:1-2 (NIV)

As we spend time in God’s presence through proper means—reading the Bible, praying, and praising—faith begins to grow in us on its own, without us trying to produce it ourselves. It is simply a product of time spent with God, where the unlikely or impossible begins to feel natural or attainable.

I would like to clarify that I see saving faith and practical faith as two distinct things. I call saving faith the gift of belief in the Gospel, in Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord, and in His completed work on the cross. After that, I see practical faith as a separate process with stages—birth, growth, and maturity—that involves God’s special promises and the ability to operate within His reality.

If we mix these two forms of faith together, we may fall into treating faith and salvation as accomplishments. We would define our salvation based on how well we perform in our everyday lives and spiritual lives.
I have seen some people experience faith crises, wondering if they are still saved unless they speak in tongues, witness healing miracles, or achieve certain things. To avoid these crises, comforting explanations have been created, claiming that God supposedly doesn't have a sincere desire to heal or help all people, and supposedly only a few are meant to speak in tongues.
However, these explanations diminish God's image in people's eyes as a loving Father. They also sustain the idea that salvation depends on one's success or circumstances, rather than on Jesus’ work on the cross. Lastly, they rob people of God’s promises that are revealed through spiritual growth.

What is Faith made of?

The Bible describes faith as consisting of three parts: understanding (revelation), love, and action.

“By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible..”
Hebrews. 11:3 (NIV)

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.”
Galatians. 5:6 (NIV)

“In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”
James 2:17 (NIV)

Leaving out one of these parts changes our faith into something entirely different.

Without understanding, our faith becomes make believe. It becomes behavior where we are not aware of what we are doing or how things even work, yet we still try to appear as if we understand. Faith involves understanding. It just doesn’t follow the world’s or the majority's way of understanding things but follows God's way of thinking and making conclusions.

Without love, it becomes religion. That is, form without substance or power. Encountering God by becoming loved by Him will naturally grow our faith. So our faith should also be characterized by love, grace, and empathy.

Without even trying to put faith in action, makes it more of self-deception. Any person who is 100% correct about any topic but never applies that knowledge to practical action in any way is no different from someone who doesn’t know anything about that same topic. Even if our faith is in its infancy and not yet visible, we should still nourish it by practicing taking practical steps.

Where is Faith placed?

According to the biblical view of human being, a person consists of body, soul, and spirit.

The natural senses I mentioned earlier—sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste—are entirely characteristics of the body.

Attributes like reason, emotions, will, and imagination belong to the soul.

For me, faith is entirely in its own category. Faith resides in our spirit.

Since the soul's attributes, like expressing emotions and reasoning with speech, are carried out through the body, faith can also express itself through the soul’s attributes.
However, soul attributes are not yet faith in themselves. What I mean is that the more I manage to grow, for example, my emotions or intelligence, it wouldn't be the same as growing my faith.

In all its simplicity, faith is a spiritual quality that can be placed or directed towards something. I describe it as:

Faith is agreeing or been in agreement with someone/something.

By cooperating with God through His words or His current actions, this attribute we call “faith” will be at its purest.

When we are in agreement with the natural reality, our faith turns into unbelief. Unbelief is not really a lack of faith but rather a strong belief in something other than what God says or does.

When we agree with the Enemy, our faith turns into fear. Fear is a strong belief in a completely wrong reality. It is believing in the reality of the Enemy and darkness, in his lies or incomplete half-truths.

Because of Jesus' work on the cross, the Enemy is powerless in the sense that he no longer has any legal authority to act. Therefore, he needs someone who would share their own authority with him. To succeed in this, the Enemy always tries to find the person with the most authority to convince them to believe in his purposes.
The Enemy never gets permission from God to carry out his will in our lives, so he seeks permission from the next person in line, who is responsible for our lives: us. The Enemy did this with Adam in the Garden of Eden and continues to do so today. It is the Enemy's only way of operating.
I don’t believe anyone in their right soul and mind would ever give the Enemy permission over their lives, and the Enemy knows he wouldn't succeed at this. That's why he doesn't come and directly ask for permission but instead seeks to deceive us with all kinds of lies and manipulation attempts to get us to surrender authority to him without realizing it.

Faith acts as a bridge to bring something from any reality to our natural world—earth. We release and bring forth the reality of the world in which we have placed our faith. This is why Jesus instructed us to always cooperate with the Father God:

“This, then, is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
Matthew. 6:9-10 (NIV)

Throughout our spiritual life and growth, we practice breaking free from the limitations imposed by natural reality and renouncing any authority we unknowingly have given to the Enemy over our lives so that we learn to cooperate more and more with Father God. This is how Jesus' instruction “On earth as it is in heaven” is fulfilled.

Freedom follows!!