"How to Get Faith" Kathryn Kuhlman Reconsidering Hebrews 11 (healings & miracles)

And I just pray that as you sit there and listen, that somehow the real meaning of this little heart -to -heart talk will come through. I believe that there's a difference between the faith of the Old Testament under law and the faith of the New Testament under grace. I know. you will agree with me that seldom do I ever talk about faith. Probably I talk less about faith than anyone in my position that you've ever known. One would think that because we believe in healing the sick body that I would have many, many sermons and would talk much about faith. And yet... I seldom do. I want to give you the Word of God. And again, I want to make that very definite statement. There is a difference between the faith of the Old Testament under law and the faith of the New Testament under grace. Consider something. Turn, if you will, please, to Hebrews. And when I will have finished speaking today, I want you to take the time. I want you to read Hebrews for yourself. Now, the key to Paul's epistle to the Hebrews is the word better. Watch that little word better. And this is especially interesting in the light. of the faith chapter of this remarkable letter. He was trying to get them to see the truth of Christianity by contrast. Hidden away in the rich little root was the color and the fragrance and the beauty, the flower of grace that was to come later. Was not the flower better than the root? Was not the end? better than the beginning? Was not the blood of Christ better than the blood of the Lamb? Was not Jesus better than the angels who had visited their fathers from time to time? Was not the voice of God's Son better than the voice of the prophets? Over and over again, Paul uses that word better. Then this was the heartthrob of the epistle. And when it comes to the faith chapter, is there any reason for his departure from the purpose of the letter and the motive of the epistle? I think not. The theme is still better. And the purpose is to show the... beauty of the faith of Jesus in comparison to those works and the words of the patriarchs and the prophets that were counted unto them as faith. It was the faith of that day. It was the faithful that time. Remember now that Paul closes that faith chapter with the words, God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect. In other words, the acts and the testimonies of the ancients were held up like pictures in a gallery for... the Christianized Jews to behold and admire. There was a story of Abel and Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah. There was Isaac and Jacob. They were all framed in a picture of obedience to the divine word. Oh, look at the obedience on the part of each one of them. Then there came Moses and Joshua, followed by a grand parade of all the illustrious of the days of old before Jesus was born in the stable of Bethlehem. But now Jesus was born. Here we have God in the flesh. We have the very Son of the living God with us. And nowhere in that entire epistle does Paul tell them or us that our faith today should be patterned after theirs or that it should be similar in its workings, similar in its operation to the faith of their fathers. Instead, watch something. Instead, he tells us something better. Oh, that little word, better. He introduces a flower that has grown out of the root. Their faith in the old days was manifested by work and word in obedience to command. But not now. That will come. Don't you misconstrue something that I'm saying. Don't put words in my mouth. Neither put words in the mouth of God that are not there. Don't, whatever you do, misinterpret what I'm saying. That will come. Works will come. But it is only a part, and a small one at that, of what the New Testament teaches us that faith really is. Yes. It isn't works. It isn't a matter of you do something and then God will do something. Really, we've almost gotten to the place where we proposition God. That is more or less the spirit of the age today. To get something, we proposition somebody and... Many women stay awake all night figuring out how they can proposition somebody to get them to do what they want them to do. Sometimes I think that without knowing it, we are more or less trying to proposition God. You don't do it. You do not do it. Of course. Of course there will be work. There will be testimony. But that is not faith. Not New Testament faith at any rate. Now, in this connection, it is interesting to note that if you turn back to the Old Testament account of the lives of the men and women introduced in the 11th chapter of Hebrews, The word faith is never mentioned in connection with their lives at all. The word faith occurs in the Old Testament only twice. And in one of these instances, it's prophetic. And in the other, it's used in a negative way regarding the unbelief of a wicked generation. And the two passages that I referred to are in... Deuteronomy, the 32nd chapter, the 21st, and in Habakkuk, the 2nd chapter, the 4th verse. So we must come then to the unanswerable conclusion that Paul is not holding up the lives of these illustrious patriarchs as a pattern for them to follow, but rather as the Excellent beginning in God's will of something more wonderful that they were to discover in Jesus. Remember, they were living on the other side of Calvary. They were living on the other side of the cross. You and I are living in the full blaze of a risen and resurrected... Jesus. We have one position of great high priest seated upon the right hand of God the Father. Never forget that. Oh, that's so wonderful. The faith they were to possess were all their fathers had and more. The faith that we are to possess is all that the old testament saints had and more because we're living the full blaze of the cross we're living in an hour when we have a great imitator we are living in an hour when we have one at the right hand of god the father who ever liveth to make intercession for us We are living this wonderful day of Pentecost literally. And the Holy Spirit is with us and in us. And Paul was not belittling or underestimating the faith of the Old Testament. and the saints of the Old Testament, but what he was saying was, all that they had is ours and more. Seeing that they were surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, they too were to lay aside weights and sins and run with patience the new race that was set before them. They were to do what? And here is the key. They were to look to Jesus, who was the author and the finisher of their faith. If he was the author and the finisher of their faith, and the faith of Paul, then he is the author and the finisher of my faith. He is the author and the finisher of your faith. In other words, all true faith begins and ends in him. It does not say that he is the author and the finisher of his faith alone. But it states that he is the author and the finisher of my faith. He is the author and the finisher of your faith. There's nothing in front of the alpha, nothing back of the omega. He begins it, and it begins in him. He ends it, and it ends in him. When I want it, I must seek his face. I cannot get it anywhere else. but from that matchless one of whom it is said, he is the author and the finisher of faith, not of his own alone, but of yours and mine. Our contact is in him. Know that. I am not your contact. No man is your contact. No woman is your contact. He is our contact. He is the great mediator. He is the author and the finisher of your faith. The author and the finisher of my faith. And when I... I want faith, and when I need faith, I must seek his face. I cannot get it anywhere else but from that matchless one, the very Son of God. Had we made the mistake of looking at the 11th chapter of Hebrews and then seeing what they did then, begin to roll up our sleeves and start to show our faith and prove it? by what we do. Had you ever done that? If you have, then you've stood in a bewilderment of what seemed to be unanswered prayer. And you've been left frustrated, doubting your faith, wondering what you have done because your prayer was not answered. because your body was not healed. Remember that faith acts, but the act comes from the faith rather than the faith from the act. That's the reason it's so very easy to step over the borderline from the faith that God imports into the realm of presumption. Oh, it's so easy to get into that realm of presumption. Many a time. What we thought was faith was nothing more or less than presumption. Somebody is wonderfully healed by the power of God, gives his testimony, and tells how instantly he stepped from out of that wheelchair. So another person hears it and tries to do the same thing and not. And then they weep and cry. You do not pattern after another. You do not do it because another did it. The first was gloriously healed and stepped out of that wheelchair because at that moment, the one who is the author and the finisher of his faith gave that one that faith. Turn, you are trying to pattern after that one who had been healed and not because you had your face turned to Jesus Christ. You were thinking of the one who had been healed and not on the one who is the altar and finisher of our faith. I pray to make this so simple today. I've tried to make it so simple. Do you not know that no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly? If you need, take it to Jesus. Have you a problem? Lay it at the master's feet. Begin to trust him. And if you give him your confidence, if you give him your trust, it'll not be long before he will give you his faith. Why play with the teacup of our struggles and endeavors when his faith is as boundless as the ocean? And he's no respecter of persons. He loves the weakest and the simplest of all of us. We become so important in our own eyes, so proud of our spiritual accomplishments. The righteousness which so vainly flaunts itself through so many of our testimonies is the kind that is of self. Look to him and say, Dear Jesus, I am through with my struggles and I am through with trying to manufacture something that is not there. As a little child, look up and say, Thou who art the author and the finisher of my faith. Give me your face and you will see the result of that face in the healing of that body.