I did a comprehensive study on faith several years ago.  I think I have even written a few posts on the things I learned, but I don't think I ever did one on this aspect of faith.  If I did, it was before I reached the startling conclusion that faith, far from being some sort of mystical quality that can be difficult to define, boils down to simple trust.  Trust that God knows what He is doing, no matter how it feels to me at the moment.  Trust that He has my best interests at heart in a spiritual way, even if it looks like my physical life is falling apart.  I love making discoveries when I study, and I love sharing them.  So here goes.
            I saw many occasions in the Scriptures where things like this were said:  O ye of little faith; I have not seen so great a faith; and Increase our faith.  In some way, faith can be quantified, and, more important to us I think, it can grow.  A little more searching and pondering and I came to the conclusion that some things take more faith (trust) to handle than others.  So maybe we should take note of those things so that our faith will not fail because we were unprepared.
            And as they went on their way through the cities, they delivered them the decrees to keep which had been ordained of the apostles and elders that were at Jerusalem. So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and increased in number daily (Acts 16:4-5).  When we exercise a particular muscle, that muscle will usually be sore the next day.  We can either stop exercising and see an actual decrease in strength, or we can keep exercising and grow stronger.  It seems to me that exercising our "learning muscle" can work the same way.  Sometimes learning hurts because it shows us our weaknesses, our faults, our misunderstandings of the Word.  So what will we do about it?  Keep working and studying and learning, or quit because we don't want to learn something new or what we learn—some "decrees"--may not be to our liking.  So learning new things not only requires us to trust that God knows best whether you agree with Him or not!  Only those without that kind of trust (faith) will rebel.
            We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing. Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring (2Thess 1:3-4).  Paul tells the Thessalonians that he boasts about their growing faith and love for each other.  But what is it that is making that faith grow?  Persecutions and afflictions.  I suppose this ought to be a no-brainer.  Of course it requires more faith to handle persecution and afflictions, and those very things are also making their faith and love grow. 
            Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.” The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” (Luke 17:3-5).  I have always found this passage hilarious.  Jesus says we are to forgive again and again and again, even for the same sin, and the apostles immediately cry out, "Lord, increase our faith!"  These men knew that it would take a lot more faith than they had at the moment to obey that command.  Faith to forgive?  Yes.  Remember, faith is trust, and it takes that kind of faith to rely on God to take care of the wrongs done against us.  Vengeance is mine, he says in Romans 12:19, I will repay.  Do we trust Him to handle our affairs, or do we think we need to take care of it ourselves?  If we find ourselves unable to forgive, then maybe we don't have enough faith (trust) in God to do so, no matter how much we protest otherwise.
            But you must remember, beloved, the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. They said to you, “In the last time there will be scoffers, following their own ungodly passions.” It is these who cause divisions, worldly people, devoid of the Spirit. But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life (Jude 1:17-21).  This might be the most obvious case.  We need a strong faith to handle it when people scoff at our beliefs.  How many have fallen because someone called them stupid for believing in God?  How many could not stand up to the crowd and dare to be different?  And how many times have divisions in the Lord's body caused the weak to falter and eventually leave.  "If this is the Lord's church, I don't want any part of it."  If only they had worked harder on "building up" their faith instead of allowing others to tear it down.  When you see these things happening, pray for God to "Increase our faith."  We are trusting in Him, not in fallible, flawed people, because that is what the church is made of.  If you want the perfect group of people, then you had better stay away from it yourself.
            Remember when these times come to shore up your faith.  In fact, start working on it now before the hard times come.  Lack of preparation is no excuse.  If I can find over 200 passages on faith, what it is, how to build it, when we need it most, and the wonderful things it can do for us, so can you!
 
And when they came to the crowd, a man came up to him and, kneeling before him, said, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and he suffers terribly. For often he falls into the fire, and often into the water. And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him.” And Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly. Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matt 17:14-20).
 
Dene Ward

We eat a lot of soup.  It’s cheap, filling, and healthy.  Even a 400 calorie bowlful is a good meal, and most are far less.  You won’t get tired of it because of the nearly infinite variety. 
            We have had ham and bean soup, navy bean soup, and white bean and rosemary soup.  We’ve had cream of potato soup, baked potato soup, and loaded baked potato soup.  I’ve made bouillabaisse, chicken tortilla, pasta Fagioli, and egg drop soups.  For more special occasions I have prepared shrimp bisque, French onion, and vichyssoise.  We’ve warmed our bones with gumbo, mulligatawny, and clam chowder.  I’ve made practically every vegetable soup there is including broccoli cheese soup, roasted tomato soup, and lentil soup.  And if you want just plain soup, I have even made chicken noodle.  You can have soup every week for a year and not eat the same one twice.
            Not only is it cheap to make, it’s usually cheap to buy.  Often the lowest priced item on a menu is a cup of soup.  I can remember it less than a dollar in my lifetime.  Even now it’s seldom over $3.50.  So why in the world would I ever exchange a bowl of soup for something valuable?
            By now your mind should have flashed back to Jacob and Esau.  Jacob must have been some cook.  I have seen the soup he made that day described as everything from lentils to kidney beans to meat stew.  It doesn’t really matter.  It was a simple homespun dish, not even a gourmet concoction of some kind.
            Usually people focus on Jacob, tsk-tsk-ing about his conniving and manipulation, but think about Esau today.  Yes, he was very tired and hungry after a day’s hunt.  But was he really going to starve?  I’ve had my men come in from a day of chopping wood and say, “I could eat a horse,” but not only did I not feed them one, they would not have eaten it if I had.  “I’m starving,” is seldom literal.
            The Bible makes Esau’s attitude plain.  After selling his birthright—his double inheritance—for a bowl of soup, Moses writes, Thus Esau despised his birthright, Gen 25:34.  If that inheritance had the proper meaning to him, it would have taken far more than any sort of meal to get it away from him.  As it was, that was one expensive bowl of soup!
            The Hebrew writer uses another word for Esau—profane--a profane person such as Esau, who for one mess of meat sold his own birthright, Heb 12:16.  That word means “unholy.”  It means things pertaining to fleshly existence as opposed to spiritual, things relevant to men rather than God.  It is the exact opposite of “sacred” and “sanctified.”  Jacob understood the value of the birthright, and he also understood his brother’s carnal nature.  So did God.
            What important things are we selling for a mess of pottage?  Have you sold your family for the sake of a career?  Have you sold your integrity for the sake of wealth?  Have you sold your marriage for the sake of a few “I told you so’s?”  Have you sold your place in the body of Christ for a few opinions?  Have you sold your soul for the pleasure you can have here and now?
            Examine your life today, the things you have settled for instead of working for, the things you have given up and the things you gave them up for.  Have you made some really bad deals?  Can you even recognize the true value of what you have lost?  Don’t despise the blessings God has given you.  Don’t sell your family, or your character, or your soul for a bowl of soup.
 
Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Phil 3:17-20.
 
Dene Ward

We had our first opportunity for an overnight with our grandson Silas when he was two.  It was better than a trip to Disneyworld, better than a vacation in an exotic place, better than dinner in a five star restaurant, better than just about anything you could possibly think of.  Do I sound like a doting grandmother yet?
            When he woke the next morning, he remembered that it was the two of us who put him in the crib the night before and he called out, “Granddad!  Grandma!”  And there was that smiling face and those big blue eyes under a head full of tousled blond curls. 
            My one concern that weekend was understanding what he was saying.  He has been talking since he was one, but sometimes in a language we can’t quite figure out.  It sounds for all the world like a real tongue.  It comes complete with hand motions and facial expressions and he is quite fluent in it.  Unfortunately, we aren’t.
            The last year he has gained more English and less of his personal argot.  For two years old, as he was then, he had quite a vocabulary.  We were doing shape recognition, and he pointed to one and said, “That’s an oval.”  I hadn’t quite gotten over the shock of that when he added, “And that’s a rhombus.”  I quickly flipped through my own mental file card index, trying to remember that one from high school math classes. 
            That morning after we got him out of bed, he turned to me and said, “Can I have bussenwuddy?”
            I was stumped.  Maybe I didn’t hear right, I thought.  So I asked, “Bussenwuddy?”
            His little eyes brightened and he started jumping in my lap.  “Yes, yes!  Bussenwuddy!”
            Okay, now what?  Bussenwuddy...  I flipped through those file cards in my mind once again.  What have I heard him talking about that sounds like bussenwuddy?
            Finally it came to me.  “Buzz and Woody?” 
            Another excited little bounce.  “Yes, yes!  Bussenwuddy.  Can I?”  He wanted to watch the Toy Story DVD.  I felt like a successful grandmother--I had figured out what my two year old grandchild wanted.  Do you think anyone but a grandparent would have tried so hard?
            God is trying to talk to us every day.  He has put it down in black and white.  All we have to do is pick it up and read it.  Some of us won’t even be bothered with that.  Then there are the ones that will pick it up, but then put it back down in frustration.  “I can’t understand this.”  Well, how hard are you willing to try?
            I have had women leave my classes because “They’re too much work.”  Keith has had people complain about his classes because, “They’re too deep.”  Really?  I would be embarrassed to say such a thing if I had been a Christian for two decades or more. 
            Don’t I care enough about my Father in Heaven to put a little effort into it?  It isn’t that He expects us all to be scholars, who love to put our noses in books for hours on end.  But He does expect us to care enough to spend a little time at it.  He expects us to be willing to push ourselves some. 
            No, it isn’t all as simple as, “Do this,” or “Do that.”  Sometimes He throws a bussenwuddy in there (Matt 13:10-13; 2 Pet 3:16).  But if you really care about communicating with your Father, if talking to Him really excites you, if He is the most important thing in your life, then you will exercise that file card memory of yours and flip through it occasionally, striving (a word that denotes effort, by the way) to learn what He expects of you. 
            Knowledge alone doesn’t make you a faithful child of God.  You don’t have to be a genius with a photographic memory, but you do have to love your Father enough to be willing to work at building a relationship with Him.  Pick up your Bible today, and show Him how much He means to you.
 
And he said to me, "Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with my words to them. For you are not sent to a people of foreign speech and a hard language, but to the house of Israel-- not to many peoples of foreign speech and a hard language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely, if I sent you to such, they would listen to you. But the house of Israel will not be willing to listen to you, for they are not willing to listen to me: because all the house of Israel have a hard forehead and a stubborn heart. Ezekiel 3:4-7
 
 Dene Ward