Christianity is a life rather than a mere profession, a life to be lived daily in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. But if it is to really yield “the peaceable fruit of righteousness,” there is a certain definite reaction of the soul which must be realized and consciously practiced. I refer to the habit of daily definite acts of faith, so necessary throughout the believer’s life.
It may be humbling to the flesh, but it is one of God’s certainties that the great wonderland of grace and of glory and of God can only be possessed by a life of faith. And a life of faith implies a series of conscious, definite, repeated daily acts of faith, by which we take God at His word, believe His promises, claim them for our own in spite of feelings or appearances, and so turn them into present blessed facts.
It has been beautifully said that every true believer walks continually through life on a pathway paved with the promises of God. And these promises are the most far-reaching and particular and comprehensive it is possible to imagine, so that wonderful possibilities are open to each of God’s pilgrims.
Now from time immemorial the foot, the human foot, has been the most ancient and significant standard of measurement. And for us wayfarers who today walk the celestial pathway, the believer’s foot may be just as definite a measure of spiritual things.
It is said of William Penn that his integrity so won the confidence of the Indians that they offered to give him all the land his foot could cover in a day. So he set off one day and walked nearly thirty miles, encircling and so gaining possession of the whole area that Philadelphia now occupies. One of the Indians shrewdly said to him: “The paleface has made a very long walk today!”
And God? Why, God has promised to each of us the very same! Shall we not take Him at His word? As to Israel, so He says to us: “Every place (and so every promise) that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you” (Josh. 1:3).
So a human foot, measuring, taking possession of God’s promises by faith, has possibilities which are quite incalculable. Yet in spite of this spiritual pathway of promises, many true believers continue to be spiritual paupers, to the scorn and derision of the world.
They pathetically remind one of the original owners of Mount Morgan, in Queensland, who toiled for years on its barren slopes, eking out a miserable living, never knowing that underfoot was one of the richest mountains of gold the world has known. Here was wealth, vast, unimagined, but unrealized, unpossessed. Yet every believer has, in the wealth of God’s promises, a spiritual Mount Morgan under his very feet, only waiting to be recognized and claimed, and so appropriated.
The heart of the matter may be best explained by the old illustration of walking on two feet. In all our spiritual progress, there are two elements in each act of faith–first asking, and then taking from God. Thus, if a child asks me for a present, and I hold out a shilling, it is no use for the child to go on asking any more. The shilling is already proffered. The child must now take in order to possess it.
Even so, many believers are good at asking, but fail to take, to appropriate. They go on praying, and praying, and praying for some blessing God is wanting to get them to receive. They are, as it were, hopping around on one foot, praying, and praying, and praying. But hopping is a laborious mode of progress, never intended by God, and so is such praying.
For, strange as it may seem, there is a time not to pray, a time when prayer can do no more. “Get thee up! Wherefore liest thou upon thy face?” was God’s command to Joshua (Josh. 7:10). What? Not pray? No, not when it is time to act.
Taking, appropriating, must be the sequel to asking, just as the left foot follows the right. So we shall learn to “walk and not faint,” and acquire the blessed habit of “obtaining promises.” Are you daily walking on two feet spiritually? Have you learned the happy art of asking and then taking the treasures God is longing to pour out? If so, then you really know how to turn His promises into present facts.
It is recorded of Hudson Taylor, that one day in deep depression, during his daily Scripture reading he came across the statement, “My cup runneth over.” “Yes, Lord, if Thou dost say so, it must be true, but yet it really is very far from running over, for there is not enough money for the missionaries.”
And he read again, “My cup runneth over.” “Yes, Lord, Thou sayest it, but there are dissensions among some of the missionaries.” But again, “My cup runneth over,” and still other very real burdens and difficulties came to mind.
“But, Lord, Thou art eternal, and Thy Word is eternally true. So, in spite of appearances, it must be true just now for me–‘my cup runneth over.’ I do now believe it and count it true, and thank Thee for it.”
So by God’s grace, that burdened, heroic missionary was enabled, in a time of great difficulty, to rest upon that gracious statement and promise of God, and to appropriate it as true for him just then. So he “obtained” (Heb. 11:33) that promise, and turned it into a present happy fact by a definite act of faith.
And the effect was very much more than the subjective effect of cheering his own heart. For God very soon showed him that it was literally true by dissolving the difficulties in His own wonderful way, so well known to us in the mission field. That, to me, is a perfect instance of turning a promise into a present fact by an act of faith, by a man who had learned to walk on both feet, by praying and believing, by asking and then taking.
And it is a habit one can most humbly and thankfully recommend after some years of experience as most practical and profitable–indeed as being often the only pathway open to the burdened believer. How very often in years past in the conflict of the mission field, spiritual defeat has only been changed into victory by a deliberate taking hold in faith, and by holding on in spite of feelings, to some promise of God till He had intervened and given deliverance.
And when a promise is so realized by an act of faith, I like to think of the joy it gives Him, and I seem to see the blessed Master turn His gracious face as of old, to ask again, “Who touched Me?” “Somebody touched Me.” And there is love, not censure in His look, love and gladness at His child’s boldness and confidence in Him. For it is just that very act, that touching in faith, that touches the Saviour’s heart as well as His garment, and opens His hand of bounty.
Oh, often put out, even tremblingly, thy hand of faith, and touch, and so take! This is the happy life of faith. May our hearts be stirred to deliberately set ourselves to turn God’s promises into present facts. Gracious Lord, increase our faith. Enlarge our expectations. Teach us to ask, and touch, and take.