Faith is a verb. It requires doing instead of just thinking. Praying requires faith as does actively trying to live a Christlike life. Faith is hoping something is true that is unseen and the confirmation of your faith comes when you do something about it. I have found that the more you think and talk positively about something, the more likely you are to positively believe in that thing and the more negatively you speak about something the more likely you are to dislike that thing.
When I was about eleven or twelve years of age my Dad got into this motivational speaker named W. Clement Stone. He would play his tapes over and over again as we drove to church meetings or other places. And we lived a long way from the church (about 40 minutes) to my young mind. So we (my 3 brothers, sister, and I) would sit in the back seat of the car and listen to the tapes while my Dad drove. It got to the point where we memorized parts of the tape and my brother Alan could quote them verbatim. "I feel happy. I feel healthy. I feel terrific." Those were the words of W. Clement Stone. The vocabulary of PMA became part of our vocabulary. If you don't know, PMA is an acronym for Positive Mental Attitude. So we grew up knowing that having a positive mental attitude would help you become the greatest positive thinker in life. I think W. Clement Stone had a point. Faith is like that. When you are positive that your prayers will be heard you start to pray. When you speak well of the principles you are learning about you believe them more firmly. That is why faith is an action word. Your faith grows when you positively speak of the good things that God has given and act upon those things that have been commanded of God. That goes with people too. When you speak positively about your parents or other people in your family you come to love them more. Isn't love a commandment? Jesus said, "The first and great commandment is love the Lord thy God will all thy heart, mind, and might. The second is like unto it, love thy neighbor as thyself." Faith and love go hand in hand.
That comes to the point that I wanted to make. When the children of Isreal were placed in bondage by the Egyptians, they started to pray and ask for deliverance. Their faith grew that God would deliver them. Now they were an important asset to Pharoah who wanted their labor and he didn't want to let them go. However, the children of Isreal believed that God would deliver them. They were obedient to the knowledge that they had. They knew that if they prayed to their God that he would deliver them. Moses told them to simply put the blood of a lamb around the door and the plagues would pass them by. It took faith for them to do so. In that action they were delivered from the plague and their first born were saved. How simple it was for them to do such a little thing but those who did were delivered.
This happened a long time ago but still if we exercise a small amount of faith we can be delivered from the problems we face. It might not be in the way we think it will happen but nevertheless it will happen. It might be a change in the way one looks at a situation or maybe a change that was unexpected in life. There is a plan for each of us and even though there are many people on this earth, God knows every one of us by name. He knows our hearts, what we do, what we say, and how we live. He will deliver us if we are obedient, exercise faith, and ask for deliverance.
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