Herbert W Armstrong

   The New Testament, uh, you continually read about faith and you continually hear about faith. Did you know, did you realize? Probably you've never checked up on it, uh, just a, uh, I happened to run into it once, just, I don't know what I was preparing a sermon on faith or whatever. I was looking at the Old Testament and the word faith is only mentioned once in the Old Testament, surprisingly enough, at least it surprised me, and that's in Deuteronomy 32:20. It's the only place in the Old Testament that I know of that the word faith is mentioned.

   And it says here in Deuteronomy 32 and verse 20. And he said, "I will hide my face from them. I will see what their end shall be," referring to Israel, "for they are a very forward generation, children in whom is no faith." Now, what a way to mention faith, the only time in the Old Testament. Children in whom there is no faith. Referring to the children of Israel in the Old Testament. And yet in Romans one, the apostle Paul tells us that just shall live by faith.

   Now we don't want God to be writing about this particular era of his church and say children in whom is no faith. We want to follow the admonition of the apostle Paul and to live by faith. In order to live by faith and in order to have faith, we need to understand faith. And so I decided that, as I mentioned, I think a couple of weeks ago, that I would give you a sermon on faith. Not that it's going to be the panacea, not that it's going to give you all of the answers on faith, but we'll help you. Help you, I hope to understand faith more.

   So I want to ask you a question, or a couple of questions here. What is faith? Just what is faith? How do you get faith? And of what value is faith?

   Let's turn to Ephesians 2nd chapter first of all to begin. On how you receive faith. It's like most everything in relationship to God. Ephesians the 2nd chapter. And the 8th verse, Ephesians 2:8. Says, "For by grace are you saved through faith." Was saved through faith. "And not that, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God." So faith is a gift that comes from God to you.

   All right, then you ask yourself the question. Well, that means that I don't have to do anything. The faith, faith comes automatically with baptism. You know, they baptize me, they lay hands on me for receiving the Holy Spirit and God all of a sudden gives me faith. Is that how you receive the gift of faith? No, that isn't how you receive the gift of faith. The gift is given to you, but there is also a building process that you have to go through in order to receive that faith. With a building process. And let's begin to talk about that for a minute.

   Romans 1 and verse 17. Romans 1 and verse 17. Romans 1:17. Since "for therein is the righteousness of God revealed." God's righteousness and how God is right, because we take the word righteousness, sometimes we deal with that word and we think it's some extra spiritual word that uh, only God understands. But righteousness merely is a, uh, has the root word that comes from the root word of right. And so God is right. So for therein is the righteousness or God is right revealed. If we find out how right God is, it's revealed from faith to faith.

   So it talks about the faith of God, the faith that God has. And then it talks about another faith. It talks about your faith. So there's two faiths involved. It ends up being God's faith in you. And your faith in God. And yet it's all a gift from God. And you know, I can get a little mind-boggling if you try to twist it around, you say, well, that sounds like double talk. How can it be a gift from God? If you build it?

   Well now let's examine it. And let's find out how it can be a gift from God when it's something that you have that you build. Alright, let's take a look at that and go through on how you build faith. And how faith is a gift from God in essence, and how it literally is a gift from God and of what value that faith is after you build it.

   So let's go through, I have about 4 or 5 different steps here on building faith. Now the first one is found in Romans the 10th chapter. How do you build the faith in yourself. Your faith in God. In other words, half of that faith to faith. Romans the 10th chapter beginning in verse 13. It is a building process. It does come from God. Romans the 10th chapter beginning in verse 13 (Romans 10:13-16).

   It says, "For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And how shall they call on him and whom they have not believed, and how should they believe in him and whom they have not heard, and how shall they hear without a preacher?" In other words, you do need ministers. You do need preachers. You need somebody to preach to you in order to gain salvation because you need to hear God's word. "And how shall we preach except they be sent as it is written, how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things."

   So ministers automatically have beautiful feet for your information. That's practical. That's scriptural. I'm not going to take off my shoes for you, but at any rate, going on in verse 16, "But they have not obeyed all obeyed the gospel, for Isaiah said, Lord, who has believed our report?" Who has believed what the minister said, who believed what Isaiah said? Well, we know in the Old Testament who believed Isaiah, because if anyone had faith. Except of course the prophets because of what it said in Deuteronomy 32:20.

   And then verse 17 (Romans 10:17), the very key scripture. And one area, an important area of building faith. "So then faith comes by hearing." You build that faith by hearing through your hearing process "and hearing by the word of God." In other words, you're coming to Sabbath services each week and listening to the ministry, listening to the sermons, listening to what is being taught is part of the building block of building faith.

   It's like it says in Hebrews 10:22-25, and it's an admonition that we need to be concerned about. Hebrews the 10th chapter, verses 22 through 25. Says "let us draw near," Hebrews 10:22. "Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of our faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering, for he is faithful that is promised. And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works."

   And then in verse 25, "Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as a manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much more as you see the day approaching." Why is it even more important? As we see the day approaching, referring to the second coming of Jesus Christ. Well it's because Jesus Christ said back in the book of Luke. He said, "When the Son of Man shall return, will he find faith on the earth?"

   The further you get away from creation and the further you get away from Jesus Christ in the time of his birth, the weaker faith has a tendency to come, become, uh, things become watered down. You know, back in the New Testament, you stop and think in the miracles that Jesus Christ performed in casting out demons and the angels and so on, and people weren't necessarily all that surprised and shocked when those events happened, were they?

   Well, now almost 2000 years later, if somebody starts casting out demons and we start having demon problems, uh, what's people's attitude about it? They don't have the same approach to it. They're not as familiar with the angelic world, with the spirit world as they were in Christ's day. Because we get farther and farther from God. And we have less and less faith in God.

   You know, they didn't have a discussion concerning atheism and agnosticism and so on in Christ's day. Evolution was not an issue in Christ's day. Pagan religions were, and that was the major issue. But it comes down to the modern day and modern man's thinking for evolution, atheism, and that sort of thing to come in because man is getting further and further from God. And there's less and less faith in God as we get further from the time of Christ and further from the time of creation.

   And so we need to regain the faith that was once delivered like Peter said. We have to recapture that faith. And God has given us a book. He's given this Bible with all the examples, with all the writing in it, and he's given us a ministry and he's given us a church to help us to recapture that faith and to help us to build the faith that's going to be absolutely necessary down toward this end time as man gets himself into the trouble that he gets himself into.

   The man gets himself into his worst dire straits when he has the least amount of faith and is further from God. And as I was saying, the generation that comes along, each generation gets further and further from God.

   As it says in I Corinthians, the 10th chapter. These things are written for our examples. This is what our faith, our faith is built upon. I Corinthians 10:11. Says "Now all these things," referring to the things in the Old Testament and what happened to the Israelites. "Now all these things happened unto them, for example, and they are written for our admonition upon the whom the ends of the world are come."

   The Israelites had no faith, period. They had no faith. All right. The things were written on what happened to them as a result of their lack of faith, as a result of what they did, the things that were written were written for our admonition. You know it's like in the sermonette that we learn lessons from the things that Ed went through. We pick up points as I listened, there were some things that I hadn't thought of in relationship to Saul, and relationship to David and so on. And we learn from those things and it builds our faith. It builds the faith that we need to have and the trust we need in God.

   Then Hebrews the 12th chapter in the first verse. Hebrews 12:1. "So wherefore seeing we are also come about with so great a cloud of witnesses." And of course, man is the one that divided the chapters, and the apostle Paul had just gone through an entire chapter talking about the people of the Old Testament, the people of faith such as Moses and so on, who did have faith. Now you realize that Deuteronomy 32 was referring to the Israelites and not to the prophets.

   But at any rate, we have this cloud of witnesses. It says, "Let us lay aside every weight and sin which does easily beset us and let us run with patience the race that is set before us." But we got this cloud of witnesses and God caused the Bible to be written this way so that we could build our faith, so that we can understand, so that we could learn lessons, so that we could grow in that grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ.

   And he continually uses the example of Abraham. Just continually over and over and over again, he uses the example of Abraham. In fact, in Romans the 4th chapter, he talks about Abraham, and we should be very, very familiar with the life of Abraham. You should be able to begin back there in Genesis 12th chapter, which is the beginning of the story of Abraham, and go through his life story. And you can learn a lot of lessons from uh, from the book of Genesis there in the life of Abraham and why God looked at Abraham the way he did and why Abraham was called the father of the faithful, uh, the faithful.

   Romans 4:19 referring to Abraham, it says, "Being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead when he was about 100 years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise." Do we stagger at God's promises occasionally? Well, sure we do. But we're not supposed to. Abraham didn't stagger the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God and being fully persuaded.

   We learned through the lives of these people and through what is written in this scripture, we learned to be fully persuaded. But what he had promised, he is able to perform. And of course that was imputed to Abraham for righteousness.

   So part of the building of our faith comes, brethren, from attending church services and listening to long-winded preachers. And listening to them go through laboriously examples in the Bible, week after week and month after month, and year after year to the point where we build that faith because we've got the written word of God and we try to make it alive to make it apply to you in your own personal life to help build in you a faith and a trust in God in a generation. That has very little if any trust or faith in God.

   And we strive to build that in and it comes as it says there in Romans 7 verse Romans, uh, what was that? 1 in verse 17, excuse me. No, it's Romans 10:17, but faith comes by the hearing of God's word. And so faith really does come from hearing God's word. That's part of the building block. That's part of how God builds faith in you.

   And you know I've given you sermons before on how you understand the Bible through the Holy Spirit that is in you. So God literally is giving you that faith, isn't he? He's building it in you. He gives you the understanding so that we, we as the ministers, when we stand up and give you a sermon, you understand, you understand the sermon, you understand its meaning, and you grow on the grace and the knowledge as a result of it and you build that faith in your life.

   But in essence when you really get it all boiled down, it's God building it in you, isn't it? Because he gave you the Holy Spirit, He gave you understanding. He gave the ministry the understanding. He opened up your mind to see it. And so God is really building it in you and yet you have to come to church services, you have to endure the long sermons. You have to listen. You have to think about it, you have to take it in, you have to build that faith.

   So it's a cooperative effort between you and God, and God gives you all the tools. God gives you all the tools and you go through the building process. So really it is, it's God building it in you, but you have to put forth the effort. You have to attend, you have to listen, and you have to assimilate it and put it all together and outline it and come to understand it through the help of that Holy Spirit. So it's part of the building process.

   Another part of the building process is found over in James the 2nd chapter. Another part of the building process, James the 2nd chapter. Beginning in verse 14. James 2 and verse 14. Beginning James 2:14.

   "What does it profit my brethren, though man say he has faith, and have not works, can faith save him?" In other words, I'm going to be getting too well. Uh, you mean all I have to do then is come to church, sit and endure those sermons. But put it all together and come to understand it, and I automatically have faith. Is that the only part of the building block?

   Well, no, there's another part to it. After you once come to understand God's word, as you come to see it, God has implanted it in your mind. God has given you that information and you've gotten it all sorted out, then there's another step that you have to take beyond that. And if uh, here it says, uh, a man say he has faith and have not worked, can faith save him? In other words, just all that knowledge and understanding stored up. Give you salvation. No, it obviously can't.

   "If a brother or sister be naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, depart in peace, be you warmed and filled, notwithstanding you give them not of those things which are needful to the body, what is their profit?" You know, if somebody comes to you in the church and uh, they're hungry, and in need of clothes, and you say, well, brother, I really feel for you and I'll be sure and pray about it, and you quote two or three scriptures to him and pat him on the back. And say, well, go your way, it's all taken care of now and then you and your family sit down to your steak dinner. Uh, uh, is that really helping the individual much? No, it doesn't help the individual at all.

   You know that that God provides and you quote him all the scriptures back in Psalms where David said that he hasn't seen one of the saints go begging and so on, and you encourage him and then don't do anything for him. Why does that really profit him? No, it doesn't profit him at all because the scripture does say that if you see your brother has need and you close up your bowels and compassion and your doors to him, why then you aren’t a Christian either. You're supposed to help your brother.

   And so it works, you do something, but going on, it says, "Even so, faith, if it has not worked, is dead being alone." You know, you can build this faith through knowledge and through understanding, but it can be dead faith. So you might be sitting on a whole uh, stockpile full of dead faith. What is it they, you know, you might think it's gold, it turns out to be iron pyrite or pyrite iron, whichever it is. In other words, just the color of gold, you might have a dead faith. So you need to be careful about that.

   "Even so, faith, if it has not worked, is dead being alone. Yeah, a man may say, you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith without your works and I will show you my faith by my works." In other words, you go ahead and do something, you act on the knowledge. It's not something that's just stored in your mind, it's not something that is just an intellectual, uh, experience. You actually act on your faith, you live your faith. You demonstrate your faith by what you do.

   "You believe that there is one God." And Ed referred to this in his sermon. You believe that there's one God, you know, the devil has absolute faith in God. He has absolute faith in God. He knows very well that God is God and he knows very well that God is going to do what God says he is going to do. He knows that God is the creator. He is absolutely aware of that. He has no, there's no question in his mind about that.

   Alright, you believe there's one God. Well, you do well. The demons also believe and tremble, they know there's one God and they know what's in store for them. They've been told what is in store for them and they know what's going to happen. They've got faith in God, but they aren't doing anything about it. They're going the opposite uh, uh, uh, uh, direction. They're against God, they're doing the opposite of what God wants. But they know God and they know there's one God and they have faith in God, they know he's going to accomplish what he says he's going to accomplish. And they know how they know how it affects them.

   And so it's just an interesting point, you know, about faith in God. It has to be an active faith. It has to be a working faith. You have to be a doing individual. "But will you know, vain man, that faith without works is dead? Was not was not Abraham our father justified by works?" He had faith in God and he stepped out and did what God told him to do "when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar."

   You know, you look back and you say, well then Abraham was a perfect man. He never did anything wrong. No, Abraham was not a perfect man. Abraham lied on occasion. Abraham. Wasn't his wife? That she was his sister when the truth was, she was his wife and his half-sister. And he did it in order to try to save his own skin, of course, the king found out about it, and then he had lied in the same, the same way on the other occasions.

   Now, I don't know if somebody come along and looked at my wife and she is a pretty thing and wanted to, wanted to date her and wanted to marry her, and they come around to me and I, I think I'd say, well, now wait a minute, she's my wife. You can't have her. She's mine. Abraham didn't see fit to do that. Of course, his life was at stake as far as he was concerned. I don't want to criticize him too much. But I guess my life wouldn't be at stake, but you know, I think I'd tell the truth in that matter, at least at this particular juncture, I'm sure I would.

   Abraham was not a perfect human being, but he had faith in God, and we commit sins. We do things that are wrong, but I hope that we're repenting of those things and changing those things, and we're living to, to the best of our ability and serving God. Abraham was faithful to God and when he knew what was right and he knew what he had to do and what God wanted him to do, he went ahead and did it. It's the point. And he demonstrated his faith by his works.

   "And the scripture was fulfilled which says Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness, and he was called by the called the friend of God. You see then how that by works a man is justified and not by faith only." And so as it says in Romans the 2nd chapter. In the 13th verse, only the doers of God's word are justified, not the hearers only.

   And so another part of building your faith is to be a doer of God's word. In other words, when you learn something, when you're convicted of something and you come to understand it, be a doer of it. Don't be a hypocrite about it and go another way as the demons do, but be a doer of God's word. In other words, act upon the knowledge, act upon the information that you have. Be a doer of God's word.

   And as it tells you in James 1:22, beginning, "But the doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving yourself, be a doer of God's word and not hear. For if they be a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is likened to a man beholding his natural face, his natural face in a glass, for he beholds himself and goes his way and straightway forgets what manner of man he was. But whoso looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues therein, he being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deeds."

   So in order to build faith. You don't only be a hearer of the word and a learner of the word, but you also become a doer of the word and you have to have both of those in order to build faith.

   Alright we’ve come along then. And we run into life. We run into problems in life, and those things happen to all of us. And we run into occasions in our lives where we've been a hearer and we've learned what God's word is and we've been a doer to the best of our ability insofar as God is concerned. And then there's the odd occasion that comes up where the faith that we have built through being a hearer and through being a doer just doesn't quite stretch. In other words, we don't have quite enough faith to face the circumstances.

   And so the question then comes up, well, how? How do I increase my, [Tape Skips] there's nothing new under the sun as Solomon said. The disciples ran into this particular circumstance. Where their faith didn't quite make it. Well, they didn't have enough faith. To stretch over what they needed in being a hearer and being a doer of God's word. And they asked Jesus Christ the question. They said, well, how do we increase our faith? How do we increase our faith?

   And then Jesus Christ went into one of these parables. I would, if I were guessing about the situation, I would guess that there's some other people were around other than the disciples. And you read that parable and you would almost think that Jesus Christ ignored the question. You'd almost think he just kind of swept the question aside and went on with something else. But the truth of the matter is he didn't ignore the question. He didn't beg the issue. He went ahead and answered their question.

   And they explained to him in the beginning, uh, the thing that brought up the question, what the problem was, what their particular problem was and where they were weak in faith. And then he went ahead and answered the question. It's found back in the book of Luke, Luke the 17th chapter, and I think we can learn a lesson from it. On how to build our faith. Luke 17, beginning in verse 1. Luke 17 beginning in verse 1 (Luke 17:1).

   "Then said he unto the disciples. It is impossible, but the offenses will come, but woe to him through whom they come." He says it's impossible that there won't be some problems. It's impossible that you're not going to get offended from time to time, and there are going to be offenses that come. There are going to be difficulties, there are going to be problems come along. He says it's bound to happen.

   "It were better for him than a millstone were hanged about his neck and he cast into the sea, that he'd be offended that he should offend one of these little ones." In other words, you're going to be offending people. And he says the individual who does that sort of offense, he probably would have been better off for him that he'd never been born or that he'd had this millstone cast around his neck and then to offend one of the little ones or offend a brother in the church.

   In verse 3, he says, "Take heed to yourself. If your brother trespass against you, rebuke him. And if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespass against you 7 times in a day. 7 times in a day and 7 times in a day turn again into you saying, I repent, you shall forgive him."

   Now, in reality, if a brother, let's look at this very practically and very literally as Christ was talking to his disciples, and evidently something had come up where somebody had offended somebody among his disciples. And so Jesus Christ points out, well now look, if a brother offends you 7 times in one day. And he came back and he says, well, look, I'm sorry. And I repent of that, well then you're to forgive him 7 times in a day.

   That's hard. That is difficult. You just put yourself in the picture and have somebody literally offend you 7 times in one day. And you turn around and forgive him 7 times. Now that you might forgive him the first time with reservation. The 2nd time with more reservation, the 3rd time even worse, but at the time you got around to 7, you know very well you wouldn't be about to forgive him. There wouldn't be any forgiveness whatsoever.

   I remember one remark that was made to me. An individual had made it, had done something, he'd done something wrong. And I talked to the individual. And I told him what he needed to do. He needed to call the individual that he had transgressed against and tell him that he was sorry and he was going to change his ways, and he really repented. And he called him and he told him that. And I was talking to the other individual a few days later, he says, oh yeah, he says, I accepted his repentance, but I don't believe he meant a word of it. What do you mean accepted his repentance. He didn't accept it at all.

   But here we have a case where it happens 7 times in 1 day. And believe you, brethren, that would take faith. It really would, to forgive that brother 7 times in one day. And so the only reaction the, the apostles could have, and they, and the apostle said that "Lord, increase our faith," man, it's gonna take more faith than I've got to handle a situation like that.

   So they turned to Christ and they said, look, this is impossible. Nobody can do that. And we've got to have an awful lot of faith to believe a guy's going to repent 7 times in one day, and you don't have to admit that takes an awful lot of faith. It really does. But yet we're to have that faith and it's going to take an increase in our faith.

   Now that's just one example of a problem. We're running into other problems where we need our faith increased. I will, how do we do it? How do we increase that faith so that we're able to handle that type of circumstance or a problem that comes up?

   Well, Jesus Christ went on and said, And as I say, if you just read it over, you think he ignored the whole thing. You would think he ignored the whole thing, but he didn't ignore the question. He answered the question. [Tape Skips] Brethren, it’s how we increase our faith. And we all need our faith increased, and if you want to know how to increase your faith, here's how. Simple. Everything is simple that comes from Christ. He's a very intelligent man, but he puts it in a way that really is simple, and yet it's amazing.

   "And the Lord said, If you had faith as the grain of a mustard seed. You might say under the sycamine tree, be you plucked up by the roots, and do you planted in the sea and it should obey you." Now this makes us all feel a little small, I suppose, because, you know, you, you look at some of these, we were out, I shouldn't say we, they were out cutting down oak trees last Sunday, and they were sawing them up, you know, I couldn't help but think about the poor neighbors. You know, about 8 o'clock when those 15 or 20 saws started up, they probably thought the whole neighborhood was falling apart. And if they've been out on a drunk the night before and had a headache, oh, they could probably murder the Worldwide Church of God, but at any rate.

   You know, if you'd had the faith of a grain of mustard seed, well, you wouldn't have to have those saws, you understand. We then had had the faith of a grain of mustard seed, we wouldn't have to have those saws. We wouldn't have to wake up the whole neighborhood doing it either.

   Well, that's what Christ said here, if we had the faith of a grain of mustard seed, you know, sometimes I think about this in another place he tells him, well, you can move a mountain. I'm glad there's not that much faith around. Because there might be too many people trying to demonstrate their faith they'd be moving mountains too much and be moving too many trees and maybe there might be some trees that you didn't want moved. And so maybe it's a good thing we don't exercise our faith that way.

   What Christ was trying to demonstrate really how little faith we really do have was what he was trying to do. He was trying to get things in perspective. And pointing out to the disciples, but really, look, you can't even forgive one another. And that was a minimum that's expected of one another is to forgive your brother. Even if it's 7 times a day, and he was pointing out that really that's not a great giant. It shouldn't take a great giant amount of faith to do that is what he's pointing out.

   And you know, you stop and think about it, if your brother really does repent, it really shouldn't take a giant amount of faith to forgive him, yet it does, doesn't it? And it does demonstrate sometimes how little our faith is. And we do need to build even beyond that. There are bigger issues than offending brothers. There really are. And we need to build a faith that goes way beyond that. We need to look beyond that.

   He goes on with the story, he says, "But which of you having a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say to him by and by when he's come from the field, go and sit down to eat." And again, you have to get it into perspective. He's not talking about a hired hand here who draws a salary. He's talking about a slave. When he was talking at circumstances that were back in his day and age where they had slaves. And we might as well put it in that way.

   He said, which of you having a slave plowing or feeding cattle will say to him by and by when he's come from the field, go and sit down and eat. It was not a common practice. When the slave finished his job in the field, well then it was time for him to feed his master. His day's work was not done when he came in from the field.

   He is going on, "But will not rather say unto him, make ready wherewith I may sup and gird yourself and serve me until I have eaten and drunken and afterward you shall eat and drink." That was the common practice. The common practice of slaves' work wasn't done until, until he finished serving his master, "Do you think that that servant, because he did the things that were commanded of him," do you think that he did he thank? Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded of him? He says, I doubt it.

   In other words, the servant's job was to plow in the field and work in the field, and come in and serve his master's food. And then his day's work was done. Do you think the master then suddenly went to him every night and said, Why, what a great tremendous servant you are. You did a tremendous job today. You're the greatest servant there ever was, and my, I don't know how I ever got along without you, and so on. But he just praised him continually because he did the work in the field and because he came in and prepared his meal, which was normally what the normal routine was.

   You know, it'll be kind of like you having a hired hand and you told him to go out and oh maybe he was in the building industry and he was supposed to uh, put the roof on a building for that day and he was supposed to get a certain amount done. He went out there and he got it done. And then he knocked off for the day. You didn't fall. You don't fall over backwards, man, you. Did a great job today, you know, if he's just supposed to put on 10 squares or whatever he's supposed to put on that day, and he put on 10 squares and then took off for the day because he'd done his work. Well, you don't fall all over yourself praising that guy every day, do you? No, well, you don't. That isn't the way it's normally done. You just pay him the salary and uh, if he was a good enough employee, fine. And that'd be about it.

   And Christ will say, well, that's the way it's done, you know, that's the way they deal with a slave. If a guy does just, you know, what what's expected of him, what's the normal routine of the day's routine, well you don't bend over backwards thanking him.

   Well, verse 40 then says, "So likewise." So likewise, you, when you have done all those things which are commanded you. In other words, if we do the basics. If we just do the basics, just do what is expected of us. Then we should say to ourselves, we are unprofitable servants. We have done that which was our duty to do.

   You've read that scripture before, but did you ever read it in context of the question, how to increase your faith? That is the answer on how to increase your faith. By going above and beyond, by being a hearer of God's word. And coming to understand what God's word is. And then being a doer of God's work. Of God's word, I should say, you are then categorized as an unprofitable servant. That's what's expected. That's what God asks of each and every one of us to be a hearer, to learn, to study, and to come to the knowledge of the truth. And then he expects us to put that truth into action. That's how you build the basic faith.

   But if you're going to increase your faith in order to handle difficult circumstances that comes along, the only way you can increase your faith beyond the basic faith. And increase your faith to the point where you can handle the difficult circumstances is if you're the type of individual that goes above and beyond. If you're the type of individual that does more than is expected of you.

   In other words, you not only listen and become a hearer of the word of God, you do some studying and you add to your knowledge on your own. And you diligently study because I think, well, I don't know if I've given the sermon here in the South Church, but I gave it in the East and in the Vancouver Church on Bible study and the importance of Bible study.

   But do you go above and beyond, even in your basic Bible study? Do you do research work in other areas, and do you do your diligently apply yourself in Bible study? And when it comes to a sermon, do you really listen to it and maybe take notes and go back and study it over and think it over and talk it over with others to the point where you really implant that knowledge into your mind, to where you are increasing knowledge almost daily?

   Do you do like it says back in the book of Deuteronomy with your, with your family, you talk about it at the dinner table. Do you talk about it when you rise up and when you go to bed and is it constantly on your mind to the point where you're increasing your knowledge continually of God's word? That's what we need to be doing. It needs to become a part of our very being to where we just thirst to be a hearer and thirst to be uh, to come to the knowledge and the understanding of the truth.

   And when it comes to being a doer, do you really step out and do as much as you possibly can within your own capabilities? And I'm not saying that everybody is supposed to, to, uh, you know, go out and just do the impossible. But do you really push yourself in being a doer of the word? Do you push yourself in being circumspect about the Sabbath. And making sure that you uh, uh, apply the Sabbath in a proper way. Are you, uh, circumspect in how you deal and try to exhort and encourage and help brethren in the church? Do you, do you really put into action the words that are given to you? Do you really apply them within your own scope and within your own ability?

   And I'm not saying we're all supposed to be personality characters either, uh, you know, with our own scope and within our own abilities, do we really apply ourselves is what I'm saying, to go above and beyond. Well, as you apply yourself to go above and beyond in your knowledge and your understanding and the hearing of God's word and being a doer of God's word, you automatically increase that faith. You increase the faith that you have by being a doer that goes above and beyond.

   You can increase it beyond that basic faith, and the basic faith, quite frankly, brethren, is not enough. To carry you through. We all have to go above and beyond, or else we're categorized as it says here as an unprofitable servant, and you see the answer, frankly to the question on how to increase your faith. And as I say, you might read that over and say, well, look, he didn't even bother to answer the question. Oh yes, he did. He did answer the question. He told you exactly how to increase your faith. And that's by going above and beyond. In your service to God. Whether it be in the hearer or whether it be in the doer, and that's the way you increase your faith.

   Alright we talked a bit about building faith. We talked about increasing faith. We need to go back to the basics now. And ask ourselves, well, just what am I talking about when I say faith? What is faith? What am I talking about? Am I talking about when I'm talking about doing or listening? What am I talking about when I say faith? And what is God talking about when he says faith? What is faith? What is it that you're supposed to be building? What is it that you're supposed to be hearing and going above and beyond then? And what is it you're supposed to be doing and going above and beyond this and what is faith?

   Let's go back to Hebrews the 11th chapter. For a definition of faith. Hebrews 11, beginning in verse 1. Hebrews 11 beginning in verse 1 (Hebrews 11:1).

   "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for. For the uh, hope for the evidence of things not seen." Faith is something that you're hoping for, something that you're looking forward to. If it's something you already have, you don't have to have faith in it, do you? You know, maybe you have faith that uh, uh, in 1981, you're going to be able to buy your first car. Alright, 1981, you buy the first car. You don't have to have faith in it anymore, do you? You already have it.

   Alright, so faith is something that we don't see. It's something we look forward to. It's something we trust in. It's something that we anticipate. So it's the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. And why does it say evidence of things not seen. And why does it mention substance if it, if you, you know, if it's something you're hoping for?

   The reason it mentions the substance and the reason it mentions evidence is because there is proof. There is proof that it's out there. There is proof. But that, that it is possible to have that faith, to have the thing that is hoped for. And there's evidence that the thing that you hope for is there and available if you have the faith in it. That's what it means. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

   "For by it, the elders obtained a good report." In other words, the elders in the Bible that we read about. They obtained a good report. "Through faith, we understand. That more, we understand the world were framed by the word of God so that the things which are seen were not made of things which do appear."

   By faith, we believe. That Jesus Christ created everything that is created. And that he created it from nothing. From things that didn't exist. Because we weren't there at creation, were we? The reason we believe that Jesus Christ did it as it says here, by the word of God and Jesus Christ is the word of God, as we I gave you a sermon here a couple of weeks ago. But we believe, we have faith in the fact that Jesus Christ created the universe. And that he created it from nothing. He created something from something that does not exist.

   But you know, there are ways of proving that. You know, Mr. Armstrong has gone through it, and we need to take the time to go through it. It's like it says in Psalm 14:1, a fool says there is no God. If You haven't proven that there is a God and that He is the Creator and that He created everything that you see and everything that exists. You haven't started, you're just beginning with the basics when you begin to prove that. And you need to go back and prove that there is a God, prove that there was a creation. In order to build faith in that God.

   And you need to go back and think the thing through. Maybe you haven't thought it through. Maybe you've been in the Worldwide Church of God for all of your life. Or maybe for 20 years and maybe you had never approached that subject before and you hadn't thought it all through and you've heard the ministers talk about it. You've read the booklets and you say, well, I believe it, but you've never really thought it through.

   Well, somewhere along the line you may be tried on that on that point. And you may run into somebody who has thought it through, and you may run into somebody who has proven in his own mind that there is no God. And that really being an atheist is the right approach. Those aren't ignorant men. They have the wisdom of this world and the wisdom of men that's going to come to absolutely nothing, of course.

   If you start talking to one of them. You think you can dumbfound them, you think you can uh, uh, talk them down, you think you can out out talk them? You'd be shocked. You'd be shocked. At their approach, you'd be shocked at some of the things that they say that you don't understand. You read some of their books, I wouldn't necessarily advise reading too many of them necessarily because they get a little boring. As far as I'm concerned.

   But they've got their human logic. They've got their human wisdom, and they've built it over centuries. And they've got it all compiled and they'll quote Huxley and quote all these people and all of these authorities back through the ages, through the years, the last probably 50, 60, 70 years, it's become more popular and they build up quite a story. They even have their little progressive charts, you know, how you came from or used to be a brother to a monkey. They don't claim you were a monkey, they just claim you were a brother to a monkey. You know, some of us would qualify almost now, but uh, uh, they do claim it, you know.

   And they've got all sorts of ideas on how life came on this planet, and they've got a myriads of ideas. Some of them you'd think you could really laugh at because they are humorous, but some of them, you know, they, they, they're logical to those people. And you know, uh, you need to prove those things and to make sure of the ground that you stand on.

   And you know what we talk about prophecy and we talk about a lot in the church, we'll probably be talking about it this afternoon in the Bible study, and you know, and we have faith in the prophecies of Daniel 2, Daniel 7, Revelation 11, Revelation 13, and, and all of the prophecies, we have faith in those prophecies. But you know those prophecies haven't come to pass, have they? They haven't happened yet. The resurrected Roman Empire is not in Europe. The beast is not sitting on his seat. And the false prophet is not there calling fire down from heaven yet.

   But you know somewhere along the line we have absolute faith in that, don't we, that that's going to happen, but we haven't seen it, have we? Well, why, why do we have faith that there's going to be a resurrected Roman Empire and it's going to be in Europe? Why do we have faith that there's going to be a beast? Why do we have faith that there's going to be a false prophet? Why do we have faith in the four horsemen of the apocalypse? Why do we have faith that the world is headed for its Armageddon? Why do we believe Jeremiah the 30th chapter and all the other scriptures about Israel going into captivity? Why do we have faith in these things? We haven't seen them.

   You know, we've got a lot of evidence, don't we? We've got all the things that happened in the past, don't we? We can look at the prophecies of the past and how they worked out. We've looked how we can follow the trace and know that we're modern day Israel, and we can follow all of the things that God says that he, he will do the nations if they disobey Him, and we have plenty of examples of nations that disobeyed him and it happened to them.

   We've got all that evidence of the past of the things in this Bible that point out that these things literally are going to happen in the future. And we're basing our faith on the facts. That it happened in the past and that this Bible says it and it's going to happen in the future.

   Well, how did we build that faith? We built that faith by the sermons that we hear, by the reading of the literature, by the reading of the Bible, and by studying diligently that book. And the faith that you have in the prophecies for the future is based on how diligently you have studied of the things that have happened in the past. In other words, if you applied yourself above and beyond the basics. In relationship to prophecy, you have more faith in the prophecies that are going to happen in the future. It comes by applying yourself more. You increase that faith by doing and by hearing.

   You can take the basics and your faith is going to be weak. And when the time comes concerning the place of safety or concerning other things in relationship to prophecy, you may waver. You may waver and be weak and not be able to stand the test, but if you have gone above and beyond, and you really know the ground you stand on and know why you stand there and what it really means, when the time comes, you're going to have increased your faith to the point where you aren't going to have a problem with it. You're going to know what to do and when to do it. And how to do it, and you're going to react exactly the way God wants you to, and you're going to receive all the blessings as a result of it.

   A simple lesson, brethren, on building faith and increasing your faith and how you build that faith and how you increase that faith. We have to believe. We have to believe, as it says down in verse 6, "But without faith it is impossible to please him." We can't please God, brethren, unless we build that faith, and we do our part in building it.

   As I say, it is a gift from God because God gives you the understanding, doesn't it? You wouldn't get anywhere without God. God gives you that understanding, so it's a gift that comes from him, but you have to apply yourself diligently and build it or else you'll never have it. And so it's a dual effort. It's you and God, and that's why in Romans 1:17, it says faith to faith, God's faith and your faith. It's something that God builds in you that you have. And you make a contribution to it.

   Going on here says, that without faith it's impossible to please him, "For he that comes to God must believe that he is." With every bit of our being, with the very depth of our being, we must believe that God is, that God exists. "And that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him."

   In other words, no one seeks a goal. No one would seek after faith unless there was a reason for it. In other words, I asked in the beginning, well, what is the value in faith? Well, if there is some value in faith, brethren, and if you haven't found out what the value is, you will never seek after it. No one seeks something that is of no value. And if faith isn't valuable to you and important to you, you're not going to seek after it.

   In other words, if God hadn't laid down on the scripture, if he'd just put the prophecies in here. And said this is what's going to happen. And just laid it out that way, or you wouldn't have bothered to build any faith. But if God lays out and says this is what is going to happen and if you do such and such and so and so and you do this and that and the other thing, you can have salvation, you can have protection, you can have my blessings, and you can have all of the things that God promises. Then faith becomes a value. Faith becomes something to seek after. Faith becomes something that you want. And then faith becomes something that you will diligently seek, something that you will go above and beyond to get. Especially if you know how to get it. So it does become a value.

   It's on a building process of faith brethren, we must believe that God is and that he's a rewarder, that there is a reason for it. And there really is a reason for it. There's a tremendous reason for building that faith.

   And Jesus Christ, in looking down at our generation and understanding how human beings do things. Looked at our generation and what our generation was going to face and the difficulties that we were going to face, and he said in Luke 18:8, as I pointed out a little earlier, he said, "Will he find faith on the earth? Will he find faith on the earth?"

   Well, before I answer that, let's turn here to Hebrews 10th chapter. And pick it up in verse 37. Because here's something, brethren, we're building faith in. Hebrews the 10:37. "For yet a little while, for yet a little while, and he that shall come will come and will not tarry."

   Mr. Armstrong has a co-worker letter out now in which he talks about the end time, and he talks about the second coming of Jesus Christ. But we do live in the end time. And we give you continually sermons that talk about this and one of these days I'll give you a sermon proving that this is the end time. That's not that difficult to prove because it is the end time. I try to balance off my sermons and make oh about 1 out of 4 or 3 on prophecy and just kind of intermingle them, so I'll get around to a sermon on proving this is the end time one of these days.

   But Jesus Christ is going to come. We have faith in that. We have faith in it because of what the Bible says and because of world conditions and because of the things that are brought to you through sermons and Bible studies and that sort of thing. It says "For yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry. Now the just shall live by faith."

   We have faith in the second coming of Jesus Christ. We have faith in what it means for us and for God's church and what it means for the world. We live by that faith. We believe it with all of our being, we have proven it. And we are to live that way. "But if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him."

   But then notice verse 39 in the very positive statement, the apostle Paul said. He says, "But we are not of them who draw back to perdition." There's a definite statement, brethren, and you need to ask yourself, am I or am I not in this particular category. Can you say that you are not of them who draw back to perdition, "but of them that believe to the saving of the soul"?

   Do you have the faith? Are you building the faith that is going to be able to carry you through the issues that the world is going to face in the years ahead and to carry you through and prepare yourself for the second coming of Jesus, Jesus Christ. Do you have that faith, and are you building that faith?

   It isn't going to be easy. This is going to be the toughest generation in the history of the human race to have the faith. To serve God and to be prepared and ready for the second coming of Jesus Christ. And I repeat that it's going to be the toughest generation in the history of the human race to build that faith. Because we're going to live in a generation. That doesn't have faith. We're going to live in a generation that doesn't know God, understand God, believe in God or believe God.

   We're going to have to fight atheists, agnostics, evolutionists, and pagans. And there are plenty of pagans around. O pagan religions, I should say. We have to fight all of those issues. We have to sort that truth out. We have to come to understand that truth. We have to prove that truth, and we have to stand on that proof. And we have to build the faith to understand it, and we have to build the faith to stand for it. And we have to build the faith above and beyond the faith that any other generations had to build.

   Because our faith is going to be trained and tested in this generation, or else Jesus Christ would not have asked the question. Will the Son of Man find faith on the earth when he comes back? If it had been a common ordinary generation, uh, he probably wouldn't have asked that question.

   But looking down at this particular generation, he knew and understood what the issues were going to be. He knew and understood how difficult it was going to be to walk with God and to obey God and to serve God. He knew all the difficulties that you and I were going to face, and he knew how hard it was going to be to build the faith that was going to be necessary to carry you through and to carry me through. And to prepare us to be ready for that second coming of Jesus Christ so that we can come up with that resurrection.

   So brother, it's an important subject. It's a very vital subject. And the answer to Jesus Christ's question, will he find faith on the earth, is yes, frankly, he will. We will find faith on the earth. But the only way he's going to find that faith in you or in me or in in us is if we build it. And in order to build it, brethren, we have to understand it. And so we have to understand it and build it, and we have to do it the way God directs that we should do it, and quite frankly, the way God's church that he worked through directs that we should do it.

   So the answer to Christ's question is yes, he will find the faith. And for those of you who do not draw back, who do build the faith the way God says to. You'll be there when Jesus Christ does come back, and you'll have the faith to go through the trials and difficulties that may, may be presented to you between now and the time that he does come back.