Living by faith is an essential part of our walk as believers. When we were born again, we put our faith in what we could not see, Jesus Christ and received the fullness of salvation in him. In 2 Corinthians 5:7, Paul commands us to “to live by faith and not by sight”, implying that our faith doesn’t begin and end with receiving salvation, but faith continues to be an essential part of our every day lives. 

Hebrews 11:1 declares that “faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see”. Both 2 Cor 5:7 and Heb 11:1 contrast faith to sight, suggesting that if we are living only by what we can see in the natural realm, we are not living by faith. To have faith is to look beyond what we can see and to be confident in what we do not see. But for most of our time on earth, our primary way of looking at our lives is through our natural eyes! So how can we train ourselves to not be led by what we can see, but instead to look beyond and have faith in what we cannot see? 

A vital part of living by faith involves hearing what God is saying to us. This is one way we can look beyond what we are seeing with just our natural eyes. Do you know what is God speaking over your life? What is God seeing from his perspective about that situation that is worrying you? 

When we learn to continually ask God for his viewpoint rather than just going along with what we see with our natural eyes, we can learn to walk by faith. Faith grows as we choose to trust the truth of what He is saying, more than we trust what we are seeing ‘naturally’. 

The next step of walking by faith after hearing what God has said about a certain situation, is to use our voices to declare it with authority and agree with all He has said. You and I are made in God’s image, and God shows us in Genesis 1 that words have the power to create. We have to use our words to partner with God to bring into being his will on earth – we declare what God is saying, even when this is not yet what we are not seeing in the natural realm, no, especially when we do not see it yet. 

Faith speaks out and declares the truth of what we believe God has said will happen – when it isn’t happening yet. This is part of fighting the good fight of faith! In Revelation 1, the sword of the Spirit is in Jesus’s mouth – it is his tongue! We fight the good fight of faith by opening our mouths and using our words, but our words must align with God’s words, rather than just agreeing with what is happening in the natural realm.

Learning to ‘see’ by faith and not just with our natural eyes is part of maturing as a believer. Continually choosing to align our words with what we see by faith shows that we are becoming less dependent upon our natural senses and instead are relying upon the Lord and his truth. It’s never enough to just hold the promises and words of God in our hearts and minds, they have to come out of our mouths in agreement with the Lord Almighty.

Recently, I was holding what the Lord had spoken to me in my heart and mind, and quite frankly losing the battle in my inner being to continually believe what He had said! Every time I saw the situation that hadn’t changed yet, I would feel doubtful, unsure and unsettled. I was the double minded man from James 1, being tossed about by the waves and wind – such a man receives nothing from the Lord!

Only when I began to use my voice to speak out loud the promises of God over the situation, did the doubt and fear inside me began to go. To live by faith and not by sight means our reaction to what we see in the natural realm cannot be passivity. We cannot just be overwhelmed by every situation, letting it become bigger than God.  However by using the weapons God has given us to respond in power and authority, it is possible to remain confident in him and his words, knowing that he will do all he has said he will do.

Having a word from the Lord doesn’t make us immune to feeling fear or doubt when what we see in the natural realm is still not lining up with what God has spoken to us. It takes time for the promises of God to come to pass. We are so used to a ‘microwave’ culture that we get shook when God’s words don’t come to pass that same day! Words from God are seeds that have to be planted and nurtured, and like seeds, they take time to mature and become established. 

But we must learn how to respond to that fear and doubt. Are we just going to be passive and go along with it? Or will we choose to live by faith and not by sight, and instead declare what we see by faith? 

What words has Jesus spoken to you that you have let fall to the ground? It’s time to take hold of what the Lord is saying and to live by what He has said only. God is all-seeing and all-knowing – He has a declaration of perfect truth over every situation. Ask him for his perspective and take hold of it, declaring it over what you see happening in the natural realm. 

Things are unlikely to change instantaneously, battles take time to be won, but you can begin to walk through the situation in peace and confidence instead of fear and despair. Use your spiritual eyes to picture what God has said and see that truth more clearly than what is happening in the world before you. Nothing is impossible with God.