By Smith Wigglesworth
I believe there are two kinds of faith. All people are born with a natural faith but God calls us to a supernatural faith which is a gift from Himself. In the twenty sixth chapter of Acts Paul tells us of his call, how God spoke to him and told him to go to the gentiles, “To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in Me.” (Acts 26:18)
The faith that was in Christ was, by The Holy Spirit, to be given to those who believed. Henceforth, as Paul yielded his life to God, he could say,
“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of The Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself or me.” (Galatians 2:20)
I’d like to show you the difference between our faith and the faith of Jesus. Our faith is limited and come to an end. Most people have experienced coming to the place where they have said, “Lord, I can go no further. I have gone so far, and I cannot go on.” But God can help us and take us beyond this.
I remember one night, being in the north of England and going around to see some sick people, I was taken into a house where there was a young woman lying on her bed, a very helpless case. Her reason was gone and many things were manifest that were completely satanic, I knew it.
She was a beautiful young woman. Her husband was quite a young man. He came in with a baby in his arms, leaned over and kissed his wife. The moment he did so she threw herself over on the other side of the bed, just as a lunatic would do, with no consciousness of the presence of her husband. It was heart breaking.
The husband took the baby and pressed the baby’s lips to the mother. Again there was a wild frenzy. I said to the sister who was attending her, “Have you anybody to help?” She answered, “We have done everything we could.” I said, “Have you no spiritual help?” Her husband stormed and said, “Spiritual help? Do you think we believe in God after we have had seven weeks of no sleep and this maniac condition? If you think we believe in God, you are mistaken. You have come to the wrong house.”
There was a young woman, about eighteen who grinned at me as she passed out of the door, as much as to say, “You cannot do anything.” But this brought me to a place of compassion for this poor young woman. And then, with what faith I had I began to penetrate the heavens. I was soon out on the heights, and I tell you I never saw a man get anything from God who prayed on the earth level. If you get anything from God you will have to pray right into heaven, for all you want is there.
If you are living an earthly life, all taken up with sensual things, and expect things from heaven, they will never come. God wants us to be a heavenly people, seated with Him in the heavenlies, and laying hold of all the things in heaven that are at our disposal.
I saw there, in the presence off that demented girl, limitations to my faith; but as I prayed there came another faith into my heart that could not be denied, a faith that grasped the promises, a faith that believed God’s Word. I came from the presence of the glory back to earth; I was not the same man.
I confronted the same conditions I had seen before, but in the name of Jesus. With a faith that could shake hell and move anything else, I cried to the demon power that was making this young woman a maniac, “Come out of her, in the name of Jesus!” She rolled over and fell asleep, and awakened in fourteen hours perfectly sane and perfectly whole.
You say, “How can I obtain this faith?” The answer is in Hebrews 12:2,
“Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith…”
He is the author of faith. Oh the might of our Christ who created the universe and upholds it all by the might of His power! God has chosen Him and ordained Him and clothed Him, and He who made this vast universe will make us a new creation.
He spoke the Word and the stars came into being, can He not speak the Word that will produce a mighty faith in us? Ah this One who is the author and finisher of our faith comes and dwells within us, quickens us by His Spirit, and molds us by His will. He comes to live His life of faith within us, and to be to us all that we need.
The Word of God comes in to separate us from all that is not of God. It destroys but it also gives life. He must bring to death all that is carnal in us. It was after the death of Christ that God raised Him up on high, and as we are dead with Him we are raised up and made to sit in heavenly places in the new life that the Spirit gives.
God has come to lead us out of ourselves into Himself, and to take us from the ordinary into the extraordinary, from the human into the divine, and make us after the image of His Son. And even now The Lord wants to transform us from glory to glory by The Spirit of The Living God.
Have faith in God, have faith in The Son, have faith in The Holy Spirit and He will work in you, to will and to do all the good pleasure of His will.
Published in The Pentecostal Evangel.
THE FIRM FOUNDATION
If you build upon anything else but the Word of God, on imaginations, sentimentality, feelings, or even joy, it will mean nothing without a foundation, and the foundation will have to be in the Word of God.
While on the tram heading for Blackpool, famous for it’s high tides and crashing waves, I looked over and said to a man who was a builder, “Those men are building those houses upon the sands.” “Oh,” he said. “You don’t know, you’re not a builder. Don’t you know that we can pound that sand until it becomes like rock?” I replied, “Nonsense!”
I saw the argument was not going to profit, so I dropped it. By and by we reached Blackpool where the waves were crashing over. I was looking around when I saw a row of houses that had fallen flat. Drawing the attention of the builder I said, “Oh look at those houses, how flat they are.” He forgot our previous conversation and said, “You know here we have very large tides, and these houses being on the sands fell when the floods came.
Beloved, it won’t do. We must have something better than sand, and everything is sand except the Word.
The Faith of The Son of God by Smith Wigglesworth
Life on the Altar Issue 3 Winter 2021
LIFE ON THE ALTAR 