The Shield of Faith | Joyce Meyer

Ephesians 6 says lift up the shield of faith it doesn't say drag it along with you doesn't even say just yep got my shield yes sir got a sheet of the beat oops I'm a faith woman yeah well are you lifting up the shield of faith when one of those fiery darts well father we thank you for the word today just appreciate you and letting us be here today thank you that we still have the freedom to do these kind of things in this nation and I pray that we'll never lose those freedoms and packed us with the word today in Jesus name Amen well back to mark 11:22 we're going to talk today about the shield of faith you know we Christians talk about faith a lot but it's one thing to believe in Jesus as your Savior that's one thing that we exercise our faith for there's many other things that we need to release our faith for that maybe we're missing like there's all kinds of people who believe in Jesus that live under condemnation all the time so if you really want to use your faith for something why don't you really use your faith to live free from guilt and condemnation I mean if you believe when you ask God to forgive your sins that he did forgive your sins and he removed them as far as the east is from the west and what's to still feel guilty about so I'm just trying to make the point that although we have faith and we say won't I believe in Jesus that that's not where faith in from there on we're supposed to learn to live by faith the just man shall live by faith were made right with God by faith were sanctified by faith were redeemed by faith our provision comes by faith I went to church for many many many years and I believed in Jesus but that was pretty much the end of what I believed I didn't even really know that I could believe God for other things I remember running into a woman in a store one day who was a clerk and we got to talking I found out she was a Christian and so I was just asking her questions about how the business was and you know our young Commission do you get a salary you know just we're just chatting and she said well think things had not been very good she's I have a quota that I have to meet and she said honestly I haven't been meeting it and I'm kind of concerned that I'm going to lose my job I said well why don't you just pray for God to give you favor and caused people to wander over here into your department to shop well see that was very normal to me because I had learned that I could exercise my faith for things like that but she looked at me and said well she's been a believer all of her life she looked at me and said well you mean it would be okay to ask God for money so here she's a Christian she goes to church all the time she believes in Christ but she did not know that she could exercise her faith for something as simple as provision or for God to move customers in her direction there is nothing that we cannot pray about no need that we cannot lift up to God I'm not saying we're going to get everything we want but when it comes to our needs and our provision we can release our faith but see it has to be released and sometimes to be honest we get a little bit lazy so today we're going to have a few words for the lazy people and I know nobody here today is lazy and I mean my goodness you got up and got here so I can't say you were lazy but maybe there's just somebody watching by television somewhere in the world in Europe in Africa in India in Australia in America and you're just a little lazy it's just a little too much of an effort now let's take something simple like praying over our food we better pray sincerely because there's a whole bunch of stuff in it that could kill us if we don't pray over but what do we do and I'm guilty to take it over this food blessing my buddy in Jesus name Amen or then sometimes after we've eaten half of it bless the Lord O my soul and all that's already in me but you know it's one thing to do it as an obligation or just a habit of something we do but the faith is really not working unless we take a moment to sincerely pray father I'm praying over this food and I thank you for it and I pray God that if there's anything in it that's harmful that you won't let it harm me in Jesus name Amen so it's one thing to have faith it's another thing to actually use your faith and exercise your faith so the Bible talks about the shield of faith and in mark 11:22 which is kind of our foundation Scripture it simply says have faith in God constantly and Jesus replying said to them have faith in God constantly I like that scripture not just once in a while not just occasionally not just until you're tired of waiting for your breakthrough that have faith in God constantly now let's learn some facts about faith first of all faith can grow let's look at 2nd Thessalonians 1:3 faith can grow but it only grows as we use it how many of you would like to have a greater muscle mass than what you have well you know what you can't pray that in I'm al khair how much faith you got you can get a whole group of faith filled believers together and they cannot pray muscle on you there's only one way you're going to get it and that's effort amen you have to use that muscle and the more you use it the muscle will start to grow and then to get it to grow more you have to lift heavier things or do harder things so why do we think that we go through something and we finally get through that and we're like wow and then there's something even harder than the last thing so ok we go through that and it's like huh and then another thing well you know by the time we get way up here these things down here don't bother us at all anymore amen when I first started going to the gym and working out I mean I started with these little dog bone weights that weighed about three pounds and I thought well you know now 20 pounds or 25 pounds later if I go back to something like that it's like well this is nothing we'll see some of the things that you're going through right now as you continue to grow in faith those things will be nothing you won't even notice them actually it amazes me the things that I used to get upset about I look about now and think how dumb was that to make myself miserable all day over something that ridiculous so second Thessalonians 1:3 your faith is growing and your love towards each other is increasing and abound so Paul's saying your faith is growing and your love is growing your faith is growing and your love is growing do you know what faith doesn't grow without love you say what do you mean well first of all my understanding of how much God loves me and your understanding of how much God loves you has to grow in order for your faith to grow the more that you believe that someone loves you the more you're going to be willing to put your trust in them and put your confidence in them so I would say if you're having trouble with faith maybe just kind of lay that lesson aside for a little bit and go study how much God loves you get rooted and grounded in his love and then you'll come back and it won't be as hard to put your faith in him we're supposed to receive the love of God learn to love ourselves in a balanced way love God and then let that love flow through us to other people Galatians 5:6 says faith works by love that's why in Mark 11 he says when you pray if you have anything against anyone leave it drop it let it go forgive him why because faith won't work without love if we're mad at somebody we're angry at somebody we're all stopped up inside and that love can't flow through us then our faith is not going to work either so he said I'm grateful that your faith is growing and your love toward one another is also increasing and abounds I think in the church in the last 25 years we have paid a lot more attention to faith than we have love I must say that again I think we've paid a lot more attention to faith than we have loved maybe I'll even say it a third time I think we've paid a lot more attention to faith then we have love why because we kind of learn what we could use our faith and get some things we wanted but although God may have started to introduce us to faith by teaching us that it's far a lot greater purpose than just to get your own way yes there are things that we can believe for that we want and need but faith is primarily to be used to help us get through things and remain stable and strong no matter what is going on do you know what God wants more than anything he wants a whole worldwide church full of people out there shining like bright lights making everybody else wonder how in the world can you be the way you are with everything that's going on in the world more than anything he wants us to be stable and walking in love and having peace and having joy simple little things Psalm 100 verse 2 serve the Lord with gladness so faith in love don't try to pay more attention to faith than you do love faith also another fact about faith faith can be heard out of our mouth 2nd Corinthians 4:13 I know this one's right because I looked it up this morning says yet we have the same spirit of faith as he had who wrote I have believed and therefore have I spoken we too believe and therefore we speak if you really want to know how much faith you have or anybody else for that matter listen to them and especially listen in hard times especially listen when you're having to wait longer than you'd like to and especially listen when somebody else gets what you want and you don't have yours yet and then especially listen when somebody mistreats you and God doesn't come along and vindicate you quite as quick as you'd like him to then we start finding out how much faith we really have once again I want to make a difference between this faith that we receive Christ through we believe in Christ we believe he died for us we believe he's our only hope of salvation and if you don't you certainly can get that settled right away by just inviting Christ into your life admit that you've been a sinner that you want to turn away from sin I'm sorry God please come and live on the inside of me and save me it's so simple that people miss it so there's that faith that we have but then we're supposed to learn to live by that faith to exercise that faith in every single area of our life and that takes a little bit of concentration and a little bit of focus faith dispels fear and worry Matthew 6:30 says don't worry about your provision each day has sufficient trouble of its own don't worry about tomorrow don't worry about yesterday exercise your faith each day one day at a time you know I have things just like you do I've got a couple of situations right now that are going on that are a little bit tense and some areas where I'm responsible to take care of some situations that I don't even really know how I got into to start with but you know how that goes it's one of those wimey things you know why do I have to be doing this but nonetheless I'm in it and got to see it through so you know things are going messy and so you get up in the morning and you start to try to pray and then you start thinking well you know what about this and that then just like you I have to say nope I'm using my faith to live today I'll have what I need tomorrow when tomorrow comes we all have to do it but you see it's something that you have to do on purpose you purposely have to exercise your faith in those areas and learn how to talk to yourself if need be and remind yourself of scriptures like this I don't have to worry about tomorrow surely God loves me more than a bird and I've never seen a bird sitting on a branch having a breakdown because he didn't know where his next worm was coming from I mean could you I mean God says the birds are fed there's nothing more beautiful than the flowers and God take care of them so we don't have to worry about God taking care of us either but although we don't have to worry about it we do need to release our faith for it you see this is where I think sometimes we get lazy it's like a oh yeah I gotta take care of that well have you asked him to have you prayed about it are you keeping your confession in line with what you say you believe those are our areas to exercise our faith and if we do our part God will never fail to do his part Jesus even told the disciples when they were fearful in the storm if you had enough faith you wouldn't be afraid of the storm if you trusted me why does God let us go through things because faith grows through experience with God my faith is so much stronger now that it was 36 years ago when I really entered into a serious relationship with God and I was a Christian a long time before I got serious hello come on I'm talking to some of you watching me right now by TV and don't turn the set off either I was a Christian a long time before I got serious I had enough of God to keep me out of hell but not enough to cause me to walk in victory come on don't just have enough of God to keep you from going to hell have enough to cause you to walk in victory so you can take somebody else to heaven with you well I'm sure glad that I press through and let God grow me up a little just just last night we had eleven hundred and two people receive Christ just last night I mean I spent years as a not so serious Christian marching off to church every weekend going back home as far as I know nobody ever got saved because of my life but boy once you get serious with God once you really begin to exercise exercise your faith to believe everything that he says faith is a powerful force that can change many things in our life faith heals the sick no matter how much medicine is available to us today and no matter how many medical treatments that we can get let us not forget - first and foremost believe God to keep us healthy amen and if you're not familiar with God's desire to heal the sick go read Matthew chapter 8 the first 17 verses and you'll see he was healing people every time he turned around but unbelief can keep God from being able to do what he wants to do let's look at Matthew 13 58 and he did not do many works of power there because of their unbelief their lack of faith in a divine mission of Jesus so God is working all the time but what he's doing is received through the hand of faith we have to release our faith and say God I believe your word and I want to take that as my own so some of the things that faith does faith receives provision faith saves us from sin faith can cause us to live completely free from guilt Wow faith fills us with the holy spirit by faith we can believe that we are pleasing to God even in our imperfect state faith purifies the heart it sanctifies the person it brings revelation it justifies us it gives us access into the presence of God by faith were made right with God faith gives us security and confidence it brings blessing it brings hope it produces good works it edifies it keeps us true to God and it quenches all the fiery darts of the enemy but Ephesians 6 says lift up the shield of faith it doesn't say drag it along with you doesn't even say just yep got my shield yes sir got that shield of faith ooh I'm a faith woman yeah well are you lifting up the shield of faith when one of those fiery darts oh here comes another lie no I don't believe that it comes another attack no I don't believe that Ephesians six sixteen think all this leave that there for you guys to see Ephesians six sixteen in the amplified says lift up over all the covering Shield of saving faith upon which you can quench all the flaming missiles of the wicked one in the King James says above all can somebody say above all above all taking the shield of faith wherewith you shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one but once again that's that shield faith can do us no good if we don't pick it up lift it up release it let it go and how do we release our faith through praying through saying and through faith filled God inspired action not just any kind of action but faith filled God inspired action what does the Bible say in James 1 faith without works is dead not works of the flesh but the works that God tells us to do so therefore we see we cannot be lazy can I tell you it's not enough to go to church and park your little bottom on a Pew I don't care you can go four times a week and have somebody else who's put out all the effort and hasn't been lazy feed you the Word of God spoon feed you the Word of God and then you march out and go back home and March back the next week to get another feeding that is not going to be enough it's a beginning but it's not enough it's good but it's not enough well what do you want me to do well you can start by taking some notes or buying a recorded copy of the message that you hear and then go home and study some more yourself hearing somebody else tell you something is one level but when you study that information can become revelation to you don't be the person all your life who needs to be ministered to come on let me say it again it's time for transition for some of you it's you know we want to minister to people but don't be the person who all your life needs to be the one that's receiving the ministry be the one who's helping somebody else not only that I can say I think we get to a certain point in receiving where we can't even receive anymore if we don't start giving out faith without works is dead has no power no power at all faith should always come first before works but we can't leave out the works and that takes an effort doesn't it how many of you know that doing the right thing takes an effort come on don't just have enough faith to keep you out of hell have enough faith and start releasing it to walk in victory and to be a blessing to somebody else I don't even really think that we should get through one day without being able to say I'm so glad God that you allowed me to be a blessing to so-and-so today I was able to encourage I was able to lift up I was able to meet a need I was able to share my faith with somebody lazy Christians will never stay protected from the plots and plans of Satan lazy is a good word isn't it second Peter chapter 1 verse 5 says employ every effort in exercising your faith employ every effort for this reason adding your divine diligence to the divine adding your diligence to the divine promises so we have the promises of God but he says now employ every effort in exercising your faith to develop virtue excellence resolution Christian energy and then he goes on to say some other things but my point is is that have to make an effort to exercise your faith hope is a good thing but if hope is just kind of like I wish hope is a very close relative of faith and I don't think you can have faith without hope because hope is a positive expectation that something good is going to happen so you have to have that before you even going to release your faith but a lot of people don't have any of that they just wish I wish I had we don't need wishbone we need backbone we need to be able to stand up and say I'm going to do my part through the power of God get up every morning and take 10 15 minutes to thank God for what he's doing and to praise Him and to release your faith for what you know you need that day of what may come up that you don't even know that you need and release your faith to get out in public and act like a Christian spend time in the presence of God and ask to be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit I love Ephesians 3 that says Paul prayed that they would be filled in their inner man that the Holy Spirit would indwell their innermost being and personality I don't know about you but I know some folks could use a good shot of the Holy Ghost in their personality

Channel: Joyce Meyer Ministries

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Id: BEtcy-FOTf8

Length: 26min 12sec (1572 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 21 2013