Everyday God is in the business of initiating to man. He is initiating to us so that we might respond to Him in faith, for it is faith that pleases God!
Faith Initiation and Faith Response
by Pastor Bryan Coelho
Heb.13: 5 – “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as you have: for He has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you”.
There are 3 specific propositions that accompany what the Word of God says. They are:
1. Divine proposition
2. Human proposition
3. Satanic proposition
Divine and Human proposition
Divine proposition – God initiated the fact that He would create man and that man would respond to Him. Gen.2 – and man was given a free will, which would be exercised to respond to God. There is a divine proposition of faith and there is a human response to God. So we have a divine proposition - God initiating to man and we have human proposition wherein man responds to God in faith and he is able to initiate in faith. When a person receives the message of the gospel and believes that salvation is in Christ – God initiates to him through the gospel by a messenger and man responds to him in faith. As a responder to the gospel, he believes in Christ – that Christ came as the God-man and paid for the sins of the whole world. He then is born again and the Holy Spirit then puts a burden in him to evangelize. Now he is initiating in faith to that which he has responded to – therefore he becomes a soul winner. God always presents a divine proposition – in it He presents to man and man responds in faith and there is a human proposition; he either receives or rationalizes what God has said. In his response he will act in faith or rationalize his viewpoint of what God seemed to have proposed.
Satanic proposition
Then there is satanic proposition – Gen.3:1-5 – he presented a case that was against what God had initiated to man. A satanic proposition is received when I respond outside of faith. Col.2:8; Jam.1:20-21. He now starts rationalizing the Word of God and in order to do that he must abandon faith as the premise to respond, and so God’s Word does not control him any more. He is now looking for something beyond what God has given him.
Contentment
What God has given the believer is to be enjoyed – through this you will enter into divine contentment. Contentment - to be sufficient in oneself; to be possessed in ability; to be strong; to be sufficient for that which is required of him; to enter into defense and ward off or stand against. When God initiated to man and he responded in faith, he had the ability to be sufficient and ward off against the enemy. In order for one to come out of this sufficiency, one has to leave the premise of faith. Now, he will be available to satanic proposition – this is available to a person who will not use the weapon of faith – Eph.6:12-13. Faith is a weapon – it is not just doctrine but my understanding of what I know, that delivers me. Many have only knowledge and so, not many are victorious. In the fall, they were having knowledge but there was no victory because they had left the premise of faith and it caused them to make a decision to rationalize the truth of the Word of God. I am open to deception the moment I leave the premise of faith and I rationalize, not understanding satanic proposition and I am ignorant of it and don’t think about the consequences of the decision at that time.
Man chooses to obey what God has said and God chooses the consequences of his obedience. We choose to obey God – God decides the consequence of our obedience – this will bring tremendous suffering – too many people try to figure out what will happen if they obey. You will be in heaven because of your faith in Christ’s atoning work but you could be a loser in terms of rewards and some will be ashamed at his coming – I Jn.2:22-27. Rev.2:11 - Who are the ones that will lose their rewards ? The ones who chose the consequences for their obedience – they decide they will obey because it is based upon their consequences – they don’t know that God’s plan delivers us to the Cross. The person that is living in contentment does not need any assistance - Phil.4:11. Contentment is the inner quality of life that is possessed with God inside. For our sufficiency is in Him - II Cor.3:5. Faith releases a kingdom within.
In Jn.4:46-53 when the noble man came to Jesus, there was a substantiation of faith with which he went back and went in anticipation of the authority of the word communicated to him. When we live this kind of Christianity we are powerful. So many are afraid of what will happen about their decisions in time – materialism replaces godly decisions and serving God because of convenience and not because of the will of God and therefore when their walk is tested they will conveniently choose how they will obey. They stop believing. Belief is response to God’s initiations. And when people don’t believe, they question as to why they should walk with God and satanic propositions are received and it produces death. A satanic proposition when received always produces death – spiritual death. God has not approved it and if He did people will have divine priorities. I entertain a satanic proposition and rationalize my obedience to invest in my family and I am totally unavailable to them then. When you have contentment, it produces joy. Joy – the root noun form is grace – to rejoice. The word joy is –
I Pet.1:6 – is being very ecstatic of my contentment. Though I am having a problem I respond to God’s initiations and I obey what I am receiving in faith and I trust God for my consequences but I believe that and I obey and a certain sense of contentment is there within me because faith releases a kingdom. And now I not only respond in faith but also initiate in faith. Then you are no longer pre-occupied with what you are going through. God initiates to me so that I don’t just respond to Him but also initiate to others – that is how the Church grows in the unity of Christ.
Faith initiation - faith response – sufficiency and joy in my life
Lk.10:17-20 – “the seventy returned again with joy, saying Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through Thy name”. Whenever a person goes in faith and trusts God for the consequences – satan’s kingdom is always weakened and loses its place. Jesus said, “rejoice not that the spirits are subject unto you, but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven”. Lk.10:21 – Christ rejoiced in His spirit – the word rejoiced here is that He was ecstatic in His situation. We have believed and we respond in faith and act in obedience and not just act in obedience, we initiate in faith and we have the sufficiency and joy in our condition. This is not an abstract form of living but normal Christian living. We don’t talk about situations but we let it conform us to Christ. This is a living faith – because it responds to God and it initiates as a result of the living Word. This is not a faith that is dead – Jam.2 – but it produces works because of the result of it.
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