The Effect of Faith

If we exercise faith in trials, we give honor to God and find favor and acceptance with Him.  Faith teaches us how to value and properly judge the worth of invisible and spiritual things.  It teaches us to value and cherish God’s favor above all earthly treasures, even above life itself (Psalm 63:3).  Life without the Lord’s merciful love is empty.  Faith gives us priceless knowledge and wisdom that human reason is powerless to obtain by itself.  Without faith we are ignorant and foolish (Luke 24:25).  Faith makes us willing to part with anything that hinders our relationship with God.  Faith in great adversity with the least enjoyment of God is better than the greatest enjoyment of the pleasures of the world.  Faith knows that it is always a good bargain to lose things for the Lord’s sake.  Those who have seen something of the glory of God by faith will be able to relinquish worldly things that no longer appear so attractive to them.