Who Are You Looking To?
I.
The Spirit of faith has
faith in God, it relies on God, it looks to God and to nothing else-2
Corinthians 4:14
A. Knowing that HE --- This
reveals who they are looking to and who their source is and that they are only
looking one place
1.
The
spirit of faith operates by the eye that is single, meaning that it looks
solely to God and it depends completely upon God
2.
There’s a lot of people
who say God is their source, but live like He’s not; They look to other things
to provide what they need; Not everybody who is saved has made God their source
and some are looking to other things to provide for them what they need and
they are not looking one place and they don’t have the single eye
B. *The Spirit of faith
always makes God its source and looks to Him and because of that, there’s no
pit too deep, no circumstance too dark, no opposition too great for the spirit
of faith to overcome (Why? Because God’s my source)
II.
Galatians 3:1-11-The
foundation principle to the message of faith was to rely on God, have
confidence in God and don’t rely on anything else
A. They slipped back into
relying on themselves and their own effort rather than living by faith; their
eye went from single to wandering
1.
2-How
did you receive? Through your own efforts or through faith in God
2.
3-They
got born again and made new by faith, but now they are depending on the flesh
for perfection
3.
5-The
stuff that God is doing in their lives he’s doing it through their
faith/dependence on him
4.
6-Abraham
believed and relied on God and that’s all he did
5.
It was hearing about
faith, it was the instruction about believing and relying on God that enabled
them to receive; It was when faith was preached and people got instructed about
faith that people received from God; when people relied solely on God, He was
able to do mighty things in their lives, but this wandering eye that’s looking
multiple places is a problem
B. 9,10-Relying on God,
looking to him gets you blessed, relying on other things (including yourself)
gets you cursed-Jeremiah 17:5
1.
11-We
live by faith and a big part of that is that we rely on God for everything, we
look to him and depend on him for everything
2.
People with the spirit of
faith live by faith and that means they go to God first and God only for
everything
C. 12-In the law you live by
you (what you do), relying on you, but now we live by faith relying on Him
1.
Trying
to make it happen with your own effort, relying on your own effort, activates
the curse
a. You can be doing faith
principles that are scriptural and do them with legalistic heart relying on
your own ability and to do so would activate the curse in your life
b. Faith principles acted
upon and released from a legalistic heart become the law and will not produce
c. A key issue or checkpoint
is do you have any rest
2.
Where we’ve missed it is
that we learn the principles and do, do, do to get the outside right and then we
say we are in faith so something should happen, but faith at it’s core is faith
in God, it’s confidence in God, it’s reliance upon God, it’s not principles and
precepts (even though there are principles of faith, the principles are not
faith), it’s belief, it’s confidence, it’s trust, it’s reliance on God; it’s
relying on what he did, not what you do-Matthew 23:25
a. When you are believing
that’s going to be expressed through your attitude and your words and your actions;
Our problem has been we’ve try to get the right attitude, say the right words,
do the right things with no genuine believing in the heart and if we would just
develop genuine faith all those other things would be right
3.
EX:
You can wrap a Twinkie in lettuce and call it health food, but it’s not
III.
Galatians 5:2-6-Jesus
became of no effect to them because they were relying on something else and
looking to something else; Looking to someone/something else to meet your needs
will make Jesus of no effect in your life
A. 1-The yoke of bondage
you’re don’t to be entangled in again is you relying on you and what you do
1.
The
freedom is the this life of faith where you rely on him; it’s bondage having to
rely on yourself, it’s freedom relying on Him
B. 2-They are relying on
circumcision and the law to be righteous and as they do that Jesus profits them
nothing
1.
Whatever you don’t rely
solely on Jesus to do, he can’t do for you; If you are relying on something
else to save you, then Jesus can’t save you and that goes for healing,
prosperity, victory and anything else
2.
What
they are looking to the law to do for them, Jesus cannot do for them
a. AMP-If you distrust him
(looking to other things), you CAN gain NOTHING from him
b. The way you gain from
Jesus is you look only to him
C. *4-Jesus became of no
effect to them!!! – Why? They looked to, trusted in, relied on something
else; Rather than relying on Jesus they relied on self-effort and the law
1.
Faith in something else
will make Jesus ineffective for you; If you put your trust in something other
than Jesus, Jesus will profit you nothing
a. So who are you trusting?
If you trust someone/something else to heal you, provide for you, protect you,
then Jesus can’t
2.
Fallen from grace-Because they had fallen
from faith; Lack of reliance on God will cause you to miss out on the grace of
God
a. By mentioning abundant grace he is revealing to us that these
great victories came by faith-2 Corinthians 4:15
b. He didn’t earn it, he
didn’t produce it, he looked to God, relied upon God (in faith) and God did it
by grace
3.
The way to receive the
most from God and for him to have the most effect in your life is to look only
to Him for everything (looking other places makes Him ineffective)
a. In your heart when God becomes your only source, the only one
to whom you look, the fullness of his provision will be seen in your life
b. Because people don’t have the spirit of faith their eye is
not single and God’s provision has been scarce
4.
2
Corinthians 4:14-The “HE” in this verse is so vital to their deliverance
because it reveals their looking one place on only have one source and it’s
enabling God to be effective for them
a. Isaiah 30:18-God couldn’t
be effective for them and was having to wait on them to be gracious to them
because their wandering eye
b. Jeremiah 42-God told them
he would take care of them, but couldn’t because they were looking to Egypt to
do it
D. 6-In Jesus the only thing
that matters is faith, the only thing talks is faith (i.e. money talks)
1.
If you don’t have faith
you don’t have anything – In Jesus faith is the only thing that avails
anything and faith looks only to God
a. Without faith you can’t get what God wants you to have and
therefore He becomes of no effect in your life
2.
Galatians
3:21-Faith is the only thing that can get you to what God wants to give you and
what God wants you to have
a. They were looking for
something to do to get what God wanted them to have and the only thing they
needed to do was believe
b. We’re always looking for something to do and while you look
for something to do so that you can rely on you, you are not doing the one
thing you need to do and that’s to not rely on you, but rather rely on Him
c. What would you tell a
person to do that wants salvation? You would tell them to believe and look only
to God; then what should you do concerning your deliverance from debt?
E. Many Christians don’t
have much faith in God in that they don’t rely on him for that much; Whenever a
need arises they usually look to other things before they look to God and to
His word
1.
Most
rely on him for their salvation because they know that can’t get that without
him, but beyond that they pretty much rely on other things for whatever else
they need in life
2.
The just are supposed to
live by faith and a big part of living by faith is to depend on God for
everything
3.
The enemy wants to get
you to a place where you don’t depend on God for anything because this less you
look to God, the less you rely on God, the less effective he will be in your
life
IV.
The spirit of faith
functions through the eye that is single and the single eye only looks one
place (Ex: One-stop-shop)
A. The enemy is after your
eyes and he wants to you to get your eyes on something else because wherever
you’re looking to is where your faith is; where your eyes are your faith is and
if he can get your faith in something else, then Jesus becomes of no effect to
you
1.
By
getting your eyes somewhere else and your faith in something else he can (in
your life) make it like Jesus never went to the cross for you, never died for
you, never rose again for you and never provided everything you would ever
need; that’s how big of an issue this is
2.
The wandering eye is a
manifestation of the spirit of unbelief; Unbelief looks somewhere else
regarding the need because it doesn’t trust God to take care of it; The spirit
of faith believes that God can and will take care of any need I have both big
and small so why go anywhere else
B. Matthew 6:22-33-In every
circumstance of need the spirit of faith through the single eye looks to God
first and looks to God only
1.
Hebrews
12:2-You’re supposed to be running your race looking to Jesus; To
turn your eyes away from other things and fix them on something
a. He’s the author and finisher of your faith because your faith
is supposed to begin and end with him (and not include anything else)
2.
Matthew
6:22-Single-Sound, Good fulfilling
it’s office
a. The office of your eye is to look to Jesus and if it’s not
looking to Jesus it’s not fulfilling it’s office
b. If your eye is single
you’ll get the light you need to see your need met
1)
Confusion
comes from looking too many places-Numbers 13,14-Did they forget everything God
had done?
3.
24-32-If
you’re trying to take care of yourself, then your eyes aren’t on him to take
care of you
4.
33-In
a time of need this is what you do-Seek God first and ask him what do you have
to say about this and what do you want me to do
a. 30,33-Trying to take care
of it yourself is little faith, doing this would be the spirit of faith
C. The spirit of faith and
the single eye-Psalm 23:1, Daniel 3, 2 Chronicles 20:12, Matthew 14, John 11
1.
The
spirit of faith says God is my source, He is my supply and the way he lives his
life is evidence that’s true
D. The tendency of the flesh
is to want to look elsewhere
1.
Your
flesh doesn’t like faith; faith is uncomfortable for your flesh because your
flesh likes to see and feel
a. Not trusting God is
comfortable for your flesh and that’s they the Children Of Israel wanted to go
to Egypt it required no faith
2.
Consequently
your flesh will find a place for your where you don’t have to use your faith
a. God is going to send you
to a place/give you an assignment/give you a dream so big/great that when you
get in it you are forced to trust him because your faith will enable him to be
effective for you
b. God wants you to get to
the end of yourself – He wants you to come to the place where all you got
his him and you have to trust him fully because that is the place he can be
most effective in your life
c. The more you rely on him
the more effective you will see him be in your life
3.
2
Corinthians 1:8-9-They came to a place where they couldn’t trust themselves
because themselves wasn’t enough and they were forced to trust God
a. God doesn’t want to share
your faith with anybody or anything else
b. The place where you have to use your faith is the safest
place you can be because that is the place that Jesus can be the most effective
in your life
c. We have to guard against
the desire to go to a place where faith isn’t required, where we don’t have to
trust God