Fact! Faith! Feeling!

It is crucial to build one’s spiritual life in the correct order: facts, faith, and feelings. Facts are God’s unchanging truths and serve as the foundation, while faith is trusting in these facts rather than in feelings. Feelings, which are unreliable and fleeting, should follow faith and not dictate one’s spiritual stability. Meyer emphasizes that genuine peace and joy come when we prioritize God’s truths, trust in them, and let feelings come naturally as a result.

These three words stand for three important factors in character and life. We all must deal with them in some way. But, we must put them in the right order. That is most important. Most people try to put feelings first. It's as successful as trying to build the top story of a house before laying its foundations.

Some seek faith first. They ignore the facts that support it. They resemble a man who, wanting warmth on a frosty night, refuses to approach the bright fire on the hearth. The only possible order that will bring blessing and comfort to the heart is that indicated in our title: 1. God’s facts, laid like a foundation of adamant. 2. Our faith, apprehending and resting on them.

3. Joyous feelings, coming all at once or after the lapse of days and months, as God wills.

Fact The Bible tells us facts that are like stepping stones across a brook. Before you reach the shallows where they lie, you wonder how to get over. But when you step to the water's edge, you see they span the space from bank to bank. When you have reached one, you can step to another, and so get across. It is absurd to consult feelings or seek faith while distant from the Brookside. It is also foolish to go above or below that primitive stone bridge. You must come down to them. Check how fixed they are in the muddy ground.

Observe the villagers' effortless passage. Then, you will trust them. Finally, with relief, step from one to another. Let us recall a few facts that may guide us first to faith, and then to feeling. It is a fact that God loves each of us with the tenderest and most particular love. You may not believe it. The warm summer sun may be shining on your closed curtains. But it is not felt inside. Your failure to appreciate God's love cannot change its existence.

In Jesus, every obstacle to your forgiveness and acceptance is gone. God was the dying Saviour. He was putting away sin. He bore our sins in His own body on the tree. He reconciled the world to Himself. You may not believe this, or feel the joy of it, but that does not alter the fact that it is so. After the North and South signed a peace treaty, the Civil War. Some soldiers were hiding in the woods, struggling to survive on berries. They might have returned home. They either did not know or did not believe the good news. So, they starved long after their families had welcomed their comrades. They lost. But, their doubts did not change the fact. They proclaimed peace and opened the door for their return.

A friend may have paid all my debts in my native town, from which I have fled fearing arrest and disgrace. He may have done it with such speed that he never impaired my credit. There may be all the old love and honour waiting to greet me. He may have told me so. But, if I stay away, my folly can't undo those kind acts. It only adds to my misery.

It is a fact that the moment a person trusts Christ, he is born into God’s family and becomes a child of God. There is no doubt about this. You may not feel good, or earnest, or anxious; you may even be conscious of recent failure. You may feel a deep, dark depression. But, if you have received Christ and placed your trust in Him, you have been born again. “ Who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. ” (John 1:13). You may be a prodigal or inconsistent child, but you are a child.

If you were wise you would take the child’s place at the Father’s table and enjoy His smiles. They await you! But, if you stay out in the cold like the elder brother in the parable, you won't change that your place is ready for you. It will be, when you will. It is a fact that God takes what we give, and as soon as we give it. There is no long interval. When we let go, He receives. We are immediately sealed as His when we place ourselves on His altar. When we consecrate ourselves, He accepts. The divine act is instantaneous. You may not be aware of this, and you may continue giving yourself day after day. If you do, you create needless anxiety. You give what is not yours to give. And, you lose the joy of being the absolute property, chattel, and slave of the blessed Master.

But your mistake cannot change the fact that God took you at your word when you first dedicated yourself to Him. Must our lack of faith have no effect on the faithfulness of God?

In Jesus Christ, we sit in heavenly places. We cannot alter this. We may not believe it. We may not enjoy the nearness to Jesus. But, we have a right to it. It is our place in the divine order. A tiny bit of faith unites us with Jesus. We are as one with Him as the loftiest saints. Where the Head is, there is also the Body.

In Him we died on the cross and so met the righteous demands of the holy law. In Him we lay in the grave, and so passed out of the region ruled by the prince of the power of the air. In Him we rose and ascended far above all might and dominion, principality and power.

Is Satan under Christ’s feet? In God’s purpose, he is under ours also.

Are death and the grave forever behind Christ? So, in God’s purpose, we have passed to the Easter side of them both and are to the windward of the storm. Regarding their sting or terror, they resemble the Egyptians, dead on the seashore. Has the great High Priest passed through the heavens within the veil? In God's purpose, we have passed from the outer court into the Holy Place. There, we offer gifts, sacrifices, supplications, and intercessions for all men.

This may seem unreal and impossible. But, it is true. So is Cinderella's wish to marry a prince. These are the facts of the eternal world, whether you avail yourself of them or not. Some records show that former slaves starved in bondage for refusing to escape.

They also tell of noble men who lived hard lives because they would not claim their rights. It is a fact that there is a share in the gift of Pentecost waiting for each member of Christ. Grace has given each one a gift.

The promise of the Holy Spirit is to as many as the Lord our God will call. You have a share in that infilling, that divine function, that power in service. It transformed the apostles from timid sheep to fierce lions in fight. You may never have put in your claim, but there is no grace that others have that you may not get. All things are yours.

God has made over you the unsearchable riches of Christ. No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor man's heart conceived, all the grace, love, and power that are yours in Christ. The Divine Deposit Bank stores them for you. It is a pity that you live a beggar's life when you have such wealth and power. But, if you choose to do so, your folly does not change the fact that the fullness of God is yours in Christ. The Word of God has revealed these facts. They will help us cross the brook of troubled emotions to solid ground. Let's stop worrying about our faith or our emotions. Let's trust in them. They are more stable than heaven or earth.

Faith If you want true faith, do not think about it, but look away to the facts we have been speaking. We find no difficulty in trusting our friends, because we open our heart, like south windows, to their love. We recall all their interpositions on our behalf. We remember all they have promised and performed.

Where would we place our troubles about faith if we ceased worrying about it? And instead focused on the object of faith—Jesus Christ our Lord?

Faith is more than a creed. In a creed, it's all about a person or circumstance, but we repose our trust in a per.We must not believe about Christ but in Him. Like Livingstone did.

Once, at night, an army of infuriated savages opposed him. He felt tempted to steal away in the darkness then his eye lid on the promise “I will be with you all the days.” He wrote, “I went to sleep because I knew it was the word of a perfect gentleman.” Do not believe about Christ, but in Him. Faith concerns itself with a person. The faith that passes beyond the fact of our Saviors' life saves and blesses us. We rest not on the atonement, but on Him who made it. Not on the death, but on Him who died. Not on the resurrection, but on Him who rose, ascended, and lives to intercede. He made them.

The inquirer often asks the, “Do I have the right kind of faith?” It is a needful question. A dead, spurious faith will fail us in a crisis, like the canned meats did to an Arctic exploration party. Upon returning to their stores, they found the meats useless and starved. There is one simple reply, “All faith that turns toward Jesus is the right faith.” It may bring no conscious rapture. It may be as weak as the woman’s touch on His garments.

It may be as small and insignificant as a grain of mustard seed. It may be as despairing as Peter’s cry.

“Lord, save, or I perish!” But if its deepest yearning is Christ — Christ—Christ, it is the tiny thread that will. The lost soul, near despair, escaped through dark passages into the light.

True faith reckons on God’s faithfulness. In my youth, I sought greater faith. I thought of God's greatness: His wealth and power.

Why not ask Him for money for His work? He was so rich. Why not carry the entire burden of my responsibilities, since He was so mighty? These thoughts helped me less than my now certain faith.

His clear call has stepped out into any enterprise for Him. We may lose heart and hope. Our heads may grow dizzy, and our hearts may faint. Lovers and friends may stand away. Our foes may mock us, suggesting that God has forgotten us. But He remains faithful. He cannot deny Himself. He cannot disown the helpless child He has begotten. He cannot cast aside the responsibilities He has assumed. He has made, and He must bear.

In dire need, I often turned to God. My nervous depression and heartache had worsened. I said, "My faith is flickering out." Its hand seems paralyzed, its eye blinded, its old glad song silenced forever.

But you are faithful, and I am reckoning on You!” The soul loves to go behind God's promises. Just as a wife need not quote her husband's marriage vows when sure of him and feeling his hand's pressure.

Do not worry about your faith; reckon on God’s faithfulness. If He bids you step out onto the water, He knows that He can bring you back to the boat without harm. An Alpine guide, crossing a jagged ice patch, thinks: Can he carry you if you collapse? His grip is strong, and his frame is sinewy. What iron is to the blood, the thought of God’s faithfulness is to faith. “ By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. ”(Hebrews 11:11). “ No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God. ” (Romans 4:20). Faith bears fruit. It cannot help it. Faith links the soul with Christ. His life's energy pours into the soul through the artery of faith. As it enters, it must find a way out. Fruit is (so to speak) forced from the believing soul. Why does the lark sing? It cannot help it, because someone has poured the spirit of spring into its heart. Why does the branch bear fruit? It cannot help it, because the life-forces are ever pouring up from the root. Why does a child run to meet his mother? He cannot help it, because his heart has imbibed her nature. The believer, united in Christ, receives grace from His heart and His indwelling abundance.

A believer's life speaks. It is not difficult to have faith like this. Put your will on the side of Christ—not a passing wish, but the whole desire and choice of your being. Be willing to believe, or be willing to let others make you willing to believe. Lift your eyes toward Christ.

If you cannot see Him, look toward the place where you think He is. Remind Him that He is the Author of faith, and that it is His gift. Claim it from Him, and reckon that in answer to your appeal, He does confer this priceless boon. You may not feel faith. But you will unconsciously think of Christ. You will count on Him and reach out to Him. That connection with Christ is faith. Be careful of the tender plant that you have thus planted within yourself. Give it plenty of sunshine. Live outside yourself in the consideration of what Christ is. Feed faith on her native food of promise, and let her breathe her native air on the hills of communion. Treat doubts as you would questions about your dearest friend's fidelity. Avoid the cold blast that sets in from skeptical books and talk.

Be sure to live up to your highest conceptions of duty toward God and man. Your faith will be in exact proportion to your obedience. Inability to trust almost always denotes some failure to obey. If your faith is faltering, ask yourself: Have you disobeyed? If so, return to where you lost your obedience. Christian could not face the lions. He had to retrace his steps to the arbour where he had slept, feeling a sense of loss, and recover his roll.

Faith is the primary receptive faculty. It not only reckons that God gives, but it stretches out its hand to take. “ But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God , ” (John 1:12). We receive the atonement from the Lord who died. We also receive the abundance of God's grace from the Lord who lives. So, we will reign when the heavens and earth have vanished. And, when the sea no longer divides us from our loved ones.

“ Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.” (Revelation 21:1). They prepare the beautiful garments, and faith arrays herself in them.

The armour hangs on the wall, so faith girds herself in it. The water of life gushes at her feet, but faith catches it up, as did Gideon’s three hundred men. Faith thus deals definitely with God. She does not see His gifts as the passerby sees a jewel in a shop window. She knows all God's kingdom's regalia are hers, and she takes them as she will.

She hears the voice of her Father saying “You are ever with me, and all that I have is yours.”

It was not enough that God should give the land of Canaan by promise and covenant to the chosen race. They had to go in to have it, to put their foot down on its soil, to till its acres, and to live in its rich products.

So it must be with the believer. First, he has a living faith that unites him with Jesus. It rests in Him as Savior, Friend, and King. Then, he believes that the Son of God can make him a joint-heir of His vast wealth. Finally, he learns to receive and use this great inheritance. Year by year, he expands his hold on the vast territory assigned to him in Jesus.

Oh! Settler on the boundless continent of God’s fullness in Jesus, get up into the high mountain. Look in every direction. Explore the full range of God's love. It is all yours from the river of Time that rises at your feet to the utmost sea of Eternity. Go up and claim the land, inheriting all that God has bestowed on you in the Son of His love without any hesitation.

Feeling Our feelings are deceptive because external influences can manipulate them with ease. The state of our health, changes in the weather, society, or the absence of those who love us affect them. When the air is light and the sun shines, we are more disposed toward God if we have slept well. This is truer than when the dripping November fog drenches the woodlands. The Father who made us and knows our frame understands this. Elijah was so worn out after Carmel, his flight, and Jezebel's refusal. He threw himself beneath a juniper tree and asked for a quick death. God sent him sleep for his nerves and food for his hunger.

As a rule, faith bears fruit in feeling. “ Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. (Romans 5:1–2). “ Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory.” (1 Peter 1:8).

When the prodigal returned, the father bade his servants slay the fatted calf, saying: “Let us eat, and be merry.” There is relief from sin, joy in forgiveness, and the Father's light. There is a sense of rightness and a calm outlook on the future. When the King comes to His own, the bells ring out their petals in the waiting air, as if drunk with joy!

Happy and blessed feeling is the effect of the Spirit’s work on the soul. “B ut the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. ” Galatians 5:22-23 He is the earnest of our inheritance. In our childhood, we cannot expect to enter into the fullness of our heritage. But, we enjoy its first fruits with privilege. There are foretastes of the river of His pleasures and stray notes from the full chorus of bliss. When the Holy Spirit reveals the Bridegroom, the heart is glad. This is despite the couple not yet celebrating the nuptials. But the lack of feeling does not always indicate we are wrong. There may be causes, as we have seen, that account for our depression. Christ would teach us to distinguish between: love and the emotion of love; joy and the rapture of joy; and peace and the sense of peace. Or He may desire to find out whether we cling to Him for Himself or His gifts.

Children greet their father from the window as he turns the corner and comes down the street. He hears the rush of their feet along the hall as he inserts his key in the door. But one day he begins to doubt their motives. Do they greet him for his gifts or his sake? One day, thus, he gives them due notice that there will be no gifts when he returns at night. Their faces fall. But, at the return hour, they are at the window as usual. Then, there is the same tramping of little feet to the door.

“Ah,” he says, “my children love me for myself,” and he is glad.

Our Father sometimes cuts off our joy and lets us hunger. He does this to know our hearts and if we love Him for Himself. If we still cling to Him as Job did, He is glad and restores comforts to His mourners with both hands. Seek feeling, and you will miss it; be content to live without it and have all you need. If you are always noticing your heartbeats, you will bring on heart disease.

If you are always muffling against cold, you will become very subject to chills. If you constantly think about your health, you will induce disease. If you are always consulting your feelings, you will live in a dry and thirsty land, where there is no water.

He that saves his soul will lose it. Be indifferent to emotion. If it is there, be thankful. If it is absent, do God's will. Trust in Him, speak well of Him, and, above all, hide your suffering. Don't be a stumbling block to others. Then joy will overtake you as a flood. He will make you sit at His table and will gird Himself to come forth and serve you.

Cautions Five cautions for the culture of the devout life. Heed them for holy joy and peace.

1. We must be still before God. In this age, a constant rush and effort characterize the life around us. It is the age of the express train and telegraph. Months crowd years, and day’s crowd weeks.

This feverish haste threatens religious life. The stream has already entered our churches and stirred their quiet pools. Meetings crowd on meetings. They all contain the same energetic souls who engage in many good works beside. But, we must beware. We must not swap the active for the contemplative, the valley for the mountaintop. We cannot separate ourselves from the other without risking danger. “The sheep must go in and out. The heart must receive the blood to recharge and prepare it to impel again to the extremities.

2. We must make time to be alone with God. The closet and the shut door are indispensable. We must lose the glare of the sunny piazza so that we may see the calm angel figures bending above the altar. We must escape the din of the world to become accustomed to the accents of the still, small voice. Like David, we must sit before the Lord. "Happy are they who have an observatory in their heart- house. They can often retire beneath the great arch of eternity. There, they can use their telescope to view the mighty constellations. These constellations turn beyond life's fever. They reach regions where human applause or censure cannot follow!

It is only in such moments that the best spiritual gifts will loom in our vision or we will have the grace to receive them. It is impossible to rush into God’s presence, catch up anything we fancy, and run off with it. To attempt this will end in mere delusion and disappointment. Nature will not unveil her rarest beauty to the chance tourist. Pictures, the result of a life's work, hide their secret beauty from a gallery visitor.

No one can read a charter at a glance. And God’s best cannot be ours apart from patient waiting in His Holy Presence. A parable or a pretty story may put off the superficial. But, they cannot know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.

2. An eager desire must possess us. There is a difference between wishing for a thing and willing it. In a single hour, we may wish for a hundred differing objects and forget them. But how different from this is the fixed determination, the settled purpose of the will!

The lad sees some sports equipment. The student is a rare book. The lover, a jewel-encrusted ornament for his beloved. In each case, the will is wrought upon till it resolves to acquire at any cost. They encounter privation, self-sacrifice, and delay with cheerfulness. Nothing can extinguish or slacken the determination that follows hard after its quest. So with us.

3. We must hunger and thirst. A strong desire must consume us. We must be ready to use violence to take the kingdom of heaven. Scripture's expressions are intense. "The deer pants for flowing streams. Jacob won't let the angel go. The widow troubles the unjust judge day and night." We too, may have this strong desire if we let the Spirit of God produce it in our hearts. But the merchant must be determined to seek and find the good pearl. We must strive to enter the straight gate. We must agonise (to use the apostle’s word) as the athlete for the crown.

4. We must have a promise in our hand. This is the true method of dealing with God. Search the Bible for some holy word that exactly fits your case. It won't be hard to find one. Scripture abounds with personal incidents from all walks of life. Then, when you discover it, and the divine Spirit bears it in on you, take it with you into God's presence. Or, touch it with your finger as you enter the chamber, with a hushed and reverent step. The promises are our inventory of possession. Our need should make us seek and claim the intended blessing to meet it.