What is Faith?
Many Christians use the term "Faith" all the time without fully realizing what it really is. When Christians don't understand it fully they cannot increase in it.

Faith is made up of 3 things:
1. Knowing God's Word
2. Believing God's Word
3. Doing God's Word

If you are missing or unbalanced with any of these three concepts then your faith will suffer.

A Common Misconception…
The most common misconception about Faith is: "We should focus less on doctrine and theology and get to what really matters - spreading the gospel and doing God's will."

A statement like this is dangerous. Because what is doctrine and what is theology? Theology means 'The study of God.' So we can restate that misleading statement to say "We should focus less on the study of God and focus more on what really matters – the spreading of the gospel and doing God's will." A belief such as that can undermine one's faith to the point of complacency with an immature understanding of God and his Word.

Faith is only as strong as…
The more we get to know God, the more we can trust him. It is not the less we know, the more Faith we can have – if that were the case, we should never read our Bibles. How do we get to know him more? Through the study of his word.

This is not just reading random chapters every night – that is why it's called 'study'. The study of him and his word comprise of personal reading, Church, Sunday School, Bible Studies, books, classes, etc. All of which are considered theology (The study of God). We try to learn more about God's attributes, how he works and his promises.

But Knowing God More is Useless Unless…
Bible study is great but it is not complete. I bet you Satan knows the Bible better than any of us. An atheist can sit down and memorize the Bible and know it's theology back and forth. But unless he believes what it says, it does him no good.

Even believing what you've read is not enough. One cannot say, "I have faith that if I train everyday, my muscles will grow big and strong," and leave it at that. Knowing and believing the theories about training does you no good unless you actually go out and do the training. That's why the Bible says "Faith without works is dead" (James 2:26). You actually have to follow through with what you Know and Believe about God's Word.

Where do we go wrong?
We as Christians go wrong by leaving out one or two of the three parts of Faith.

Examples: Knowing God's Word, without Believing the real truth of it, and Doing without understanding leads to legalism. Knowing and Believing without Doing is not obeying commands that God has given in his Word. A small amount of Knowledge, coupled with Beliefs and Doing leads to acting from emotion and not from understanding (emotionalism).

How Do We Increase Faith?
Focus on all three parts.

1. Knowing God's Word – Study God and his Word. Leave the spiritual milk behind and start eating spiritual meat. Figure out your personal calling.

2. Believe God's Word – Meditate on his Word and see how it applies in your life. Accept your personal calling.

3. Do God's Word – Obey God's commands. Fulfill your personal calling.