When a man just takes him at his word, God appreciates it wonderfully. He holds faith very high. It is because man's only clew to spiritual things, from the recognition of which he is shut off in his body of flesh, and the only possibility of his entering into any right relation with God and heaven and Jesus, lies in faith. Now, God loves us; and, therefore, he rejoices over every precious little bud of faith that shows itself. Because Abraham believed the seemingly impossible thing that to him and Sarah a son should be born, God counted it to him for righteousness. Because Joseph believed God's promise that God would bring Israel up into their own land, and was content to leave his body in a foreign land until the time of God's promise should be fulfilled when his bones would be carried to the burying place of his fathers, God gave him honorable mention. Because Moses, knowing the high calling of Israel, and assured that God would fulfill his promises toward them, preferred to cast in his lot with the oppressed race of slaves and, to be numbered among them [159] rather than to have all the glory of Egypt's court, God set him on high. Because Rahab believed that Jehovah, according to his word, would be with Israel and was able to give them the victory, she was saved, and her household, in the day of the downfall of Jericho. But it was not merely the believing that pleased God; for all Jericho believed very much the same thing Rahab believed, only they feared it and fought against God's decree, but Rahab submitted; they strove to overturn it if possible, but she aided in the accomplishment of God's word. Thus faith, when it puts us in harmony with God and enlists our hearts and hands in the accomplishing of his will and purposes, the trust that flies to him for refuge and takes sides with him--that is the thing God seeks as a precious jewel and that is counted to us also for righteousness. (Rom. 4:23-25.)

      Faith is a simple and natural thing. Its results, however, are supernatural and inscrutable. It is on man's part simply to trust in Him whom God hath sent to be Redeemer and Savior and Lord; to believe the word, and manifest his belief in word and action. On God's part it sets into motion all the wheelwork of the invisible universe. To endeavor to account for the results of faith by reason and logic on the human plane is little more than folly. Faith has to do with forces which eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and which have never entered into the heart of man, of which we have only a general knowledge and that only by revelation. Natural law may explain a point here and there and nature's analogies may be very suggestive; but there is no law of cause and effect that accounts for the results of faith. Faith opens the door for direct intervention on the part of God. To claim that [160] the heroes of faith, such as those enumerated in the eleventh of Hebrews, were extraordinary men, is, indeed, as has been said, to miss the point entirely. The only advantage they held was their faith in God, on account of which God worked for them and with them and in them and through them; so that their great works were really God's works, and the credit belonged to him; for faith excludes all boasting. Sometimes--yea, often--the men through whom God wrought so marvelously were not even of the average. God chose the weak, the foolish (of small mental powers), the poor, the despised, those "who were not," who went for nothing among men, and by them put to shame the strong, the wise, the rich, the great of this world, "that no flesh should glory in his presence." And to those little ones of God in Christ Jesus, to them Christ was made wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption; so that they stand in his glories and excellencies, not in their own; that, according as it is written, "He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord" (1 Cor. 1:26-31).

[TAG 159-161]