In this sermon, the preacher shares his revelation about the concept of faith. He emphasizes the importance of understanding that faith is not just a belief or a feeling, but it is substance. He refers to the book of James and Galatians to support his point. The preacher also shares a personal experience where he prayed for finances and realized that he needed to trust God instead of relying on his own abilities. He concludes by highlighting the significance of faith as substance and encourages the congregation to seek a deeper understanding of this concept.

I want to get to an issue that I believe the Lord wants me to share with you tonight. I might say that this is a message I'm going to begin tonight, and I probably will not finish it until tomorrow night. And the reason I'm saying that is that I'll raise some questions in this message tonight that will not be answered until tomorrow night. And so I appreciate you having that understanding. And if you go off and misquote me, then it's your problem, not mine. And I do want you to know that there'll be some questions that will come out of this tonight that will not be answered. And anyway, I'm not a preacher that comes in and answers all your questions. I like to raise a few. And I like to raise them so Jesus can answer them. And he is really the one that should answer your questions, not the preacher. If we could learn our path to Jesus soon in life, we would learn the key to walking with God and having victory in this present life. I feel as a father that one of the things that I need to teach my boys and my daughter also is that there is a way to Jesus, and he has all the answers. He has all of them, all of them. Not some of them, but all of them. Now, you notice that Brother Marion and I have a cup of peace up here tonight. I think he moved his off somewhere. I have to have some water occasionally to help me to speak. I need a little moisture, and it's because of some dryness I can't help. And I tell people jokingly that God is punishing me, because I used to criticize a big, old, fat preacher when I was about six years old for drinking water in front of me. When I'd sit on that front pew, I'd starve to death. And that's really not the case. I just never pull a glass out when I'm in sophisticated churches. And so you can imagine my opinion of yours tonight. I wish I could get this statement across to you. I really wish I could. The Bible is to be heard, understood, and accepted. But more than that, the Bible is to be obeyed. And people really are suffering today because they are not coming to church to obey the Bible. The only thing that I see that I could say to you tonight that might help in the way that God wants to work here is this. You need the heart to obey God right tonight. You need the heart to obey God. I'd say that to you as a preacher, a friend, and a prophet. You just need the heart to obey God. The presence of God is so close to sending a mighty, mighty, mighty revival in this place that I think it would frighten you if you just knew. But the key to it is just simply obey God. And right tonight, if you would make up your mind, especially all of you young people that are here, if you'd just make up your mind in your heart, determine right now in your heart, if God speaks to me tonight, I'm going to obey. I believe that you would see one of the greatest revivals if you obeyed that you have ever even heard of, much less seen. And I challenge you tonight to obey the Word of God. Just sit there and pray, Lord, show me wherein that I'm not obeying the Lord. And give me grace to obey the Lord tonight when this minister gets through preaching. The disciples asked Jesus a rather strange question. Not strange in the fact that it's abnormal. It's just strange because it's such a simple question. He said, Lord, or they said, Lord, what is it that we might do that we might work the works of God? Now, if I came up to you tonight personally and asked you, Sir, what is it that I might do that I might work the works of God? What would you tell me? What would you say? Well, preacher, do this, this, this, this. What would you say? Now, one thing I don't allow, kids, kiddos, is talking, laughing, and writing, and fooling around while I preach. Amen? And I watching every one of you. And if mom and daddy won't handle you, Brother Manley will. Okay. Now, the reason I do that is it really distracts me while I preach. Because I'm not a normal preacher, you know, with notes and all this. I just get up and I listen to God and let God put on my heart exactly what to say to you. As I have studied. Now, I've studied. I've been studying for 40 years, 48 years. And so I'm prepared, but I'm not running by notes. I'm not against them. Sometimes I need them to keep me from running over, preaching two hours, and so on and so forth. But what would you say if I said, if I came to you, Sir, what must I do that I might work the works of God? What would you say? I know what I would have said if someone had come to me back 25, 30 years ago and said, Preacher, what is it that I might do that I might work the works of God? Do you know what I would have told you to do? I would have said, well, to read you, well, the thing you ought to do is read your Bible, pray, go to church, give you money and try to win somebody to Jesus. Now, that would make a good Baptist, wouldn't it? It really would. But I want to tell you something. That wasn't what Jesus said. Jesus said unto them, this is the work of God, that you believe on him whom the Father has sent. Isn't that amazing? Jesus said, listen, the work of God is that you believe on Jesus whom the Father has sent. Now, if I ask you a simple question tonight, do you believe on Jesus whom the Father has sent, what would you say? Most of you, I can tell, would say, why, yes, Preacher, I believe on Jesus whom the Father has sent. Well, that's strange. These men believed on Jesus whom the Father had sent, too. They knew him personally. But he said, the work of God is that you believe on him whom the Father has sent. Now, I want to talk to you about faith tonight. And you're going to have to get your seatbelts on, your heart right, because I'm starting off with you on a level that I do not usually start with people. But I'm believing that the Lord, well, I know the Lord impressed me to preach this message. And I believe the reason is because we're taking off and not having to build a meeting. We're just being able to step in on what God is already doing. Now, I find that there are three levels of faith. I want to give these to you. I call them the grace of faith, the gift of faith, and the impartation of faith. Now, you may not be interested in this, but I've got news for you. If you're ever going to go with Jesus, you're going to have to learn how to trust him. You're going to have to learn how to trust Jesus. The tragedy of the church tonight is that it could be put together humanistically and does not need God. And the only way to get what God can do for a person is by faith. And the Bible says, whatsoever is not of faith is sin. And so God's one real objective in your life and my life is to teach us to walk by faith. The Lord Jesus called his disciples and he began to teach them the great truths. But there was one great truth that he taught them more diligently and more specifically and more intently than any other truth. And that was the truth of trusting Jesus. Jesus was constantly bringing his disciples into predicaments to test them out, to see if they knew how to trust him as he knew how to trust the Father. And Jesus found his disciples completely blowing it. The first time that is so obvious to all of us is in John 6, when Jesus turned. You don't have to turn to these references. If you'll learn after listening to me preach two or three nights, the best thing to do if you want a reference is just if I give you one, write it down. Now the reason I do not give you references in the Bible when I preach on a sermon like tonight is that I do not like to preach to the top of your heads. I like to preach to your eyes. And when I said John 6 then, two-thirds of you bowed your head. Amen. Well, see, you're not listening to what I'm saying anymore. Amen. You're going to run off and get your own sermon and cut back in on me ten minutes down the road. Well, you know, you can't do that with my type of preaching. I do not do deductive preaching. I do inductive. And if you do that with me ten minutes down the road, you'll be lost. And then you might as well stay at home and watch TV. All right? So now, I'm saying that to say this. If you want the Bible references, I'll be more than glad to give them to you. Just feel perfectly free to come by and say, Preacher, where is your Bible scripture references for this or that and the other? And I'd just love to give them to you. Now, in this particular reference in John, we have the Lord Jesus turning to Philip and saying, when he looked out and saw all these hungry people, and he said, Philip, won't you look into the possibility of feeding this crowd? And Philip looked into the possibility of feeding that crowd. And you know what Philip reckoned with? His ability. He checked the purse and found that they had about forty bucks in the purse. And he came to Jesus and said to Jesus, what is this among this crowd? We have about forty dollars. We can't handle this crowd. In other words, Philip acted just like an atheist. Amen. An atheist will act according to his reasoning. Philip did not reckon with the fact that he had the Son of the living God there that could perform any miracle in the world. I mean, he saw him work miracles, but he did not reckon with Jesus. He reckoned with his ability. He acted just like an atheist. Just like an atheist. He flunked the test. Andrew turned around and said, Lord, I found a lad here with some fish and some loaves of bread. But what are they among so many? So Andrew did not much act better, much better, did he? Andrew was in doubt. So he flunked the test. Now, the first man that ever got a glimpse of really seeing what Jesus was out to teach them was Peter. And on every occasion, Peter was the first person to see the new light that God was out to give his disciples. And Peter saw Jesus walking on the water. And he said, Lord, if that's you, bid me to come to you. And Jesus said, come. Amen. Can't you see Peter stepping out on that water? Amen. All the, all the foundation for faith was right there. The foundation of faith is the word of the living God. And Jesus said, what? Come. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. In other words, brother, you can trust God according to the word of God. On the basis of the word of God, you can trust God. Jesus, if that's you, bid me to come to you. Jesus said, come. And beloved Peter stepped out on that water. And whether you believe it or not, that God that Peter was trusting supernaturally enabled Peter to walk on water. I mean, literally walk on the water. Brother, I'll tell you what a miracle. Jesus is performing miracles just like that today everywhere. I mean, just like that today. I mean, he's still in the business. But he's only performing those miracles for those who are trusting him. And only those are trusting him who are able or who know how to get a word from God. Those who know how to get a word from God. Now, I found that there are three types of faith in the Bible. The grace of faith, the gift of faith, the impartation of faith. Now, the grace of faith is mentioned in Romans, the 12th chapter, the third verse. For I say through the grace given unto me to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. Now, then not only do we have the measure of the grace of faith mentioned there, but in 1 Corinthians 12, 8 and 9, we have the gift of faith mentioned, especially in verse 9. He said, to another the faith by the same Spirit and so on. And then in Galatians 2, 20, we have what I call the impartation of faith. I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. Now, I'm going to deal with just the grace of faith tonight. Now, maybe during a morning service, I'll get back to the gift of faith and the other message on the impartation of faith. But I just want to talk about the grace of faith. Now, this definition I must give strictly because of people who are hungry to hear the truth. But I realize that a lot of people who are not listening very distinctly and are not real students of the Word, this will sort of pass over you because it's a little heavy. But the grace of faith is that God-given ability and responsibility whereby man, by choice, can receive from God, can obey God, can believe God according to the revealed will of God. Now, you say, what are you talking about, preacher? And I wish you young people back there would really slow it down because you're really hindering me because that's where my eye is fixing. I just see you all back there talking. And in fact, I'm not going to do this one more time. Amen. I'm going to ask somebody that's big enough to keep you straight to sit by you because we're in a very crucial spot, and the devil doesn't want you to hear this message. The grace of faith. Everybody has the ability to trust God. Everybody has the responsibility to trust God. Everybody, everybody has the ability and responsibility according to the revealed will of God, to trust God. You have it. And if you do not trust God, then, my dear friends, God holds you responsible. Now, the Bible tells us that God moves and works among men according to your faith. Three times in the Bible, and I want to get this across to you. Three times in the Bible, God says, according to your faith, so be it. Do you know what that means? Listen to me carefully. It means that God is working right now, according to your faith. It means he's working right now, according to your faith. Now, listen to me. You say, Brother Manley, I believe God can save my daughter. I believe God can save my son. I believe God can straighten this problem out. I believe God can do that. Now, are you listening to me? Well, let me ask you this. Is he doing it? No, I just believe he can. Well, my dear friends, that's not faith. If you've got faith, God is doing it right now. Does that help you? To help you see you don't have faith? Let me just share an illustration with you. I'm coming at you several different directions here tonight. I'll tell you, back many years ago, while I was just learning the life that relates to God, I asked the Lord, I said, Lord, what is the key to relating to God? Is it intellectualism? Is it emotionalism? How do you relate to God? I said, Father, and God showed me from the Bible that the only way you relate to God is by faith. So if you need God in your life, you need God in your family life, you need God in your community, you need God in your church, the only way to get him there is by faith. You say, what about prayer? Every time you mention prayer, prayer is the breath of faith. So you do not disregard prayer. You see, I'm not preaching down prayer. Prayer is the breath of faith. In other words, if you've got faith, you talk to God. If you've got faith, you ask God things. If you've got faith, you believe God to answer what you've asked him. Now, I said, Lord, well, show me if faith is the way to relate to God, show me how to trust you. So the Lord gave me a problem. And since then, he's given me many problems. But this was the first big problem in my ministry. It involved $30,000. Since then, I have seen the problem of a rebellious son. Since then, I have seen the problem of standing at death's door with all my doctors saying you can't live. Since then, I've seen the problem of my wife with cancer, with the doctors at MD Anderson in Houston, Texas, saying she has no hope. Since then, I have seen numerous problems like that. But I mention them so I can identify with you. Amen, let you know that I have been some places, not everywhere. You may have one I haven't had yet. But this first one was a $30,000 problem. And I understood why God gave a $30,000 problem, because if it had been a spiritual thing, I could have rationalized and said who could be my judge and said I'm not right with God. But it was a material problem. And I said, God, I need some finances. And the Lord spoke to my heart out of the word. And I'm trying to make it short here tonight. He said, no, son, you need to trust me. I said, Lord, I've got faith. And so at that time, I was doing some studying on saving faith out of Hebrews 11. And Hebrews 11, 1 became a reality to me. It says, now faith came by hearing, faith cometh by hearing. Excuse me. I'm quoting John Romans 10, 17. Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. And I looked at that verse and I said, I saw three little words. You know what those three words were? Faith, listen to me carefully, is substance. And I saw those three words and that word substance just jumped out there along with that is and along with that faith. Faith is substance. I said, Lord, that's exactly what I need is substance. That's exactly what I said. And I missed the message. I'm going to say it again. It says faith is substance. Here I was saying, Lord, what I need is substance. And God saying, no, son, what you need is faith. And I said, well, Lord, I've got faith. So you know what God did? Now, listen to me carefully. I said, Lord, I've got faith. He said, well, if you have faith, then where is your substance? And it hit me just like that. I mean, just bang. And I mean, it just overcame me. And I saw it for the first time. You see, when your faith is, God is whatever. Come on. Well, when God, when faith is, God is whatever. Write it in whatever you want to write in. But whatever he is, he is now. And I saw it. I said, well, Lord, my faith is not right. I do not understand. I thought I had faith. So I begin to see now as a psychologist, I looked at faith, you know, from the human standpoint, not as a humanist, humanistically, I'm not, I mean, I'm talking about tearing it down. I saw the psychology of faith from the human standpoint. I saw that faith had three elements in it. I saw that that was the element of intellectualism. I saw that you could, you must, in order to have faith, you must believe that God was. And not only that he was, but that he is. And not only that he is, but that he's a reward of those that diligently seek him. And you must believe that God can do anything. Now, cooperate with me. Can you, do you believe God like that tonight? Well, now, everything I believe God could do, he wasn't doing. So that should have shown me that believing God could do something is not faith. Now, I had all kinds of intellectual faith. I really did. Do you have that kind of night? I not only had all kinds of intellectual faith, but I got into such predicament with this $30,000 problem that I was fixing to have to quit the ministry to go pay bills because the churches wouldn't take care of me. That was a rationalism. Because they were taking care of me according to my, oh, Lord. Amen. That's exactly what was going on. Boy, I was heavy on it. And I found that there's an intellectual element in faith. You want God to take care of you. You desire, you anticipate, you hope, you plan. And this emotional element gives way to fasting and prayer. I wanted God to solve my problem so bad I couldn't stand it. And I knew he could. And I wanted him to so bad I couldn't stand it. But you know what happened? I just prayed and fasted and nothing happened. I believed he could. I wanted him to so bad I couldn't stand it. So I prayed and fasted. Now, isn't that about as far as all of us go? Come on now. Because we're fixing to take a little leap. We're fixing to go out a little step further. Amen. You still here? Don't look at your watches. Hold on. Because I've got to complete this message if it takes to midnight. And the way you listen is the way I'll be able to complete it. The sooner the better. There's one more element in faith. I call it the volitional element. Remember the definition I gave you a while ago? Faith is the ability and the responsibility to obey, to receive, to believe God by what? Choice. Now, you know what I found? I found that in the word of God, God supplies a Christian's needs of faith. According to his riches in glory. That's scripture. I found something else about God. He not only promises he will supply man's needs according to his riches in glory. He says, according to the word of God that he hath already supplied, given unto man all things that pertaineth unto godliness and life. I couldn't believe it. Here was God saying, I've already let you smell it. I couldn't taste it. I couldn't feel it. I couldn't hear it. Therefore, I couldn't understand it. But God said it. God said it. I knew he could. I wanted him to so bad I couldn't stand it. Now, do you see my predicament? Many of you've got children that you'd like to see saved. You believe God can. You wanted him to so bad you can't stand it. And there's a Bible full of promises that you can find that God will do it. Come on. A husband, a wife, children, grandchildren, parents, friends. The only problem with a lot of us, we're not in a predicament like I was to where it's either trust God or get out. But I want you to know with the world out there, it's either trust God or get out. And we're letting them go to hell. And we are turning people by the millions to the devil because we call ourselves believers, but we're not trusting God. I said, Lord, I know you can. I want you to so bad. What else can I do? You know what I found? I found that I could choose to do what? Choose to believe. I could choose to take Jesus at his word. From that moment on, it was a private experience. There's no way I can tell you humanistically how you and God can get to that place where you decide that you're going to take God and his word. But I said, Lord, I'm going to take it at your word. And I'm going to walk out of this office and declare, praise God, what I have believed in my heart. I took Jesus at his word. Believed that not only was he capable, he wanted to, but he was doing it right then. I chose to believe. How did you feel, preacher? Like a fool. What did you think? I was nuts. You said, what happened, preacher? The Lord let me go through a little test. First person I saw was a stinking preacher. He said, how are you doing? I said, praise God. God is solving my problem now. Not tomorrow. He's doing it right now. Unless you're in the now with God on your problem, you're not with God. I wish you'd take that, because that will help you. You know what that preacher said? This is why I said he was a stinking preacher. He said, how is God going to solve your problem? I said, bless God, that's not my problem. My problem, my job, my responsibility is to believe on the Lord Jesus now. That's it. And I started believing on Jesus now. And in two and a half hours, friend, God supernaturally put the wheel in motion and let me know it and solve that problem. Boy, that day was over, friend. I was in another world. But I'd learned something. That when faith is, substance is. When faith is, action is. When faith is, reality is. The whole book of James had opened up. The whole book of Galatians had opened up. I'd learned this little secret, that there's a technique of faith found in Mark 11, 24. And I do want you to turn to that with me, please. As I close. And when I start saying I'm closing, that means I'm coasting down. I haven't come to a stop yet. And here's what I learned. And I'll, you're there now and you'll, I'll point you back to the Word in just a moment. And I really want you to get anchored on this thought. That's why I'm trying to take a little more time here with you. Because I realize this is revolutionary to most churches. And I wouldn't just flop it on you if you hadn't already had some preparation. You know, you've had some preparation. So I, I realize that it's difficult to take this. Here's what I learned. As you receive Jesus Christ, your Lord, when you get saved, so walk ye in Him. And I look back and I realize that when I got saved, I was in the same predicament about trusting Jesus as I was when I trusted Him for that 30,000. I knew He could save me. I knew He wanted to save me and I wanted Him to. And there that preacher was standing up acting like a crazy man saying, bless God, if you just trust Jesus, He'll save you. And I knew He could intellectually. I wanted Him to emotionally. But that preacher said, just believe on Jesus. And I prayed the sinner's prayer and that didn't work. So I was standing there, I said, sink or swim, live or die, go to hell or heaven, I'm coming home. And the moment that decision was made to trust Jesus, I chose to trust Him. I chose to trust Him. And the moment that decision was made, you know what happened? He saved me. Since God is instant, it's hard to decide which one came along first, believing or receiving. But the Word of God divides it up. You know which one comes along first? Believing. You had to believe, instantly you receive. And that day with that $30,000, I believed and instantly I released God to start receiving. And I just kept on believing and kept on receiving. Mark 11, 24, and the King James says, Therefore I say unto you, what thing soever ye desire when ye pray, Watch this, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall what? Which one comes first? Believing. Believing. And then you receive. Good night. See you tomorrow night. Finish the message.