when you were out here in California a couple of years ago teaching in my Church you opened us up to a good illustration and understanding similar to the teaching of this article on 1 John 5:15. You showed us what it means to ask in His Faith according to His Will and not in our natural faith that we were born with. You asked us to look at, what some deem the sleeping and uncaring, Savior, who was in one of “many” boats on the sea that stormy and windy gale force winds day, so great a sudden squall, the waves were filling the “boats”. Cf. Mark 4:36. Their natural faith caused them to believe they were going to perish. Had they understood His Faith and His Will properly they quickly would have realized that the Scripture taught He was going to die at the hands of ungodly men crucified on a Cross not die by drowning in the sea.

In that particular boat that Jesus was sleeping in, notwithstanding the fact that all the other boats following that boat were equally experiencing the same grave circumstances of life that day, the disciples, not of His Faith, but of the kind of natural faith “circumstances” avail upon us to rely upon from birth, woke Him up proclaiming, “Jesus, don’t you care that we are going to perish today”? Jesus wakes up and rebukes the storm and the sea instantly becomes calm for everyone in all the boats on the sea that day. He then promptly rebukes the sailors for their “lack” of utilizing His Faith and maybe, more to the point, rebukes them for exercising their great faith instead of the gift of Faith He gave them already. As you pointed out when you were here, they were using theirs and not His Faith to deal with the circumstances that were so quickly brought upon them.
That Faith, His Faith, if they had understood the Scriptures correctly, would have taught them how to deal with that circumstance. They would have already understood that He was going to die another way, by what means and outside Jerusalem. Had they understood that Truth of Scripture, they would have discarded their natural faith in those present circumstances that day and rose up and used His Faith available to everyone who will do the Will of God in this world His Way and rebuked the storm? By His Faith they would have summarily rebuked the storm instead of waking Him up and accusing Him of not caring for their lives. Obviously He cared for them as He was there asking them to follow Him! By the way, when we are using our own natural faith in the circumstances we face each day in this generation, we tend to be blinded and not realize that there will be True benefit to all involved in the same situation where His Faith is needed. He lets His rain fall on the just and the unjust! Great harm will come upon everyone who does not believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, even in today’s world.

He taught them how He was going to die already, by whose hands and by what means and where. Clearly if they had understood what the meaning was in the Scriptures He was teaching them, they would have realized at a minimum that He was not going to perish by drowning in the sea that day and since He was in their boat, they most likely were not going to perish that day either. Only His Faith makes sense out of the Will of God, Scripture and our present circumstances.

When we learn to understand Scripture with our natural faith we will be filled with fears and not understand the promises of God nor comprehend the adversity that comes to test the Faith once delivered to the Saints that works in our lives too. What this false faith movement does is blind us so that we do not see clearly God’s intentions and His reality as foretold in Scripture already. His Word will not come back to Him void. Godliness and content is great gain, not a “means” of great gain as the faith teachers teach falsely. Our natural faith always opposes God’s Will and purpose and voids His Grace in our lives.

He does not teach us anywhere in Scripture to name it and claim it and live it in our day as the King’s kids according to our will and purpose to please us. That is impossible. No, His Faith is given to us to please Him in every good work that He deems is possible for us to do. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. Without His Faith it is impossible to please Him or do good works. Natural faith is deceitful and this deadly faith comes naturally working in us at birth and it brings ruin upon this sort of believer. We inherited this kind of faith from Adam. His Faith kills it. It is His Faith alone that can kill it. Whatever God gives us to do will be possible for us to do so that He gets all the Glory. Whatever we ask of God to do that is not of His Will is impossible for Him to do for us because He cannot sin. This kind of prayer does not bring Him Glory. It is a vain prayer prayed with a vain imagination to fulfill our vain lusts and the will of the devils. That is why in one breath Jesus blessed Peter when he answered correctly according to the Will of God and then moments later He rebukes Satan in Peter saying he sets his mind on the things of man and not on the Will of God:

Mat 16:21 From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.
Mat 16:22 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.”
Mat 16:23 But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

michael
Eureka, Ca.