Читать книгу A Search for God Anniversary Edition - Edgar Cayce - Страница 31

Faith is an attribute of the soul. It is the inner spiritual knowledge of the Creative Forces of the universe. As we become cognizant of the physical body through the senses, so we may become aware of the soul through the activity of its attributes. Faith may be denied or renounced until it ceases to exist within the consciousness of the physical mind. It can be acknowledged and exercised until it will remove mountains. That which is brought into consciousness through the activity of spiritual forces, manifesting in and through the spiritual force of the individual, becomes the essence of faith itself. Hence, it has been termed by many that faith, pure faith, accepts or rejects without basis of reason, beyond the ken and scope of that which is perceived through—that which we bring to our activity through—the five senses.

“Faith,” as defined by Barnabas, “is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”¹ Faith knows that it has already received and acts accordingly, doubting nothing. It is the builder of the seemingly impossible. It is that which has brought into manifestation all that has ever existed. God is, faith is. It is the evidence of God's promise fulfilled. Man's divine privilege is to accept, use, develop, and enjoy the fruits of faith.

In the material world we often mistake confidence for faith. We are prone to depend upon our physical senses, forgetting that they are deceptive. This is not faith, but confidence—for confidence comes through the physical senses. When trials and Good disasters arise, that are seemingly beyond our power to control, we begin to sink, and immediately in hopelessness and distress we cry out, “Lord, help me, I perish!” It is then that the Voice speaks, “O ye of little faith!”²

Let us examine ourselves and see whether we are holding to faith or confidence. We must view spiritual things from spiritual standpoints and accept them in a spiritual way.

Many say, “We have faith,” but they begin to explain that it applies to mental and not to material things. We say, “We believe, but—” which means there is doubt, the very opposite of faith. Remember, when we entered this material plane, we became subject to material laws. It is the failure of our senses to perceive and fully to understand these laws that brings many of us to the point where we have little real faith.

There is a world before us to be understood: the mysteries of the universe, the law of love, the power of thought, and the matchless gift of faith. We stumble, we falter, even when we have the divine promise, “If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.”³ With such a promise, should we not cry out, “Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief”?⁴