How many times do we hear people say they believe in God, and that's mostly when they are in real trouble.....

I as most of you know love to find and read, M R Dehaan books.  I am currently reading Adventures in Faith.  I was reading last night and came upon a quote that really made me think. 

"Abraham believed God.  Now Paul does not say that Abraham believed in God, but rather, he believed God.  There is a vast difference between believing in God, and believing God.  All men, except fools, believe in God; that is, they believe there is a God; but most of them do not believe a word He says."

I have really thought and thought about this statement and I am sure I will continue to contemplate it well into the future.  Think about this statement, and I mean really thing about it, what does it say about your life?  What does it say about the people you know?  the people you meet and the people you don't know or meet?  What does it say about God? 

What does it say about my life?  I have said before that I was born into a family of faith.  My Grandfather Jim was a lay Preacher for a good portion of his life, he was a missionary for a part of his life and he was a man of God to the end of his life.  He wasn't always a man of God, he as a young man was a non believer and an alcoholic.  He became a man that preached the sins of alcohol the rest of his life after he was saved.  I have no knowledge of his salvation or how it came to him.  I never asked him and he never spoke to me about it. I do know that about a week before my Grandmother Thelma and my Grandpa Martin died he had had a deep conversation with them trying to lead them to salvation, from all accounts he didn't persuade them to change their believes but I don't know that they didn't accept the Lord of their own accord in their last days only God would truly know that.  My Grandfather Jim raised all of his children up in the Lord.  To my knowledge all 8 of them are saved and but I don't know for sure, only God would know.  I was raised up in the Lord by my Father, and my Mother, but my Mother came to faith as an adult and was not raised up in it.  My dad was a lay Preacher for a good part of his life.  Sometimes I think that being raised up in the faith of the Lord can have an almost opposite effect than people would think.  Most will say that, or think that, preachers kids are born to salvation, well not always, think of the jokes about "preachers daughters".  All jokes have a grain of truth in them.  I remember some of my aunts experiencing quite a bit of rebellion in their lives before they settled in to faith in God.  Okay, I digress.  I wasn't by any means my families most rebellious child and I, with 3 of my siblings, sought salvation at a young age.  Which is not always the case, sometime kids raised up in faith are so complacent to faith that they don't seek their salvation for a long time, sometimes they are so caught in believing in  that they don't believe, once they are at the age of accountability. I personally believe the age of accountability is between 12 and 20.  I base that on a couple of chapters in the Bible, the chapters the tell of Jesus leaving his family when he was twelve and being found in the temple conversing with the Church elders and when asked why he had ran away, He said he must be about his fathers business.  The other reverence, I find, during the flight of the children of Israel from Egypt.   The people sinned against God and he condemned all who were over the age of 20 wonder in the desert until they all was died, only the people who had been under 20 except two got to go into the Holy land of Canaan.  Surely that would say that God did not hold them accountable if they were under 20.  These are my beliefs from studying the Word of God.  I know many have others thoughts on this.  Back on subject, believing in or actually believing God.

I know that as I said some people, even those raised up in faith, struggle with believing in or believing.  I never really thought of it as being a difference, and I think maybe many of you haven't either, but when you contemplate it and really think, and I mean really think about it, the difference is the difference between salvation and being lost.  I know lots and lots of people that are "spiritual", or believe in a "higher being", or believe but don't have time to do the "god thing".  I have always accepted that but in the last 3 years, I have begun to think that they are in trouble.  I was one of those Christians that was saved as a young person and then went into hibernation.  I was saved but my faith didn't grow.  I was a babe in Christ far longer than I should have been and was a carnal Christian, saved but not working for a reward not trying to win souls to Christ, not sharing my salvation as a testimony.  I am lucky that God never figured I was no longer worth his patience and he didn't just let me die and meet the Judgment Seat of Jesus.  I know now that God knew I would pick up my Bible and advance from milk to meat and become the Christian he knew I could be, a spiritual Christian, a Christian working toward my reward.  The Christian God knew me to be.  I have in the last 3 years become a Christian working toward knowing what God wants of me, talking to him in a more seeking and real way.  I always sought him but in the past I sought him only in need, I never sought him just to Praise him, just to be with him, or just to know him more.  I now do daily.  I am trying to teach my Littles that as well, much more than my older kids, as they were raised in my more carnal Christian years, now I speak to them to seek their salvation and seek God, and much more than I was raised.

I sorrow for my friends that don't believe God, oh they believe in him but that is as far as it goes.  I sorrow for my family members that only believe in God, I sorrow for the people I know that are believers in God and do not believe him.  Salvation is about believing the Word of God, to actually know that his Words about his son are absolutely the truth with proof and no doubt.  I still say the first five words in the Bible lead you to your salvation, that you believe the "In the beginning God created....."  If you can believe that you have no problem knowing that "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, and who so ever believe in him (Jesus) shall not perish but have everlasting life." I know you will say it says believe in,  it say to believe in Jesus, and to do so you have to believe that God did it.....

I don't want you to believe in God, I want you to believe God, a vastly different thing.  God is not about feeling, emotions or knowing, he is about the simple, the very simple, act of belief.  You either do or you don't, it's sort of like being pregnant you are or you aren't.  Do you believe?  I pray so....tomorrow.