The Measure of Faith

Well, this is Mark Morgan, and I want to greet you today in the name of the Lord. We're excited to be a part of this 75th General Conference, amen — even though it's a little different this year, a virtual conference, but nonetheless we're excited about being able to participate and be a part of these breakout sessions. And hopefully we'll explore the Word of God together today and find some interesting things, amen. Again, God bless you, and we pray that all is well, and that God is protecting you, your family, congregations, churches, the people of God, amen.

I want to talk to you today about the measure of faith — the measure of faith. I want to read from Romans chapter 12 and verse number 1: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. 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." Verse 4: "For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another." Verse 6: "Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith." Amen. I want to stop there, and tie in especially verse number 3 and verse number 6 as we talk about the measure of faith, amen.

I find that Romans chapter 12 is very intriguing. The way it starts is very intriguing to me; there's a lot of spiritual insight into it. First of all — I have this question asked a lot: "How do I find the will of God? What method or what means do I use to find the will of God?" First of all, I think that in the statement "the will of God," we have to understand that there is basically a battle of wills: there's your will, my will, and then there's the will of God. So what do I do to get past my will and to find the will of God? Well, according to this, Paul gives us the answer: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice."

I remember asking Dr. James Hughes one time about that verse of Scripture and what it really meant, about a living sacrifice, and he gave a pretty good definition and insight to it. He said, "Well, you know, in the Old Testament, when we offered a sacrifice, we put it on the altar one time; it was dead, it stayed there, it didn't come off the altar. The problem with us is that we can die today, but tomorrow we can come crawling off the altar and we want to live again. Our will wants to be prominent." And so this living sacrifice means it's a daily sacrifice. This is a lifestyle that we live.

So Paul goes on to say that this is "a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." Now watch what he says here: "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." So I think Paul's given us pretty good instruction and insight on how to find the will of God. First of all, I think that the will of God has to be found at the altar. Now, when we talk about altars, I think sometimes we get a little confused about them, and we associate the altar with prayer. Well, we do pray at the altar — I'm not saying that there's not an aspect of prayer at the altar — but basically the altar was about dying out. So it wasn't just that — a lot of people can pray, but they have no altar. And I hope that makes sense. But you can never have a true altar and not have prayer.

So the deal is, when we look at this, he tells us that we are to present our bodies a living sacrifice. The biggest battle that any of us have is the battle of the wills — my will versus the will of God. I've always said that Jesus Christ did not die — I know in the physical sense — but He did not die at Calvary; He died in the garden. I believe He died when He said — I believe this was the ultimate sacrifice — when He prayed in the garden, "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass" — and here's the key — "nevertheless, not my will, but Thine, be done." So you have here this great battle of the will that is the biggest struggle that we all have: being self-willed versus understanding the will of God.

So here Paul says, "Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." Now, I know some people just apply that only to salvation, but this is really a particular lifestyle that the apostle Paul is dealing with us about. Number one: it doesn't take much — my mind, my will automatically lends toward me being conformed to this world. So Paul says, "But be ye transformed." How? By the renewing of your mind. Well, how is my mind renewed? My mind is renewed at the altar, when I'm dying out to my will — I'm praying the same prayer that Jesus Christ prayed: "Nevertheless, not my will, but Thy will be done." It's here that, once my will is crucified and my will is put aside, it's here that God can begin to transform my mind. He begins to transform me to do His will by renewing my mind.

I understand that some people would just view this Scripture as salvation, but I believe that it implies a particular lifestyle. My mind is renewed — of course when it talks about this, it's not just renewed by salvation — but I think, as Paul alludes to the previous verse, it's a living sacrifice. In other words, my mind has to constantly be renewed, because if it's not renewed, then what happens is my thoughts, my thinking — I become self-willed; vain imaginations, all sorts of things begin to take course. So I think here Paul's given us a little formula or method for living for God: the fact is, there has to be a continual — I would advocate today that it's probably better for me to focus on that every day.

If you'll remember in the Lord's Prayer, Jesus said, "Thy kingdom come" — which says, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done." Now later He says, "Give us this day our daily bread." I think that was components of prayer for our daily prayer life: asking God, "Let Your will be done in earth" — not "on earth," but "in earth" — "let Thy will be done on earth," which I believe is in us. So I think it's important every day that I have to go to this altar, every day I have to present this living sacrifice — that if I'm not careful, and my mind is not renewed, then, as the Scripture says, I become conformed; my thinking starts going adversarial against the thinking of God.

The Bible says a carnal mind — which I believe is the most deadly or dangerous mind there is. Personally, I believe that the carnal mind is a mind of someone whose mind has been regenerated by the Holy Ghost, but yet now they're reverting back to the flesh, and they've gotten into this carnal realm of back and forth, from spiritual thought to carnal thought. Peter's a prime example of that. One moment Jesus is asking, "Who do men say that I am?" Peter's response was very clear: "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona." But if you'll watch, six verses later, the same Jesus that said, "Blessed art thou," says, "Get thee behind me, Satan: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men." Well, what happened? One moment he's blessed; now he's being referred to as Satan. What happens is, one moment he's speaking by divine illumination — he's speaking by the revealing, his mind, illumination coming to his spirit and mind, of who Jesus is. But when Jesus goes to the subject, "I'm going to die; I'm going to Jerusalem; I'm going to die" — that didn't fit into Peter's mind. That was not what he perceived the will of God was for the Messiah. So now he speaks against it: "We're not going to let You do that." And of course, there the carnal mind — our own reasoning, our own logic — takes over. "This is not fitting the way that I thought it was going to fit. This is not happening." This is Peter's problem: "This is not happening the way that I thought it was going to happen. I got the revelation of who You are, but now my mind must be renewed, and something needs to happen in my mind for me to comprehend that the plan of God, according to Isaiah, is for the Messiah to suffer."

So it's very important for us to recognize this and understand. Again, Paul's dealing with a lifestyle. Now we get into all this still about "that ye may prove." First of all: be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove — prove. In other words, it's not just enough for God to renew your mind; now something has to be transformed, there has to be something that begins to take on formation, and then you could go prove what is that good, acceptable, and perfect will of God. Again — I don't think there's three levels of the will of God. I think the will of God: it's good, it's acceptable, and it's perfect. But it has to be proven. So in other words, my mind is renewed. If it's not that — I'm being conformed to this world; I'm thinking the way that I want to think; my will is in the driver's seat. But when I die out, when I give myself as a living sacrifice and my mind is renewed — it's renewed by God speaking to me and giving me His mind. "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ." I know it's talking about servitude and humiliation, but the fact is, we need to find the mind of God, the will of God, and then we act it out. We go do what He said that we were to do. We prove what is the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God.

Now, in verse number 3, he says: "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, first of all, in the very start of this verse, when Paul says "through the grace given unto me" — you're going to watch Paul use that term a lot. In Ephesians chapter 4 he talks about "according to the grace that was given"; Corinthians, he talks about the grace. So he understood that his ministry and what he was doing, and this grace that was given to him to do these things — he wasn't doing it on his own; he didn't have enough strength, but it was by the grace of God. And of course, grace is also given to us by measure. So in other words, God has measured His grace to me for me to be able to do these things and be able to perform these things.

So: "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, I hear a lot of people talk about — okay, everybody that's saved — and they just use these verses for salvation: "So once you're saved, God gives to every man the measure of faith, so all of us got the measure of faith." I agree with that in a sense, but yet it's broader than that. "For I say, through the grace given me" — now watch what he says — "that you ought to think soberly; don't think of yourself more highly than you ought to think." So I don't think that the measure of faith is just that I got saved and so God gave me this faith. But actually, the key statement in here is that every man should not think of himself more highly than he ought to think. Now remember, we're talking about the will of God; the subject, of course, Paul's dealing with is doing the will of God and proving the will of God. So this again deals with the will. It begins with my thought; it begins how I'm thinking. So he says, "Now don't think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, for God has dealt to every man the measure of faith."

Now in this — the word "measure" here: the word "measure," of course, would come from a root word where you would get a meter, or something that's meted; it is particularly a measure; it's a limited portion; it's a degree. So God's given to every man the measure of faith. Well, I personally believe that that measure of faith that Paul's talking about here is by what's being renewed in our minds — what God is speaking to us as His will is. So in other words, God is speaking to me, God is sharing me His will, and it's God that gives the measure of faith. I call it the boundaries of faith. So in other words, God says, "Okay, this is My will. This is what I want you to do. This is where I want you to go. That's what I want you to say." So I'm the one that's setting the measure of faith. "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." I know when Paul's writing that to the Romans again, he's dealing again with salvation stuff, but there's a principle that's involved there: faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. So what happens to me — that sets the measure of my faith — is the things that God reveals, or the things that God speaks to me, as He renews my mind and gives me understanding of, "This is My will; I want you to now go and prove it."

Now, I think that we get in trouble because — I've used this text a lot in preaching a message called "Boundaries," and I established the fact that what Paul's actually saying to everybody here is: God is the one that sets the boundaries of your faith. You don't set it; somebody else doesn't set it; but it's God that sets the boundaries, or the measure, of your faith.

Now, "to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think" — let's just try to create a word picture here. So in other words, this is the illustration that I would use, all right? God speaks to me and says, in regard to my ministry, my life, "I want you to go three steps and stop." All right: "I want you to go three steps and stop." But to somebody else God says, "Okay, I want you to go seven steps and stop." Well, pride — pride's a dangerous thing; pride is a very dangerous thing. Because you should not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think. In other words — obedience, and success — we've got to quit: the measure of faith cannot be determined by someone else's measure. In other words, if God speaks to this man to have a 10,000-soul revival, but He speaks to you that you're going to have a thousand-soul revival, you cannot compare the measure of faith that God's given you to his measure. Because if you're not careful, pride will cause you to think more highly than you ought to think — meaning that this is the boundaries of my faith, this is the measure of my faith, and I need to be careful not to go beyond that. For me to go beyond that and to think that I can fill in the blanks — and here's the deal: "Okay, I've got to go three steps; he got to go seven. So I know there's four more steps." Okay, so you have to be very careful that pride doesn't enter the picture, that causes you to go beyond what God told you to do.

You know, in America success is viewed as one thing, but in the Scripture, success basically is not measuring yourself with someone else and what they've accomplished; but basically it is: as long as I'm in obedience to what God's told me to do. So if God tells me, "Go three steps and stop," and I do that, then I'm just as successful as the man that God told to go seven steps and stop. So it's here that God says the measure of faith.

Now, when you come on down through here — don't think of yourself — basically, when you go beyond what God has said, you've now assumed the position of God. The very thing that Lucifer said: Lucifer said, "I don't like the boundaries that God has put me in, so I will exalt; I'll go do this." And he goes beyond the boundaries that God had given; he goes beyond the measure that God had given. And when he did — "I will exalt and be like the most High God." So when pride enters, exaltation comes in; we go beyond what God's told us to go beyond. And when we do, we've now assumed the position of God out of pride: "I know what's supposed to be next; I know what's going to happen next."

So now later Paul uses this term — and I'll hurry to a close here — Paul uses this term: "Let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith." Now, I've heard some people say, "You know, if you've got faith to believe that, you say it." Well, I don't necessarily believe that. I can say, "By faith I say these things; by faith I claim these things." But when it comes to prophesying — prophesying is not me just thinking something in my mind and saying, "Okay, I've got faith to believe this, so I'm going to prophesy it." No. But faith again cometh by hearing. When it comes down to the word "proportion" there, basically it means something that's said, or including a thought. So in other words, whatever it is that I'm about to prophesy, it's something that has been said to me; it is the will of God; it's something that God has established, He's decreed into my thought, into my mind, my spirit. "This is what I prophesy." So God sets the measure of it. God says, "This is what I'm going to do. Now, when you prophesy this and you speak this, then don't speak beyond this. Stay within the confinement of what I've told you. Don't add to it; don't take away from it; but speak exactly what I've told you to speak."

I think we get in trouble sometimes when we go beyond what God's told us. You know, a lot of people want to fill in the blanks. You know, prophecy is a very unique thing, because Paul taught the Corinthians that prophecy is in part. So I've had to learn through experience and all that: when God speaks some things to me, I can't make that the sum total. It's a part of something. And so I hear that, I do that, I'm obedient to that, and then He'll add something else; He'll speak something else; He'll reveal something else; He'll add to something else. And I've learned that every day, if I can just find the will of God for that day and build according to that day, according to the will of God, every day connects — and days become weeks, weeks become months, months become years, and years becomes a life. I think this is the key to it. I think this is where the measure of faith — when God speaks something to me, I can't fill in the blanks and go beyond that.

I've had a lot of people do that. I've had a lot of people come to me and say, "The Lord spoke this to me" — and I believe that He did. But then where people get in trouble is as they go beyond what God said. I've been there. I've been there. One situation in particular: God spoke to me in a revival service some very specific things, dealing with people and some sin in the church. But I went beyond that. And when I did, I was about to get myself in trouble spiritually, get myself in trouble. And finally, through prayer and a warning from God, I realized, "You know, God said, 'I didn't tell you to do this. I didn't tell you to say more than that.'" And so I had to back up and repent. So I don't want to fill in the blanks. I don't want to add to it. But I want to go to the altar; I want my will to die out, my ways to die out; I want to explore in my mind to be renewed to what the will of God is; and then I want to go prove it.

So again, I think that the measure of faith, and it being said that God has dealt to every man the measure of faith: let God speak to you. It doesn't matter if He tells you this, and somebody else something you would think greater or more successful — don't get caught up in that trap. Don't get caught up in that trap. Hear what God's saying; know what the will of God is; prove it; go do it. And you know what? When you do that, you've stayed within the confines of the measure of faith. You've stayed within the confines, and pride's not exalted you beyond it.

So, you know, a lot of people get in trouble — I'll close with that — a lot of people get in trouble when they try to out-think God: "Well, I think this is what God ought to do." No. I can only say and prophesy whatever it is that God has spoke or decreed to me. Now again, I can, by faith, claim some things — "By faith I believe this." But when it comes to prophesying or the measure of faith, then that's up to God, how He establishes that. So again, I think that's found at the altar. I think Paul gave us a good formula and recipe for finding the will of God.

So I want to encourage you: we're entering into a time right now where God wants to speak to His people. He wants to decree His wisdom and His will. If we've ever needed that, we need it right now. We need to inquire of God. We don't need to be conformed by fear; we don't need to be conformed by difficulty or circumstances in our world. Right now we're dealing with a pandemic, but we don't need to be conformed by that, to think this. But we need to go to the altar and let our will and our thinking die out, to where we can find the will of God, we can find that measure of faith, and then go do what God's called us to do. There's a great harvest ahead of us; there's great revival ahead of us. But let's find the will of God; let's find the wisdom of God; let God establish the measure of faith in your life, amen.

God bless you. Hopefully this has kind of helped you a little bit. I'm sharing some of the things that I've learned through life experiences. So go to the altar; die out to your will; find the will of God; go prove the will of God; and don't go beyond that. Don't think beyond that. Don't fill in the blanks. Be obedient. And if you're obedient to what God's told you, then truly, in the sight of God, you're successful. God bless you. I've enjoyed spending this time with you, and hopefully it's been very helpful.