It's time to rip the cover off what really works to ditch addiction, depression, anger, anxiety, and all other kinds of human suffering. No, not sobriety. We're talking the F-word here: Freedom. We'll share, straight from the trenches, what we have learned from leaving our own addictions behind, and coaching hundreds of others to do the same—and since it's such a heavy topic, we might as well have a good time while we're at it. [00:27.6]
Bob: Welcome back to the Alive and Free podcast. Today, we get to talk about faith. Yes, faith has related to freedom and feeling totally alive, and finally having the changes you want in your life and all of those things. It's very, very related and it starts with growing up. Most of you listening to this are probably Christian, some of you may be Muslim or, or Jewish or Hindu, or have no religious background whatsoever, or may have had some and departed from it, or may have not had some and then come to it, whichever tradition you've come from, the idea of faith has probably been one that's been in your life for a long time. The idea of faith now, most people consider when they say faith, they usually are in two strains. They're like, well, what, what faith are you? And then they're referring to a religious denomination. That's not what we're talking about. [01:20.3]
But often the other faith is the idea of faith is that it's a belief in something. It's a belief in something that somehow empowers your life and makes it possible for you to do other things. And while that's beautiful and wonderful. When I was a kid, I had no clue what this meant. It's a word that has been defined so many different ways. And as a little kid, you got to remember little kids don't understand things that aren't really concrete. They understand that you're using the word faith, and they understand that if they say that word in a Sunday school class, that the teacher will give them a treat. And so, they've learned growing up the first several years of their life, seven, eight years of their life, growing up, how to use people's words in order to get what they want out of life. That's fine. Only around seven or eight years old, do abstract concepts like faith, even come into the possibility of them considering it. And then it feels like this invisible thing that you're supposed to have and if you don't have it, oh, ye of little faith, oh my gosh, bad things are gonna happen. And so, I grew up with this really vague notion of faith. How did you grow up with it? Was yours vague or was yours really specific? You're supposed to have faith hope and charity with the greatest is charity, but faith kind of leads to hope which leads to charity and all of these different things. [02:36.6]
So, I remember growing up thinking what the heck is faith. I went as a missionary for a Christian Church to Brazil. And I spent a couple of years there teaching people about need the need to have faith, faith in Jesus Christ, faith in all of these other things. And I still was vague on it. I, you know, I sort of believed in them or something, but constantly throughout those years, I would be studying things. that's dimensioned faith, trying to wrap my head in some way around this concept that never was clearly pinned down by people. And as I looked through scripture, I would see phrases like. by your faith or your faith has made you whole, or by your faith, you have been healed or it's because of your faith that this has happened. And Jesus commonly was blaming other people for what happened to him, meaning he was telling him it was their faith that made it happen. [03:27.9]
Greater faith, have I not seen in all of these places and because of your faith, I've been able to do these great works, but the faithless people didn't get them and so on and so forth. Boy, that seems like it would be a great thing to have, doesn't it? Would you like to have some faith? I'll take me a helping a faith that if it, if it'll make miracles happen, if it'll make healing happen. I was like, man, give me some, I definitely went on want in on this thing called faith. But every door I tried to enter felt like I was just walking into this vast abyss of nothing. That I can, how, how much faith do I actually have? How can I tell if I have faith? What the heck does this actually mean? And so, I just kind of settled for years thinking, oh, well, if I have faith, it means that I'll have a really good feeling in my heart, that the evidence of my life will show what kind of faith I have. If I have faith, it means I'll do the things that I'm supposed to doing, even if I hate them and I'm not enjoying them, but I'll do my duty. And that that's an evidence of faith. You know, show me your faith by your works kind of thing. [04:28.2]
And so well, I'll just do all of these like faith-based things. And that'll be proof that I have faith, but still, I'm not feeling that same healing power, that same miraculous thing happening in my life. And so, it was all very confusing. Doesn't mean it was wrong, just confusing. Well, what I've found is that there is a way out of the confusion and I want to share with you a simple way of looking at the various aspects of faith in a way that actually can enhance your life, whether you're of a particular religious persuasion or not. Because ultimately this boils down to how the mind and body work, how they have been designed by that, which created them the way that they function to produce a really happy, healthy, free life. And we can put words like faith on it so that you can see that even the religious traditions do have it, but we can also just lay it out in really practical terms. [05:25.0]
So, one of the first hurdles you're going to run into when you're dealing with faith is the fact that every prophet, every teacher, the high and the low have all defined it in different ways. For instance, Paul, one of his phrases, well, whether Paul wrote the book to the heat of the letter of the Hebrews are not as under debate, but whoever wrote the Hebrews, you know, faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. That's the king James version of that one. What the heck does that even mean? Faith is the substance of things you hope for. Okay. So, if I'm hoping for money in my pocket, then the substance of that money is faith. What does that even mean? Faith is the evidence of things that are not seen. Okay. So, if I have faith and that means the things that I don't see are real. Is that actually makes sense? What happens like there are plenty of religions around the planet. There's even the Jedi religion around the planet, that's built around the Star Wars universe. Tell me this, they believe in these things that are not seen. Does that mean that they're real? Can you see how it's a convoluted kind of conversation? How it would lead to endless circumlocutions left and right? If I hope for something, then the substance of that thing that I'm hope for is faith. The substance of it is the, those things are made of faith. That doesn't make sense. Okay. But if I believe in something that's not seen, then that means it's real. [06:56.3]
My kids believe in fairies and all kinds of stuff. They believed in Santa Claus that didn't make Santa Claus real. It may be made it real in their experience and maybe made it possible for them to conjure a psychological reality around something. But did that actually make it real, real. Sorry if you're listening to this and you still believe in Santa Claus. Cats out of the bag, sorry. So that's a problem, right? So, if we go from there and we jumped, now when I was raised, I was raised as a member of the church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints, AKA Mormons. And in that faith, there was a book of Mormon scripture or verse in the book of Mormon of Alma talking to some really poor folks. And he's talking to them this big, old, massive discourse on faith, which is absolutely beautiful describing it like it's a seed and grows into a tree if you nourish it, even if you just have the desire to believe. [07:48.0]
But in there he says, faith is like, when you have faith, you believe in things which are not seeing, which are true. You hope for things which are not seen, which are true. Now that's an interesting one that I used to, like I used to hang on. I was like, yes, I hope for things which are not seeing, which are true. It's the truth and faith is that I believe in it, even though I can't see it, but the problem is what if I am believing something that isn't true. It's not seen, I can't tell the difference. Do I have faith only if the things I believe in are true, but if I have the same amount of belief, but in something that isn't really real, then I don't have faith, if I have something else. Again, it's a really circular definition that at the outset sounds like it's saying something. But in the end, when you really examine the language, it isn't really saying much that was useful for me. Now, maybe for a lot of people, it's very useful. So, I'm not denying that it can be a doorway into some key insights. But what, what I wanted to know was how can I mobilize faith? How can I actually acquire this thing that I'm supposed to have? And so, I would jump around from one place to the next and the whole works thing that was there. And that was it, that was in the book of James. And we'll go to another spot and James really quickly, but that spot in there well, if I have faith, I'll show you my faith by my works, but that wasn't producing what I wanted either. So, I just kept falling back on, what is this thing called faith? [09:09.3]
If you or someone you know is looking to drop the F-bomb of “Freedom” in their life, whether that's from past trauma, depression, anxiety, addiction, or any other host of emotional and personal struggles, but they just don't know how or wants some help doing it. Head on over to thefreedomspecialist.com/feelbetternow and check out some of the things we've got in store for you or book a call so we can look at your unique situation and get you the help that you're looking for. [09:37.3]
And finally, one time I read in the book of James in the New Testament, a verse in the first chapter where he invites everybody in verse five, to if you lack wisdom, ask of God who gives liberally to everybody and doesn't sit there and scold you because you don't know and he'll give it to you. But then in verse six, he says, but let him ask in faith, nothing wavering for he, that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. I want to make clear what's going on in there. Let him ask in faith again, the word in question and then, and a positive phrase and a positive it's something that's put next to literally it's positioned is add or added to add positive. A positive phrase is put right next to something to clarify what it is. So here James is saying, let him ask in faith, AKA unwavering, nothing wavering unwavering focus, because he, that wavers meaning he who's focused, goes from one thing to the next, to the next, to the next to the next. It's like a wave of the sea. It is driven with the wind and tossed. [10:57.8]
Now consider what the opposite of faith would be too many people. They would say doubt. Well, what is doubt? But rather a hesitation between two opinions, right? You think this one is that way, but you're not sure. So, you think, well, what about, but what about this? But what about that? Meaning you're not maintaining a focus on only one thing. Doubt is nothing more than being split between two opinions. A double-minded man is evil in all his ways has one of the Proverbs, right? So, we're sitting here in a situation where it seems like this is going to bear some fruit. If faith is focus on something, boy, that's something I can do. That's something I can practice, isn't it? Isn’t that's something that you can practice? Maybe you're not the greatest at it yet, maybe not. [11:43.1]
Years ago, Andrew Carnegie, I might have told this story before, because I think I've told a lot of them. Andrew Carnegie was audited by the IRS, by the federal government, whatever. I don't know if the IRS existed at the time, that he was around. But somebody who could not understand how his company was making that much money. They checked every facet of his business; everything was above board. And so, they were flabbergasted and flummoxed, how on earth are you making this much money without doing dirty dealings? So, they brought him in and they asked him like, what's going on here? And he says, well, it's simple. I can tell you the trick. It's very, very simple. They're like, what is it? He says, well, I've spent some years training myself to the point where I can focus on something for a period of time. And right now, I can focus on a single thing for five straight minutes without wavering. Now they were like, what? You're kidding me. Right? That's the secret to all of this business successes that you can focus on one thing for five minutes, really, really? He says, well, yeah, try it. And when you really sit down and measure it, how quickly your mind wanders from one thing to the next, most people don't even get to 30 seconds. And here was a man who had trained himself to be able to maintain, an unwavering focus for five straight minutes. And guess what opened up for him? Business deals and wealth and success in his arena. I don't know if he was a great fellow or not in terms of character or anything else like that. But possibilities opened up for him because of his focus, unwavering focus, AKA faith. [13:11.2]
Now, this is fascinating because if you only have the faith, like a mustard seed said, Jesus, then you could move mountains. Okay. Well, what is the faith of a mustard seed? At first, I mean, obviously just the size is important. Five minutes, Andrew Carnegie that he had the ability to maintain focus for five minutes. I'm not at five minutes there. Ain't no way. My brain is like a squirrel. I'm working on I,t slowly, slowly it's happening. But sometimes I can't even count to 21 without losing track of things. Okay. Often, I can't count to 21 without losing track of things when I'm in the middle of like doing some processes. And so, I'm still working on well, he was able to hold five straight minutes of unwavering focus. [13:53.7]
There’s a great short story, the wonderful story of Henry sugar by Roald Dahl, where a lot of the, the intention here, a lot of the possibilities here came from one person's ability to focus. It was this cool story, I highly recommend you read it, read it to your kids. It's a, it's like 60 pages or something. So, it's a longish short story, but it's a really good story, about a guy who can like see through the back of cards and develops all these superpowers because of his ability to really focus on some stuff. Anyway so, if I have the faith, like a mustard seed, first, we look at it in terms of size. Naturally, that would be the first thing. If you have faith like a grain of a mustard seed, like you could move mountains. If you really had the ability, that much ability to focus, just to stay with something then, and any number of things could open up for you. But the other thing is what is the faith of a mustard seed? Well, it has an unwavering focus to do one thing and one thing only grow into being a mustard plant that produces mustard seeds. [14:47.8]
In other words, it's focus is simply I'm to be 100%, all that I am all the way, all the time. If the conditions are right, I'll grow. If they're not right, I'll wait. If, if they're right again, I'll grow. If they're not right, I'll wait. If they somehow shift around, I'll wither, but I'm going to hang onto life as long as I can. There is no doubt, there's no wavering. There's no, maybe I shouldn't be mustard. Maybe I should be a persimmon tree. There's not a question in its mind about whether or not the carrots next door are something that it should maybe consider as a career path. No, it's simply there as itself 100% on. Same with the sun, same everything else. All of life works this way unwavering, total focus on just being all that it is. And moving forward. [15:34.4]
Humans are the only ones because there's so much possibility mentally and emotionally and spiritually with us that we have the ability to mess that whole thing up. So here we are with a possible definition of faith. Let's see if it bears fruit. Peter gets out of a boat to walk across the water to Jesus. He's walking across the water. Cause he looks at him and he's like, that's Jesus dude. Call out to me. If you call me, I'll be able to make it. So, he comes over and he's on the way. And all of a sudden, a wave comes up. At that point, Peter's focus, AKA faith waivers. Literally it gets stuck on a wave and he looks at the wave and then he's caught between the wave and Jesus in the middle of that, the focus is lost. His ability is lost and he starts to drown. Jesus catches him. He looks at him. I don't remember if he says, oh, ye of little faith, but he asks you like, why did you doubt? It's the same thing? What made you lose your focus? [16:33.5]
So as a guiding principle, as an idea, that faith is nothing more than the ability to focus entirely on one thing. And that, that then is the possibility that will bring you all of the miraculous stuff and the healing and everything else. Then it becomes something that can flower in your life. Guess what? My journey out of depression and anxiety and stress and overwhelm and business failures and addiction, addictive behaviors and all the other stuff and self-loathing and all this stuff that I went through. It came from an unwavering focus in many ways. Now it did waiver a lot, I will admit it, but every time that there was any leap toward anything, it was because I had given up needing a guarantee. It was because I had given up even considering what we're going to be, the pros and cons of this. And I had just gone for it 100%, no matter what happened, I tried everything that was there. I had an, a longing and a thirst for freedom and for truth and for that, which was real. And every time that was at the forefront of my life, massive shifts happened, huge transformations, incredible experiences, and amazing changes that came from places I never would have even considered before. And if I look back, the common thread in all of them was I just went, there was unwavering focus. [17:59.7]
Because you see there is always a leap. Even if you have unwavering focus, it requires a leap of faith. The leap of faith or the leap of focus is that you give up on any other options that you have literally decided, meaning cut or killed like infanticide or something, but cut away down from you every other possibility. When you're focused on one thing, everything else ceases to exist. That is a massive leap. There's no turning around. So, to have faith does require a leap. It requires that you no longer be sitting there looking for guarantees that you no longer be hesitating between opinions. And when you do that, when you do that, things will yield. If you have enough attention, enough focus in my experience. Life cannot help, but yield to you. The more you are willing to just simply pay attention and focus and keep going and not let your emotions get in the way or your thoughts get in the way or anything else, get in the way and, and go toward that, which you care most about.It's undeniable. At some point it'll happen. Maybe it will be a short time for some of you. Maybe it'll be a long time. There's many factors, but as long as your own wavering, it's bound to happen. That's faith. And that to me has been the most profound and the most helpful definition of faith I have ever seen. [19:20.9]
It bears out in all the stories, the woman who had the issue of blood, it was her faith. She was the one that was like, I'm going to go do this thing. My unwavering focus, my, this my, that. She went, fought through the crowd, grabbed his thing, all that stuff. Maybe it was placebo. Maybe it was all generated inside of her. Who cares? She had decided, this is what I need. She had settled on it. And she went for it without sitting there thinking she was an idiot for things that she could grab someone's cloak and somehow the 12-year blood issue was going to go away. The Centurion whose son, or was dead at home. Well, what happened there? Well, Jesus just told him, look, you're good. He's fine and then he went. It was faith like he had never seen before, right? In each case, it bears out that there is some level of unwavering attention, focus, or action that's going on. There is full commitment to something. So, if you're going to have faith in Jesus Christ, it means that there is no other object for you. You can't have, you can't believe in Satan. You can believe in Jesus. You can have faith in Jesus. You can go toward Jesus. He can be, he can be the only thing in your life. He can be the sole creator of all your goodness and all your happiness and that's great. [20:30.1]
If you're leaving room in your psyche for Satan, then you're wavering between that, which is bringing you life and that which is bringing you misery. If you quit wavering, all these things will be added to you. All things are possible for him to him that believe it. That's what mark said. Well, believe that word in English means to come from be love. But if you love something, you can't stop paying attention to it. If you really love all that you're after and you're giving it constant attention, it will flower. It will grow. It will nurture. It will happen. It's all the attention we give to the negativity, to the other side that causes the misery inside of us. So yes, faith does require a leap, but it isn't a leap into believing something that you can't see or listening to a story that someone told you or believing a theology that was just handed down to, you. No, it requires a leap of attention, a willingness to go find out a seeking, a desire, a longing, and a giving up of possible other avenues. [21:31.1]
And if you're willing to pay attention, if you're willing to willing to look for the truth, it'll show up. In my experience, that's been the case all the time, sometimes slower, sometimes more quickly, but every single time it has happened. And all of the healing I've experienced is because I've been willing to simply go to cut off all other opportunities and have an unwavering focus in one direction. I invite you to do that in your life. What is it that lights you up the most? What is the highest thing you can think of? Can you go toward that with unwavering focus today? And guess what? For those of you that are stuck in theology and have faith crises, and aren't sure what to do with it, you can't have a faith crisis if faith is only your ability to pay attention and unwavering focus. You can only have faith in one thing or another thing. All of you have faith. Everyone listening to this podcast right now has a tremendous amount of faith and their life has evidence of faith. [22:34.4]
So now we go back to Paul's statement that faith is the substance of things not seen, right? It's evidence of things not seen, substance of things hope for. You have faith, 100%. Your life is evidence of the faith of the kind of faith you have. If you're having trials and struggles and misery it's because you are focusing on that, you are giving it life with your attention. If you're seeing miracles left and right it's because that is your focus. If you're seeing freedom, it's because that is your focus. If you're seeing a hardship, it's because that is your focus. These things aren't inherent in reality, they come from you, they come from your faith. And your faith used well, your focus, your attention really can make you whole. [23:24.7]
And that's it for todays “Alive and Free Podcast.” If you enjoyed this show and want some more freedom bombs landing in your ear buds, subscribe right now at wherever you get your podcasts from. And, while you're at it, give us a rating and a review. It'll help us keep delivering great stuff to you. Plus, it's just nice to be nice. [23:42.2]
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