Title deeds of faith
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Hebrew 11:1
Today's key verse is elaborated in the amp version as follows: “Now faith is the assurance (title deed, confirmation) of things hoped for (divinely guaranteed), and the evidence of things not seen [the conviction of their reality—faith comprehends as fact what cannot be experienced by the physical senses].
Faith in God does not mean it is baseless or without evidence. This is unlike false hope, which is like wishful thinking, which is based on our desires. A business owner might go to a bank and say, “I want to borrow money because I hope next year the economy will get better.” The banker probably won't approve the loan because it's like “wishful thinking” as it has no concrete plan and surety of repayment. Conversely, if a business owner says, "I secured a business deal with Google and I need a loan now to manage my cash flow.", the banker most likely will approve the loan. There is substance and evidence behind this.
Sometimes we lose faith in God because we set our false hope on something baseless and our own desires, which confuses what faith is all about. When people mistakenly place their "false hope" on men and earthly things, such as their spouses or partners, or on their careers or businesses, it is unstable, and we are building our foundation on sand.
It is imperative to know that faith has substance, and the Greek word for substance means an assurance and a “title deed”. A "substantive faith" distinguishes us from false hopes founded on lust and wishful thinking.
The amp version explains that the "substance" is like the "title deed". The title deed indicates our legal right to the property, even if we don't live there right now. The title deed is therefore God's words and His promises. Nevertheless, there is a big gap in our minds between whether God's words are mere concepts or actual convictions of reality. Faith is necessary to bridge this big gap from wishy-washy thinking to conviction that "it is reality!" Faith is critical because it gets us "from hoping to having".
Though the promises are yet to manifest, we exercise our faith that they are the title deeds to what God has promised. When we hold the title deed to the promises, we own them. As we put our faith in God's word, we have hope that does not disappoint (Romans 5:5), as faith gives us the hope to expect unseen promises to become reality.
Blessing prayer: Keep us from false hope by putting faith in your word and faithfulness. Having faith in you, we declare all promises as title deeds. In Jesus name, Amen
