OF UNBELIEF

Preface

(doubting God)

An evil heart of unbelief starts deceiving.  Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” 

Unbelief says that God will let you slide this time.  It is a little thing.  Surely God understands.  Moses didn’t go to hell, but he didn’t get to go to the promised land.

You can’t get too far in God to where sin is not sin.  Unbelief is sin for an unbeliever, and it is sin for a Christian all the way to the end.  Revelation 21:8 says that the unbelieving are among those who will have part in the lake which burneth with fire.

Unbelief will keep you out of heaven.  Romans 14:23 says, “. . . for whatsoever is not of faith is sin.”  James 1:15 says, “. . . sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.”  Don’t let sin stay around.

Unbelief brings a false comfort that God will not smite you to the wall for sin.  He will.  God cannot go against His Word. 

He said His Spirit shall not always strive with man.  He strives with us to fast, pray, and read the Word to get a hold of us.  God made you, and He wants you to yield over to Him.  Let’s believe God!

by Pastor Kevin Badgley

I’m after souls because God is after souls.  Before we can lead captivity captive, we have to be captive of the Lord ourselves.  In order to be truly free and to have the liberty of the Lord, we have to be a captive of the Lord.  If you are free from the bondage of sin, you are bound up in righteousness.

I can identify with what Paul says in Romans 7:24.  “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?”  Paul was alive when he wrote it, but he said he was in a body of death, like he was in a dead carcass.  The thing just didn’t want to serve God.  It was all the time struggling and warring, the battleground being between the ears, in the mind.  Everybody does this. 

It can be likened to the battle you fought when you were under conviction of the Holy Ghost of God, wrestling whether or not to come to Jesus.  I wrestled with it.  I was backslid 18 years, and I wrestled because I thought I was all right.  I grew up in church.  My folks took me to church, but I didn’t care much for it. 

Something got a hold of me one day.  The conviction power of God moved on me and said, You must be born again.  I said, I know all that.  The Bible says the devil knows that, and the world in many places knows that, but they have no idea what the words mean. 

The Bible says when you are born again you are a new creature.  2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”  All things become new, because the work of sanctification in the believer’s life is not fully yet at the altar. 

Philippians 2:12 says, “. . . work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”  That does not mean you work to get saved.  It means to work the salvation.  You can work salvation or you can work iniquity.  Jesus told the workers of iniquity to depart from Him.  He never said that to a worker of salvation.

You have to work out your OWN salvation, not mine.  You are not going to heaven on my shirttail or mama’s skirt tail, or Grandpa’s prayers from way back when.  You have to receive God the way He told us in His Word.  The lost and the backslider are without hope unless they come to Jesus. 

Hebrews 3:12 says, “Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.”  He is talking to Christians when he says to watch out so there is not an evil heart of unbelief!  He describes the manifestation of it – in departing from the living God.  We are to be careful not to have unbelief, because God says it is evil. 

Romans 3:18 says, “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”  James 2:19 says, “. . . the devils also believe, and tremble.”  Man believes, but they don’t tremble.  You should not walk like a cowardly dog ready to get hit, but you are not supposed to walk around like a bull frog with your chest popped out either. 

We are supposed to believe God through and through.  Some things in God’s Word are easy to believe.  Face value is easy, but it’s tougher to do them.  When we have unbelief, sometimes it is nothing more than neglect to do that which faith would cause you to do like fast, pray, read the Word and obey it. 

James 4:17 says, “Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.”  That is an act of unbelief, because unbelief wars against faith and the truth.

Romans 8:7 says, “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.”  I have had a terrible wrestling in my mind, and God runs this scripture over and over to me. 

The carnal mind will never be subject to God.  It will never understand Him.  The law of God, His Word, must be spiritually discerned.  1 Corinthians 2:14 says, “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

Unbelief just kind of creeps in.  First it comes in like this.  Well, I won’t do this today.  I will do it next week.  Pretty soon, it gets to where you know you didn’t get it done, and you really don’t know if you have to.  You think maybe you shouldn’t, because it is liable to be too much for you.  You think maybe the really supernatural walk is only for certain people.  Many people believe they are saved, but they can’t back it up with a witness of God’s Spirit in their lives

Sometimes all I feel like I am doing is pounding my head against the wall and getting nowhere at a high rate of speed.  I even feel like I am going backwards, and the harder I pray, the thicker it gets up there.  It has a tendency to make you want to back off of your praying. 

God warns us of an evil heart of unbelief.  We cannot give up the fight!  Paul told Timothy to fight the good fight of faith.  It is a war for our own existence, and for others.  When we pray for others we get our minds off of ourselves. 

An evil heart of unbelief starts deceiving.  Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”  A deceitful heart is bound of the devil.  A sinner or a backslider is manipulated by the devil. 

When a Christian has unbelief working on him, trying to flip him over and turn him around, it is his heart, not the devil.  When the devil sees you struggling, of course he will try to push you further down.

Cain had stood in the presence of God, but then he sacrificed to God, along with his sin.  He left the presence of God and dwelt in Nod. 

Noah was a child of God, but later when he got drunk, he cursed his youngest son.  Do you see what an evil heart of unbelief can do even in a saint of God if they don’t pray through and get rid of the thing when they hear it knocking at their door? 

Abraham loved a strange woman, and his wife condoned it.  God told Abraham the he would beget a son in his old age by Sarah, not by somebody else.  They believed the promise, but not the process of it.  Abraham believed God, but not one facet of the promise.  He got into the biggest trouble you ever saw.  It is better to believe God for the whole thing.  If we only believe part, He calls us lukewarm.  Hagar’s son was a wild man. God named him that and today he is still slaughtering Isaac’s children when he can. 

Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup.  He did not believe the Word that God would provide for him.  He backslid so far that the Bible says God hated Esau.  Out of unbelief, during a time of struggle, under great pressure, Esau sinned.  What was that pressure?  He was hungry.  What would you sell your soul for?  You don’t quit sin just because it is not available.  You quit because God said to.  You take whatever steps are necessary to get free from anything that is not of God. 

Hard times are coming and we’d better get prayed up now.  If you wait till then, God will not hear you.  Even though you are fasting and praying and believing God now, and it seems like you are going nowhere, the Bible says you are laying up treasures in heaven, and you can draw on that account.  God’s Word is still true, so let’s live it.

Jesus is looking for a bride that is clean, spotless, without a wrinkle, and chaste, a virgin church ready for His coming. 

Self does not believe God; self wants gratification, and it wants to hurry God.  I’ve said, God, hurry up and move.  He says, Son, hurry up and move.  I told God he was slow, and he said I am slower.  I say, God I am wore out.  He says, Come to me all ye that are weary and heavy laden.  

Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.  Have you forgotten the way?  No.  Perform the doing of it then.  Don’t let an evil heart of unbelief steal the joy of the Lord.  The first thing the devil will get is your joy.  Then he works on your faith. 

Do you have temper fits?  God has a way of pulling things to the top.  He has a way when the pressure is on of making things come out that weren’t seen before.  After I got saved I found out how wretched I was.  The Lord spoke to me once in prayer, Son, man is filthy even without the devil.  We were born in iniquity. 

Moses had a fit.  Unbelief says God should have let him slide.  Unbelief says that God will let you slide this time.  All Moses did was hit the rock, but he did it against what God said.  Unbelief says, It is a little thing.  Surely God understands.  Moses didn’t go to hell, but he didn’t get to go to the promised land. 

Achan fought in the battles with Joshua and the rest of them, but he just had to have a wedge of gold and some garments from Jericho.  Some people want to take their money with them to heaven, but their money is keeping them out of heaven. 

Jesus preached to the rich young ruler and told him to get rid of his money.  The gold around your neck could be the chains of the devil that are holding you back from serving the living God.  Achan and his whole house were destroyed.

Balaam was a prophet of God.  The Lord appeared to him and spoke to him.  His eyes were open and he saw the Lord.  However, he listened to a religious group that was around him at that time.  God smote him after a jack ass preached to him one day.  Later on when the children of Israel nearly annihilated the Moabites, Balaam was among the dead.  According to Peter he didn’t go to heaven.

Samson played around with the harlots.  He was anointed of God from his mother’s womb, and he was an awesome man of God.  He had a spiritual strength that outweighed his physical strength.  When he lay down in the bed of the enemy one time too many, Delilah gave him a haircut he would never forget.  They took out his eyes, and he was blind.  When he woke up he declared he would shake himself as before, but his hallelujahs and his preaching did not stop the enemy. 

A preacher can preach the Word of God to you all day long, and be backslid in his soul.  In recent years there was a man of God who had an awesome ministry, yet he gave it up.  His ministry was in 123 countries before he fell.  Pornography and lewdness destroyed him.  An evil heart of unbelief moved in.  God knows it isn’t right, but I’ll quit someday. 

Saul, the first king of Israel, called by God, was anointed of God.  Samuel, one of the greatest prophets of the Old Testament anointed that man for the kingship of Israel.  He was head and shoulders taller than anybody else, and he was an awesome warrior, but he disobeyed God.     

When it comes to handing out mercy to me or any Christian, I pray we are not as big in the Lord as we think we are, so the mercy will go a little bit further.  Luke 12:48 says, “. . . For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required. . . .”  Moses sinned that one time and that was it

Eli, the last of the judges, had two sons, and they were sleeping with the women at church.  He was warned by a prophet of God, and then by a little boy.  God told Eli to clean up the ministry, or he and his linage would die.  He didn’t correct it, and God’s Word came to pass. 

Achish, king of the Philistines, was going to fight against Saul.  They wouldn’t let David join them, because some were afraid he would turn and bushwhack them.  I believe it was the Lord, so that David and his men wouldn’t slaughter God’s anointed.  However, David went back to Ziklag and found all of his family and all of his goods and that of his warriors with him pillaged, burned down, and taken away. 

David knew better.  Goliath was a Philistine.  The devil is still the devil.  Sin is still sin, and you can’t get too far in God to where sin is not sin.  If unbelief is sin for an unbeliever, it is sin for a Christian and a preacher all the way to the end.  Revelation 21:8 says, “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.”

Unbelief will keep you out of heaven.  Romans 14:23 says, “. . . for whatsoever is not of faith is sin.”  James 1:15 says, “. . . sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.”  Don’t let sin stay around.

Solomon lusted and had hundreds of wives.  He could have anything he wanted.  We think if we get certain things, it would be just right and we could serve the Lord.  It will never come, because then there would be something else you want.  I told the Lord if He would give me this and this, I will really get with it, because I will get it out of my mind, and He did it.  I was so happy, but then I got all involved in what He did for me that I forgot what I said to Him.  Unbelief does that to us. 

Unbelief says we have plenty of time.  Some say, I was raised in church, or I sat under So and So’s ministry.  There is no way I’ll go to hell.  You will go to hell faster under my ministry than under some others.  Unto whom much is given, much is required.  God’s Word is MUCH.  His blessing, and power, and anointing, and wisdom, and knowledge is MUCH.  That’s what He was talking about.

Jeroboam sinned and caused Israel to go into idols. Ahab sinned and cursed the priesthood.  Judas Iscariot sinned.  He performed miracles and went out when Jesus sent them two by two.  He cast out devils, healed the sick, and sat with Jesus at communion.  He ate the same food, breathed the same air, and was around the anointing many times.  He was the church treasurer and had the offering bag.  Yet he is known as the greatest betrayer and traitor in the history of man, because unbelief got in.  He went to the religious leaders and tried to pray through.  He said he had betrayed innocent blood.  They were supposed to be men of God and able to pray him back through to God.  However, they were against God, and he had handed Jesus over to them, so what hope was there for him?  The Bible says he killed himself.

That is like us knowing the deep things of God, and having faith to do it, yet we don’t do it and go somewhere else where they don’t preach it so hard or teach it as fact.  What hope is there? 

Ananias and Sapphira were in church giving an offering to the preacher.  They lied to him, and God killed them for it.  An evil heart of unbelief did that to all of these.  There was a man called Alexander the coppersmith that Paul talked about.  He said that God would reward him according to his works.  What is God going to do with us? 

God is not a habitual over looker of sin.  The Bible says He won’t have anything to do with sin.  He gave us Jesus to stand in the gap for us so we can repent.  He will make us perfect where we can stand before God, but if we have unbelief, we won’t even come to Jesus. 

I know men who died and went to hell thinking they were fine.  Unbelief, after a while, will turn everything around, and you will think you are just fine.  I dealt with a man and told him he needed to get a hold of God and pray through.  God was trying to set him free.  He said he knew it was true.  He did not deny it or puff up in pride, but unbelief kept him from taking that final step.  His pride kept him out of the altar of God, and out of heaven, because he died.

I preached my heart out to a sinner man who was my former history teacher and watched him turn pale under conviction.  His eyes got a glassy stare, and he tried to look around, but there was no place to be found.  The Holy Ghost was dealing with him, but he did not believe it was the right time.  Maybe someone beside him kept him away.  He did not come to God.  He said he would talk to me the next week about this thing.  He did not show up the following Sunday.  The Monday thereafter he died. 

Unbelief, a simple thing, a false comfort that you have more time, destroyed him.  There is a false comfort that God will not smite you to the wall for sin.  He will.  God cannot go against His Word.  He said His Spirit shall not always strive with man.  That is what it means. 

It does not change when we become a Christian.  He strives with us to fast, pray, and read the Word to get a hold of us.  God made you, and He wants you to yield over to Him. 

The Bible warns us not to have unbelief.  Revelation 20:11-13 says, “And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.  And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.  And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.”

Revelation 20:14 says, “And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.”  Look at Verse 15:  “And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.”  Your name must be written in the book of life. 

Jesus said in John 14:6, “. . . I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”

Jesus, 2,000 years ago, paid the price for our redemption, healing, deliverance and sanctification.  After He laid His life down, He arose the third day to prove that we can do it too if we will believe God. 

Luke 10:19 says, “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.”

Unbelief will keep you out of the deep things of God, and out of God altogether.  God will spue lukewarm out of His mouth.  You have to be in the heat before you can get warm.  You have to be in God before you can get lukewarm.  A sinner can’t be lukewarm, but a backslider can be. 

A sign of lukewarmness coming in your life through unbelief is when you feel like you have got the blahs.  Smith Wigglesworth said it in such a way that it scares me nearly to death, but I think he is right.  He said, If you are in the same place today as you were yesterday, you are backslid.

You say you don’t feel like you are going anywhere.  If you prayed to the Son of God, by faith you know you are going on in the things of God.  If we sit in one place, we need to pray through and believe God.  We cannot let an evil heart of unbelief destroy us. 

1 Peter 4:18 says, “And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?”  Let this word strike every heart. 

Hebrews 12:14 says, “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:”  We have failed miserably.  God said whosoever will, may come.  Whosoever means even someone who is cold in their soul.  I thank God for the promise that we can be set free from every sin.

I ask God to return the fear of God into souls of men again so when unbelief knocks on the door, we will fear God more than listening to unbelief.  I bind the devil for it in Jesus’ name.