Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.

Mark 11:24 (NIV)

The claims Jesus makes about faith are astounding. But how exactly does one go about living a life of faith? How does one believe in a way that we receive what we ask for?

This is an important question because without a good answer, we can find ourselves tied up in all sorts of emotional knots. A visiting speaker at Elevation Church made the observation that the evangelical church in particular has created a culture where it is believed “bright and shiny” emotions – such as joy and hope – are the only ones God wants us to have, and this belief finds it roots in a poor understanding of faith. That if we are feeling hopeless and sorrowful, we are somehow denying God’s goodness and operating in unbelief. Which of course can only lead to a culture of people doing their best to hopelessly deny their emotions. And, as a part of what we might call a faith-based culture, I see this all the time.

But what then is faith if not controlling our emotions? Better yet, how does one have it? Here, it is helpful for us to have the right paradigm. When it comes to faith, most of us see ourselves as faith factories; that is, we think it is our job to produce faith by working with the raw materials we have at hand, like intellect and human effort. But faith is more like a woman on a first date. She may be hopeful, but she knows very little about the man on the other side of the table. And – here’s the rub – she has no idea whether he will come through for her till she gets to know him.

That is the true paradigm of faith. Faith is inescapably relational, and our ability to have faith in God for any situation is directly proportional to our intimate knowledge of Him. It is not something we can possess without knowing Him intimately any more than a woman can possess confidence in the man without getting to know him. Which is why cultivating a life of intimacy with God – one where we come into supernatural contact with His love – is so vital. God’s love is not just the fringe benefit of our salvation; it is the life force that empowers all else in the Christian life. As we come to know God’s love, our confidence He will come through for us in any situation we face will increase.

But this is not all there is to faith. For the life of faith is a relationship, just like a dating relationship, and our faith depends on what is going on in that relationship. For example, a woman who has gotten to know a man and who has earned her trust will believe him when he says, “I will meet you at the restaurant by the pier this Saturday at seven.” But her confidence will not only rest on what she knows about him. It will also rest on the simple if not obvious fact he has just told her what he intends to do. In the same way, our faith in God showing up in a way we expect is not simply based on what we know about Him. It is also based on Him revealing to us what He intends to do.

Many believers are driving themselves nuts trying to muster the faith God will show up in a specific way in their lives without God revealing to them what He intends to do. The reason for this is the faith-factory paradigm: when Jesus encourages us to have faith, we think He means from thin air. Granted, there are many instances in life where we can ask God for things with confidence on the basis of His character alone. But our tendency to think faith takes place outside relationship, as though God is requiring us to know precisely what He intends to do in any given situation without letting us draw close enough to Him to know what He is doing, is neither biblical nor rational. Nor relational, I would add: it is the breeding ground for emotional knots.

But if faith rests on God telling us in advance what he intends to do, doesn’t that defeat the whole purpose of faith? Not really. At least, Abraham, the father of faith, did not think so, who believed precisely because God told him what He was about to do. Nor did Jesus, who only did what He saw The Father doing. The endgame of faith, as with dating, is not control or wild predictions; it is relational intimacy.