Lesson 5: Hold fast your faith
1 Timothy 1:18-20 - www.bible.com/bible/59/1ti.1

18 This charge I entrust to you, Timothy, my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you, that by them you may wage the good warfare,
19 holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith,
20 among whom are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme.

What does it mean to hold fast to our faith? If, as we read in Ephesians 2:4-10, our faith is from God, then is He not also responsible for growing our faith? The simple answer is, no, it is our responsibility to keep and grow our faith. What God gave us in faith, as stated in Ephesians 2, was a seed or a grain – see Matthew 7:20 – but it is our responsibility to help it grow.

Growing our faith comes through spending time with Him in His word each day and obeying what He asks of us (Romans 10:17). We get to know Him through His word, and we apply what we learn to our life. For example, we might read the story of David and Goliath and think what great faith David had to be able to kill this giant with just a sling and a few stones.


Then an incident comes into our life which we know we cannot conquer – for example, we may lose our job, or a member of our family becomes very ill and the doctors say there is no hope for them. We are facing a giant we have no real hope of being able to conquer. But then we remember David and his faith, and we cry to God for Him to help us with our giant. We remember God’s many statements in His word that we must come before Him with a pure heart, so we confess everything in our life which is not His way, we turn our backs on our sin (2 Chronicles 7:14), and we ask Him to glorify Himself through our need. Then we go looking for a job, asking Him to guide us to the right place; or we go to the doctor and ask what suggestions he has for treatment, asking God to give the doctor His wisdom. Then, holding fast to our faith, we watch God work out in our life His perfect plan. When He answers our prayer we immediately thank Him. Our faith in Him grows just like David’s did.

Sometimes the things in our lives will seem so hard it is impossible for us to hold on to faith in God, but then is the time to determine in our hearts with all our might that we will not let go of God no matter what happens. And we cry to Him to place His hands over ours so we cannot let go of Him. We must be able to say with Job, even if we die we will not quit trusting Him (Job 13:15).
*Can you look back at a time in your life when your faith was tested? What did God do, and what did you learn about Him through this very difficult experience? How has going through this helped you grow in your faith, so you’re more prepared to meet the next challenge in your life, trusting God and His promises?