Hebrews 11:1 provides the Bible definition of faith:
Hebrews 11:1Now (the word now has nothing to do with time, it is a continuative that explains, and is translated and, or also) faith is(present tense) the substance (two words-hupo, “under,” histemi, “to stand”, to be under the authority of, that which is the basis of something-guaranty, security) of things hoped for (“favorable and confident expectation, to expect with desire), the evidence (the convincing proof) of things not seen.
This definition begins with a simple declaration, and faith is. Although the word now has nothing to do with time, like most preachers use it, faith is in the present tense. Faith can never be spoken of in the future tense. It is always in the present tense. It functions in the present tense, but it is based upon something that is already happened and was completed in the past.
Faith is based upon the eternal realm in which God lives; when God speaks it becomes an eternal reality. Faith is based upon the word that God speaks. Faith has its substance in the spirit realm or the eternal realm. The natural realm is the time realm. There was a moment in which time began, and a moment when time as we have known it will cease. Everything of the natural creation will pass away and is not eternal, but the word of God will never pass away.
We will never see the will of God manifested in the time realm, unless we receive it by faith as a reality already existing in the eternal realm.
Faith is the substance. When the New Testament was being written, this word substance was used in the legal profession as the title deed. It was a written document describing the property a person owned.
The substance of faith is the legal aspects of our salvation; it is the eternal reality of what Jesus accomplished for us on the cross.
This faith is birthed in our heart through the revelation of the Holy Spirit to our spirit. Faith comes by encountering the presence of God in His communication to us. Faith is the revelation of what is legally ours in Christ; it is what the Holy Spirit can legally bring into manifestation in our life.
Faith is the evidence or convincing proof. This is also a legal word and was used in criminal courts. The prosecuting attorney would present his convincing proof in such a way that the jury would have no doubts. This is the conviction of the Holy Spirit to our heart so that we see things in a new reality.
Faith does not create things, but obtains things that already exist in the kingdom realm of God’s Spirit. If we are to obtain something by faith in the natural realm, it must already have been spoken into existence in the spirit realm by the word of God.
Once God’s word has been spoken in the spirit realm, the substance of faith (being under his authority) brings it into manifestation in the natural realm.
When God speaks out of His being there comes forth this creative force that is called the Word of God. The essence of God is released in his words; it comes alive in the realm of the spirit and remains there eternally alive. Every word of God is living, once He speaks it-it exists. Every word God speaks is an eternal word, and time does not affect it.
We cannot separate the faith of God from the eternal life of God. It is Gods faith that he gives to us as a gift and becomes active in us as we are being filled with His Spirit.
The faith of God flows out of heaven into our spirit, enabling us to lay hold of the provision of the cross in the realm of eternity.
Faith is a faculty given to us by God; it is totally outside of human experience or ability to have faith. Faith has to come to us as a gift from God. He provides us with this faculty which allows us to step from time into eternity and in the eternal realm we grab hold of the eternal word of the living God which hangs there throbbing with all the power of his timeless eternal life and we grab hold of that truth in the realm of eternity or the kingdom realm of the spirit and from there we bring it back into this time-space world and then there is manifestation.
That is what faith is, it makes things come out of eternity into time. Everything that God has ever said or ever done although it will have a point in history where it has happened, at the same time it becomes an eternal event. When we can comprehend that then we begin to realize that things which happened in the past still throb with the eternal power of the eternal now because God spoke them out of his eternal being and he spoke them into existence into the realm of eternity.