There is only one faith that saves and it isn’t a religion.

When people ask what faith are you they want to know if your beliefs align with theirs.

1 Corinthians 12:5

(ESV) and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord;

(KJV) And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.

(CEV) There are different ways to serve the same Lord,

The fact that you serve the Lord does not mean you are saved nor the manner in which you do it.

The greatest testimony I ever heard was that of a Vineyard pastor who said, “I served as a pastor for 20 years after divinity school before I came to a saving grace knowledge of Jesus Christ.”

How could anyone preach the gospel and bring souls to Christ without being saved himself?

1 Corinthians 3:5-8 English Standard Version

5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.

Only God can make us grow in Christ, to become this new creation in Christ, having placed our faith in Christ, to believe in Him and all that He has done to win this bride unto Himself.

We can strive in the flesh to attain knowledge, positions and title and it is as Solomon declared, “vanity of vanities”.

John 12:24 English Standard Version (ESV) Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Matthew 7:20 English Standard Version (ESV) Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.

The seed of faith planted produces fruits of faith. Yet it has to die where it is planted.

Matthew 25:14-18 My Version (as I understand it)

The Parable of Operation of Faith

14 “For it will be like the Lord Jesus Christ going on a journey, who called his servants[everyone] and entrusted to them his property. 15 To one he gave five units of faith, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. 16 He who had received the five units of faith went at once and traded with them, and he made five  more. 17 So also he who had the two units of faith made two more. 18 But he who had received the one went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s faith.

The Operation of Faith is found in where we place faith. There is only one place that any of us can place our faith and are immediately changed. The idea that faith is not given out equally is derived through the scriptures.

Romans 12:3 English Standard Version (ESV) For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

As we noted yesterday grace comes through faith and here we discover that faith is measured out by God according to our abilities to handle it, Matt. 25:15

Ephesians 3:16-17 English Standard Version

16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love,

According to the scripture we are changed because Christ abides in us by faith. Putting our faith In Him puts Him in us and we become a new creation. The Operation of Faith is to change those of us who believe in Jesus Christ from the inside.

What of the one who buried his faith in a hole that he dug for himself?

They are placing faith in anything other than Jesus Christ. That could be in pride, property,  the stock market, buying futures, bonds, securities, or anything that one might trust that is not God’s promises. What did Jesus say to that one servant?

27 Then you ought to have invested my faith in the church/religion, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. (My Version again)