Ep. 146 | You Want Stronger Faith? It's Spelled R-I-S-K

Oct 6

What if the missing piece in your faith isn't more belief, but a risk you haven't taken yet?

In this episode of the 100xLife Podcast, Rob Dayton continues the coaching series with the second half of Jesus' first command: repent and believe. If repentance is changing the way you think, belief is where that change has to show up in your whole life.

Rob breaks down what Jesus meant when he told people "your faith has made you well," and shows that faith is your spirit, soul, and body all moving in the same direction on one truth. He tells the story of the woman who reached for Jesus' cloak, then gets personal about his own three-year journey out of sexual addiction, when his spirit and mind said yes to Jesus but his body kept doing the opposite. He also gets honest about the areas where his faith still falls short today.

From there, Rob gives you a practical path for growing faith in a specific area: retrain your brain with your imagination, then take the risk when the opportunity comes. In the kingdom, he says, faith is spelled R-I-S-K.

This is a coaching session, so grab a notebook. Rob wants you to apply it this week.

You'll Hear

Why Jesus kept saying "your faith has made you well"
What faith actually is: spirit, soul, and body aligned on one truth
What it looks like to be double-minded, and why Jesus calls that lukewarm
What the woman who touched Jesus' cloak shows us about faith in action
Rob's story of moving from sexual addiction to purity, and what alignment looked like along the way
How to use your imagination to retrain your brain
Why faith requires risk, and how failing is part of growing it
A simple question for finding your kingdom purpose: what one thing from heaven do you want to see on earth?

Journal Prompts

Holy Spirit, show me an area where I'm not aligned in faith between my spirit, soul, and body.
Holy Spirit, give me imaginations of how that would look in heaven. (Journal his answer in the first person.)
What training is required? What reprogramming does my body need to match what my spirit and soul are saying?

Missed the first part?
This episode builds on the repentance session two weeks ago, "There Are Three Ways to Think. Which One Are You?" → 100xlife.com/podcast/episode144

Partner with 100xLife

Welcome to the 100X Life Podcast, where we activate people who desire to live the words of Jesus and experience the abundant life He promises. I'm your host, Rob Dayton, and I hope this podcast inspires you to put in the work of following Jesus.
Hey, 100x lifers. Welcome back to the podcast. Nancy and I are in Bellingham this week with our daughter and son-in-law, Ben and Kendra, and our grandbaby Elise. It's so wonderful to be with them and hang out in Bellingham, which is on the coast. It's actually above Seattle, about 20 miles before you get to the Canadian border in Washington.
So just got back from an epic mountain bike ride. So I'm pretty, I'm pretty tired. It was awesome though. Hey, so just wanted to bring you a little coaching session today on the triune being and particularly we're gonna talk about faith. We're gonna talk about faith. And I wanna I wanna have this be a continuation of our talk on
Repentance. Repentance. This was two sessions ago. We talked about repentance and Jesus saying, Hey, now the the time has been fulfilled. Repent and believe. And so we're going to talk today about that second part, belief. But that first part, repent. Change the way you think. That is something that as a Christian, you can become pretty ninja, a master of changing the way you think. And you need to be.
So if you haven't listened to that that podcast, go back and listen to the one on changing the way you think, repentance, because that plays right into belief. And so Jesus is saying you gotta repent and believe. And I like to s I like to phrase it, you've gotta repent to believe. So you've got to change the way you think, and that leads to belief. and Jesus repeats this many, many times. And so it's it's
Fundamental to Jesus following is to have this capacity to change the way you think. And then we're gonna talk about how do you believe? What does belief look like in the kingdom? Practically, what does that look like? What is the process? I I remember when I was a kid and people would say, Rob, you just gotta have faith. You gotta have faith. And I'm like
How do I do that? And I know 100x Life has been a resource for many of you in practically showing you how to faith to build a mind muscle, a spirit muscle to actually practice the words of Jesus.
We're going to talk about that little bit today. So let's get into it. if you have a notebook, grab a notebook, take some notes. this will be a resource. Every time we do a coaching session, it's because you're gonna follow up and actually do something. You're gonna act you're gonna take it, what you've learned, and you're gonna apply it. Whenever you can apply something you've learned right away, and then within a week, that's when it starts to get sticky and you remember it. So let's get into it. So, what I want you
to know first is that this word belief
In the Greek is related to the word faith, which is pistis. So belief and faith are very intertwined, they're related. So when Jesus is saying, your faith has made you well, for example, which is a great example, your faith has made you well. Isn't that fascinating that Jesus says that again and again and again to people who have been healed by him? Your faith has made you healed.
And then another way of saying that, the same word in the Greek, belief, your belief has made you whole. And what I want to suggest is that that power of belief or faith, when it when we know it's true, and here's what I'm going to suggest: is that when we come into alignment between our spirit, our soul, and our body, the triune being.
we are made in the image of God. We're made in three parts. first Thessalonians says that we're spirit, soul, and body.
We like to say 100xLife that the soul is the mind, will, and emotions. It's the seat of decision. We know that the mind exists beyond the body, which contains the brain. So your brain is in your body, and we know that your mind continues to think after your body's dead. near-death experience people commonly will they'll they can see themselves usually rising up from their bodies. Kind of funny. and they can totally think, they go to heaven, they can think, they they they
remember.
Remember, so your mind is something other than your body. And it's in your soul. And also in you, the soul is your decision point. It's the will. It's what you decide. It's where you have the power to be like God. We get to choose actually what we do. We choose love, we choose fear. And then your spirit.
is seated in heavenly places in Christ right now. It's Ephesians 2:6 and it's glorious. That's where you're the most unified with Jesus right now. And so these three parts of us, faith or belief, exists when the spirit, the soul, and the body are in alignment on a subject.
That's when it when it exists. Paul would say when you're fully convinced, when he says fully convinced, you are in alignment. There's no division. You're not divided. You're not double-minded. You know, like I was when I was a kid. I was I would say I'm a Jesus follower, I'm a Christian. but I even though I would say that in my mind, my body, I would perform other things. I was sexually addicted. I chose not to believe that word of Jesus.
On if you ever even think of another woman, you'll be, you've committed adultery. I just said that wasn't true. And so I had a, I was duplistic. I was double-minded. And that is not belief. Saying one thing and doing another is in another passage in Revelation, what Jesus calls lukewarm. You, you're, or you're double-minded, is what Paul would call it. And that's worse, that's a worse condition than being in alignment on mistruth.
Jesus says you're neither hot or cold, you're lukewarm, and so I will spit you out of my mouth. That's the state I was in. And that's what we want to eliminate as followers of Jesus. And I don't know, I would say, me included, you know, I there's many areas in the words of Jesus where where I do not have full alignment yet, that I'm pursuing to be fully aligned so that my faith.
in his words is completely automatic. And that's what I'd say you really have. The evidence is first, obviously, from your spirit, it believes it believes all things. It's the closest thing to love. It believes fully. It's it's a powerful belief. And then the soul, which is the which includes the mind, the seat of decision, can decide to believe. You know, many of us, when we said yes to Jesus, we decided to believe. But then if the body has a different
Programming, and that's really what the brain is. It's a it's a neuroplasticity programming for automatic behavior. If it's programmed differently than what the mind says it wants, that's where you get you're not aligned, and that's where faith does not work. So think of the the woman in the tradition, her name is Veronica, but she's the one who had the bleeding issue when Jesus and Jarius are on their way to heal his daughter, and they're
in a crowd and
And
people are pushing all around Jesus. And she thinks to herself if I only touch his cloak, I will be healed.
So she was fully convinced in her spirit, in her mind, she had made up, and then we get action, which is the body takes action. So you know the brain is in alignment with the decision the mind makes when we take action that is in alignment. So she reached out and she touched his cloak. The the thing that's fascinating about that miracle is that Jesus is not involved, other than she touches his cloak and
He feels the power leave, and he's like, Okay, what how did this happen? Who did this? And then he says to her daughter, Your faith has healed you. So, and that's the that's the only place he says daughter. So it's really interesting that he calls her daughter. That's a bunny trail. But like, wow, isn't that crazy that she had this alignment between her spirit, her soul, and her body, where the
She said to herself in her mind, this is what will happen if I do this. And then she does it. That is faith. So for us, we want to explore. Here's the opportunity. When we practice repentance, changing the way we think, we want to explore where we have incongruencies.
That you know, that is the opportunity for us. That's the opportunity for growth. This is the 100xLife is the reflection on where there is misalignment. We are we we say we want to do a thing, and then we can't do a thing. So thinking of my my journey of of moving from sexual addiction to sexual purity with my wife Nancy, is that took a long journey, a progressive journey of
Reprogramming
the brain So I said, hey, I'm all in. I don't want to lust after another woman. That's what I'd love to do. That's what I that's so my soul was like, yes. My spirit's like, yes, yes, yes. Let's do that. And so my spirit and soul are in alignment. And then my body was absolutely not, because then I would do the thing I don't want to do. Was the is the Romans 7, Paul's Romans 7. I do the thing I don't want to do. I don't do the thing I want to That is misalignment between the mind and
The soul and the and the body or the brain. So slowly I had to change the way I thought over three years. And it was it was baby steps, the little actions, you know, first just not being able to not looking at pornography or you know, blowing it very infrequently is another way of saying it. And then, you know, stopping to have imaginations,
about women just that I saw. You know, stop those imaginations about having sex with them, which is, you know, this part of sexual addiction. Many men struggle with this. So if you're struggling with that, you know, this is this is a road of alignment. This is how you get to faith and believing that word. And then slowly to the point where now I'm making love with Nancy and I'm thinking of other women. So that's so that was the last part to go. And then not having that at all. And then getting in the gym every once in a while where definitely there's temptation
And then holding that back and holding the line. That is faith. So I have automatic behavior.
that and I'll give you an example. Like it used to be when I was sexually addicted, I had a rule that I could not have a laptop when I was on the road in bed with me. That would be a no-no because then I would be like, my body wants to get some pornography going. now that's not an issue. I don't even think of that. So that is alignment of faith. That's alignment of faith. That that is that my spirit is saying, We're not doing that. My mind and my
my
soul have completely decided we're not doing that, and then my brain is automatically not doing that. So wow, that is alignment and faith. So what are the things, what would you say if you were to think about it a little bit that you have some misalignment?
You know, I I would say for me, and and there's I would say there's many areas, we could chase this forever. You can go beyond the words of Jesus. I'd say, I'd say you have a misalignment in any area where you don't believe and have alignment for something that's true in heaven.
To be here on earth. So Jesus, let me let me give you some background on why that Jesus gives us permission to do that. He says that we would pray that his kingdom come, his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So he's inviting us to pray that everything that's in heaven that's happening now would come to earth. And then I would propose to you through the words of Jesus and behaviors of love, we actually bring those things to earth. So in your
imagination this is a great exercise you can just look at the things of heaven what is in heaven that you want to have on earth in fact that's a great way to s to find your kingdom purpose is to ask that question if you were to bring one thing from heaven to earth what would that be?
Think think about that. What what would the thing that you'd be most passionate about that doesn't exist in heaven? Like for instance, no disease, or no lying, or no sex trafficking, or people are honored all the time.
Children are raised appropriately. people don't speak hate. People don't condemn. I mean, there's the the list could be extremely long of the things that are in heaven that have not yet manifest on earth. Paul says in Corinthians that the last enemy to to be destroyed on earth is death itself.
Death is the last enemy of God. One question is, what are the other enemies of God that haven't been destroyed? That'd be another way of thinking. What hasn't come from heaven to earth? Because every time something comes to heaven to earth in its fullness, that would be an enemy of God being destroyed. And so that's a great way to think of it, of areas where you still have misalignment. I would say I don't have the faith.
for many people to get healed. I I have the faith for many things like when someone has a lower back issue for instance I've seen that healed so many times. I have no problem praying for that. if you had
If you had a like someone in the hospital and we were praying for full restoration or healing of a disease, I'm all about praying for cancer. I have I have great alignment of faith in the area of praying for cancer. But for a cold, like I I don't I don't recall ever praying for someone's cold to be healed and it actually has been healed. So I I just say I'm lacking in that area. Like I have doubts. When I'm praying for a cold, I would have doubts to see that healed.
I remember when I was on State Street and there's this guy named Peg and he's a one-legged man and we were going around, which is something that we did at the House of Prayer, and we would just walk down the street and get words of knowledge and and pray for people. And I remember running into Peg and just saying and and just I I I just I said, Hey, can I pray for you? And I can I put my hand on your leg and his stub, and I I did put my hand on his stub, but man, I had no faith that he was gonna have his leg grown out.
How many know Jesus can do that. so I'm just I'm kind of staying in this lane of faith for healing, but it's interesting because where I have full alignment and confidence.
In someone getting healed. I'll even, I know with that with the whole lower back pain, I'll be like, hey, come over here. You know, Susie's about to get healed of her lower back pain. That's how much confidence I have. It's like, come watch Susie be healed. That is complete alignment. I have a another way of saying the hope is spelt with expectation. I have a strong expectation that that's gonna happen. Whenever you don't expect something, you want something to happen. You you've decided in your mind that.
it needs to happen, but you don't have expectation for it. That would be another example of misalignment where you don't have true faith. True faith again would be alignment of a spirit, soul, and your body. They're they're in unison and then they manifest.
heaven on earth when there when there's faith. You know, Jesus said if you have faith without doubt, and you know, that's another way of describing alignment is there's no doubt within the three parts of you, the triune being you can actually move a mountain.
so and the other the other one of the ways he suggests praying is that you pray and believe that you've already received that thing, which is another posture of expectation because when you believe you've already received something, you're starting to express thankfulness to God for that thing. your expectation is really high. That would be another description of faith in alignment, the the spirit.
Soul and body. So that's what I'd like you to do. Take that reflection. You could choose a word of Jesus to make it easier. You know, which word of Jesus am I am I not fully aligned where I'm not exercising faith? And then how do I grow that? So that's what the so once you've identified, so the first journal prompt might be: Holy Spirit, show me an area where I'm not aligned in faith between my spirit, soul, and body. Show me an area.
Whether
it's an area of bringing heaven to earth, whether it's a word of Jesus that I'm not completely believing, show me Holy Spirit. And then the next step is that you've got to start angling towards belief. In other words, your body is resistant. Your body is saying, I don't expect this to happen. It's not acting as though it expects it to happen.
It doesn't move automatically into a posture of expectation. And then you'll just notice in that area when it happens. You know, let's go back to the healing. Let's just say I I want to grow in the ability to heal. The Bible is loaded with the people who are leading in in Acts.
They were all laying their hands on people and healing. Jesus says, when the my followers will lay hands on people and they'll get well. So healing is a part of being a believer. So if you know, and I don't want this session to be all about healing, but it's a perfect example for you to grow. So how would I do that? Well, you start imagining in your imagination, that's the one of the best ways to change the way you think, the way to reprogram the brain is to start.
Imagining healing. So imagine yourself coming across someone. Imagine yourself before you get in the situation where someone actually asks you for prayer for healing, you're starting to imagine yourself doing it. Imagine yourself actually putting your hands on someone and then imagine them getting healed. Remember that whenever you imagine something,
The brain does not know that that's true. You're actually playing a movie. The mind is playing a movie, that's an imagination for the brain, and the brain doesn't know it's true. It actually thinks that it is true. That's why Jesus says, don't even think about having sex with a woman, because if you do think about having sex with a woman, your brain thinks that you are and then starts behaving like you are. So imagination is key. In fact, if you are trying to change the
the
way you think regarding lust and fantasies, don't just stop, point your imagination at something really good. And that would be
Anything that's in heaven, that you're inviting God to bring that his will be done on earth as it is in heaven, that's in a great imagination. So imagining someone get healed, imagining you laying your hands on them, imagining their joy of being healed. imagine God pointing out someone to you.
that needs healing, like a word of knowledge. A word of knowledge is just the spirit coming on you, and then you know something that you couldn't have known, like someone has knee pain, or someone has back pain, or I'm just staying on this thing of healing, and you've got we've got to imagine ourselves getting these things.
Have a fantasy about doing the things Jesus did, or the things the followers of Jesus did, one of them healing, this is what we're talking about, and growing your faith. So faith would be I'm fully aligned. So we're reprogramming our brain with our imagination, imagining the thing happening. and then as soon as, you get the opportunity, this is when it gets real. Okay, let me tell you: in the kingdom, faith is spelled
R-I-S-K. Faith requires risk. And when Holy Spirit prompts you of something and when you've been imagining something and the opportunity comes, faith in practice is actually taking the risk. Now you might fail.
I've failed so many times when I've taken the risk of faith in the grocery store. You know, hey, I I have this thought about you. Do you mind me sharing? And then I say it and they're like, no. Okay, well, I took a risk. But you have to practice risk if you're going to exercise. Listen to me on this. If you're going to exercise faith in an area, you're going to have to take a risk.
That's the bottom line. So you've got these imaginations going, and then the opportunity comes, the spirit shows up, you probably will feel something in your body, an unction, a desire. You might feel heat, you might feel electricity, you might get teary, you might get joyful, you'll feel the power of Holy Spirit within you. And then in concert with that imagination you had, you'll be prompted to take a risk. Again.
Faith is spelled R-I-S-K. And so you do it. And that's a practice. It's a it's a gym. It's a practice gym of growing our faith. We just give it a try. And you can't align yourself.
with the things of heaven and the things of Jesus until you take a risk and actually try it. You've got to do something. You may have imaginations first, and then you step out and you do something, and maybe it's awesome and it's right, and you have this incredible testimony, and then you do it again if you're like me and it doesn't go well. But you keep trying until your body has alignment and has full expectation. You know you have.
full expectation when the Holy Spirit prompts and you don't feel, notice feel, the body doesn't feel like it's a risk. No, the body will be like, well of course, we're going right in and we're doing this. That's when you know your faith will be fully developed.
once you've endured and you've you've gone through the practice of taking a risk of stepping out on something you've been imagining about, and we've been using healing as an example, and you actually do it and do it until you get to the place where someone asks for healing or Holy Spirit prompts you, gives you word of knowledge about someone to heal them, and your body does not have any doubts. It's fully convinced that what
is about to happen is going to happen. That is alignment of faith. The spirit, the soul, and the body completely aligned on an idea fully convinced, with no doubts.
That's when faith is big. That's when it gets strong. That's when it gets powerful. Now we're not God. We're not Jesus. we have many characteristics of both. and you know, it's not gonna be a hundred percent. countless people who have tried a thing and have become slaves to righteousness or have become really
Full of faith about certain things coming to earth from heaven, so certain aspects of heaven being coming true on earth.
They're not 100%. And you know, we won't know this side of heaven as to why that is, but it's not going to be 100%. Maybe it's because, well, then we would be God. So there's going to be some failure from time to time. That is part of the human condition. But man, you can grow so much in your faith in a thing that Jesus has given you and permission and invited you into through his words or through his invitation to have heaven.
be done on earth as it is in heaven, either is good. So the second prompt would be Holy Spirit, give me imaginations about how that would look in heaven. So you're gonna write in the first person from Holy Spirit about those imaginations. And then what is the training that's required? What is the reprogramming of my mind to be consistent with what my body, with what my spirit and and soul are saying.
So write it down. Journaling is going to be a great way, another way to transform the way you think. And guys, this is a powerful, this is a powerful practice. And so give it a try. Take a risk. Get out there and do it and practice your faith in one area, either a word of Jesus or something that you know you would love to see that's in heaven, true in heaven, you want to see it true on earth. Go get them and we will see you next week.