You will remember the story. We read that Jesus had blessed fellowship in this home of Mary and Martha and Lazarus, but as He was away when Lazarus took sick and died, they sent Him word to that effect. When He arrived, Lazarus had been dead for several days, but He raised him from the dead. It is a very dramatic scene, wonderful and beautiful, but in this story we find Jesus giving voice to a little word which is the digest or the epitome of the whole process of faith.

After He had brought them to the place of confession of their faith and was about to bring forth Lazarus, He turned to Martha and said, “Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?” In that simple verse He disclosed to them the entire process of faith development, the movement of the Spirit and the process by which God works everything that is ever wrought out in us.

He uses identically the same pattern. He starts with the phrase:

1. “SAID I NOT UNTO THEE?"

That is point number one and refers to something spoken, something given: a testimony, a word, a promise, a covenant, a bit of revelation which comes within the brackets of “Said I not unto thee?” Said what?

2. “THAT, IF THOU WOULDEST BELIEVE."

Believe what? Was it to believe the Word? Believe what? Believe what He has said to her, not everything in the entire Bible. Jesus tried to pin Martha down. He wanted her to come right out and say that she believed He could do what He had said He would do, but she only replied,

“Yes, I believe in the resurrection.”

That was not the point. “Can you believe a little further? Can you bring out one specific fact of the resurrection theory and see it demonstrated?” But she could not come that far, and so simply said, “Well, I believe that in the resurrection he will come forth.” That was lovely, but not what He wanted. Do you remember when Jesus was deal­ing with Peter to obtain a confession from him, He asked, “Whom do folks say that I am?”

“Oh, they say You are so and so.” “But whom do you say that I am?”

It was then that He drew out of him a confession, a specific confession. You can believe a great many general truths, but let that become specific in its application and see how different it all is.

So here He questioned Martha, “Do you believe?”

“Oh, yes”, she said, “I believe in the resurrection he will come forth.”

“But do you believe in the resurrection right here and now?”

Well, that was being quite specific. But that was what He was dealing with at the time. It is wonderful to have faith for many things far away in the distance; to believe in divine healing when you are feeling well and strong. Then we can say, “Oh, yes, divine heal­ing is one of the main tenets of our faith.” “Yes, I have read a tract on divine heal­ing, and, praise God, I—ouch! I have a pain.”

“Well, do you believe it now? Your faith in divine healing has come right home now to that pain in your side. I don’t care how much you believe in divine healing, have you faith right now to believe for that pain?'' That is the way the Lord deals with us. He does not care much about people get­ting blessed on general principles.

So He turned to Martha and said, “Said I not unto thee, that if thou wouldest believe. . .” Believe what? The thing that He had said to her. And if she would believe that, the result would be,

3. “THOU SHALT SEE THE GLORY OF GOD."

The very thing she had believed for would be demonstrated before her: Here is the divine process; the statement to which faith must pin itself. Faith must grasp that which has been said, and if we are obedient to that law and dare to do the thing which He says, we won’t have to worry about any demonstration of the thing because it is a basic law and it will come forth whether we want it to or not. If we have believed, we have done our part and the rest is in His hands. But peo­ple won’t leave it at that.

They say, “Are you sure you have faith? Then get under the burden for this, brother.”

Well, if I have really believed, I cannot become burdened and all tense and strained. So I go to sleep while the others are out saying, “O God, where is my faith?” The Lord has laid hold of the situation. These people don’t have faith; they have the jitters. Then they make themselves very religious by getting some kind of a strange complex developed, and they sit back trying to get faith, as if to say,

“Now, don’t disturb me; I almost have it now.”

Now back to the story. I call it:

The Rule of Three

1. “Said I not unto thee,
2. That, if thou wouldest believe,
3. Thou shalt see the glory of God?"

This is the divine arrangement and pat­ tern. It is the method of Jesus. What did He say? What did He pin Mary and Mar­tha down to believe? Had He made reference to this situation at any previous time? Why yes, He wouldn’t have said to them, “Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe,” unless He had men­tioned something they were to believe. How many are familiar with the first thing He said about this dead man? When the first group came to Him, before He met Mary and Martha, He made a remark which was very striking.