I found this post by C. Michael Patton to be very helpful:
There are four different ways to define faith. It is incredibly important that we, as Christains, don’t go wrong here.
1. Blind Faith: Faith as a blind leap into the dark.
“Faith is a blind leap into the dark. The blinder the leap, the greater the faith.” Have you ever heard this? In the 1989 film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, this mentality was put on the big screen. Indiana Jones was making his way through the caves through tests and trials as he attempted to retrieve the Holy Grail which would bring life back to his dying father. The last test was a “test of faith.” Here Jones was challenged by a great chasm which separated him from the grail. But when he looked, there was no way across the chasm. The solution? A step of faith. After much hesitation, he closed his eyes, held his breath and took the blind leap. His faith was rewarded as a bridge, unseen to the naked eye, suddenly appeared.
Take something as simple as a chair. God is the chair. He is asking you to sit down (rest) in the chair. 

2. Irrational Faith: Faith as an irrational leap
In this view, faith is something we have in spite of the evidence. While everything may militate against our faith, we are to make the most irrational choice of all. The more irrational the faith, the greater the faith. 

3. Warranted Faith: Faith as a step according to the evidence
The next option is that faith is a step according to rational evidence and inquiry. In other words, we believe because it makes sense. Everything in life, according to this view, takes faith. Even getting in your car and driving to work takes faith. You have to have faith that your car’s brakes won’t go out, that other drivers will not cross the yellow line, and that you won’t fall asleep at the wheel. These are all steps of faith, but they don’t need to be irrational or blind steps. We can have warranted trust in ourselves, other drivers, and our car due to our knowledge of these things. This is called “warranted faith.” We make our decisions precisely because the evidence supports it, but this is still faith. 

4. Biblical Faith: Warranted faith brought about by the Holy Spirit
It might surprise you to know that while all of these are legitimate ways that the word “faith” is used today, none of them represent the faith expressed in the Bible. The faith that God calls on us to have is neither blind nor irrational. And while we believe our faith is the most rational choice that we can make given the evidence, rational alone is not enough. The Bible says that without outside intervention, we are antagonistic to spiritual truths. If we rely on naked intellect or personal effort alone, even as Christians, we will never truly be able to rest in God. The most important component to our faith has yet to be revealed. What is this element? It is the power of the Holy Spirit. The third member of the Trinity must ignite our faith. Yes, he uses rationale , inquiry, evidences, personal effort, and our minds to do so. But these things alone can only get us so far. In order to have true faith, the power of the Holy Spirit must move within us, releasing us from the bondage of our will.


It is our will that is the problem. We don’t have the will to trust in God alone. Listen to what Paul says to the Corinthians:
1 Cor. 2:12-14 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. 14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
Any time we rely on ourselves to rest in God, we are acting as “natural” people. We have to act as spiritual people and call on God to increase our faith through the power of the Spirit as the Spirit energizes our will and intellect.

I read the following quote yesterday. I found it in a book written to pastors, but it is without a doubt applicable to each of us:
There is nothing that will put you in your place, nothing that will correct your distorted view of yourself, nothing that will yank you out of your functional arrogance, or nothing that will take the winds out of the sails of your self-righteousness like standing, without defense, before the awesome glory of God.
In the face of his glory I am left naked with no glory whatsoever to hold before myself or anyone else. As long as I am comparing myself to others, I can always find someone whose existence seems to be an argument for how righteous I am. But if I compare the filthy rags of my righteousness to the pure and forever unstained linen of God's righteousness, I want to run and hide in heartbreaking shame.
This is exactly what happened to Isaiah, recorded in Isaiah 6. He stands before the awesome throne of God's glory and says, "Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!"(v.5) Isaiah is not speaking in formal religious hyperbole here. He is not trying to ingratiate himself with God by being oh so humble. No, it is only in light of the awesome glory and holiness of God that you come to have an accurate view of yourself and the depth of your need for the rescue that only a God of glorious grace can provide.
Tripp, Ted, Dangerous Calling: Confronting the Unique Challenges of Pastoral Ministry, p. 121

On this, the 40th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade court decision to legalize abortion, the well-known words of the Psalmist are in order:
For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more than the sand (Psalm 139:13–18a). 
 
Long before you and I took our first breath, God knew us because he was busy forming us. His love had already been cast upon us. The life forming in his mother's womb was already precious to the Heavenly Father. The gift of life is indeed to be treasured at all stages. May we seek to protect those who cannot protect themselves.

Pastor Sam Storms writes:
 Sarah’s father had been a demanding tyrant. His so-called “love” for his daughter was cruelly and continually dangled in front of her like the proverbial carrot on a stick. His promise sounded tantalizing to Sarah but ultimately rung hollow: “If you look pretty, I’ll love you. If you make good grades, I’ll love you. If you are successful and helpful and don’t embarrass me in front of others, I’ll love you.”
I’d heard similar stories before. But that didn’t make her words any less difficult to endure.
“I was never quite pretty enough, slim enough, smart enough,” Sarah told me. She never did get a bite of that carrot. All she could remember was the bitter aftertaste of her father’s disdain and rejection. Sarah and I spent considerable time working through the destructive consequences of her lack of experience with a father’s love.
But we weren’t making much headway . . . until I asked the question, “What does God feel when he looks at you?”
“Pity,” she snapped back, never pausing to think about it.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I’m pitiful. I’m pathetic,” she said.
For the next hour or so I explained to Sarah how much God loves her. I labored at finding just the right words to convince her it was true. It was tough going. I explained the depth of his love as expressed in the cross of Christ. I used images, vivid metaphors, and countless word pictures. They all failed. The idea of a loving Father who enjoyed her was incomprehensible to Sarah. Nothing seemed to make sense.
GOD SINGS OVER YOUThen I had her read Zephaniah 3:17: “The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.”
“That’s how God feels about you, Sarah!” I told her. “He looks at you, he thinks of you—and he sings for joy!”
She was stunned. “God sings? God sings? Over me?”
After a few moments of shocked silence, tears began to well up in her eyes and eventually streamed down her cheeks. “Sam, are you sure?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
“But I’m so pathetic,” she protested. “I really am. I’m overweight, and I’d die if anyone saw the inside of my house right now. It’s almost as messy as I am! My husband is furious at me again. I can’t do anything right. And you say God sings over me with joy? I doubt it! More likely, he’s screaming in disgust. My dad used to do that.”
Again I asked her to read the passage: The Lord my God is in my midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over me with gladness; he will quiet me by his love; he will exult over me with loud singing.
The tears returned.
GOD ENJOYS YOUSarah’s reaction to Zephaniah 3:17 was dramatic but not unusual. I’ve seen it again and again. It has led me to a simple but startling conclusion: what makes life livable is enjoying the joy that comes from knowing that you are enjoyed by God.
This in no way minimizes our responsibility to love God. The greatest commandment in the Law is that we love the Lord with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind (Matt. 22:37). Not loving God is, therefore, the worst of all human sins. What I have in mind, though, is his love for us, his deep, emotional, loving movement toward people he created in his image. So let’s not reverse what the Bible sets in order: “In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10, NKJV). Our love for God is a reflex of his love for us. He loved us first! We must be careful not to invert the sequence.
Tomorrow no longer terrifies when your soul knows God’s delight in you.
I’ve been a Christian for 51 years. I’ve been a pastor for 38 years. I guess that makes me “old” and somewhat experienced. In any case, I’ve seen more than I care to remember of human pain and predicaments. I’ve counseled rebellious teens and lonely senior citizens. I’ve spent hours with bitter wives and their passive husbands. I’ve cried with victims of sexual abuse and rejoiced with those set free from bondage. Their problems may be different. Some are men, others are women. Some are old, others young. But the one thing they share in common is the deeply felt need of the human soul to know and feel that God loves and enjoys them.
The one thing that gives us hope, the one thing that conquers despair and brings strength for the struggle is the assurance that no matter how bad the problem may be, God loves us. Pain becomes bearable and tomorrow no longer terrifies when your soul is touched with the reality of God’s delight in you. That is why I have written this book.

​Gracious Lord,
Your name is love,
in love receive my prayer.
My sins are more than the wide sea's sand,
but where sin abounds,
there is grace more abundant.
Look to the cross of you beloved Son,
and view the preciousness of his atoning blood;
listen to his never-failing intercession,
and whisper to my heart, "Your sins are forgiven,
be of good cheer, lie down in peace."
Grace cataracts from heaven adn flows for ever,
and mercy never wearies in bestowing benefits.
Grant me more and more
to prize the privilege of prayer,
to come to thee as a sin-soiled sinner,
to find parden in you,
to converse with you;
to know you in prayer as
the path in which my feet tread,
the latch upon the door of my lips,
the light that shines through my eyes,
the music of my ears,
the marrow of my understanding,
the strength of my will
the power of my affection,
the sweetness of my memory.
May the matter of my prayer be always
wise, humble, submissive,
obedient, scriptural, Christ-like.
Give me unwavering faith
that supplications are never in vain,
that if I seem not to obtain my petitions
I shall have larger, richer answers,
surpassing all that I ask or think.
Unsought, you have given me
the greatest gift, the person of your Son,
and in him you will give me all I need.

Then Job answered the Lord and said: “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. ‘Hear, and I will speak; I will question you, and you make it known to me.’ I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” (Job 42:1–6, ESV)
Job's story is timeless and captivating. Trouble rains down upon his life and all but his breath is stripped away. His friends told him that it was his sin that brought all this pain and agony and if he would simply repent, the clouds would break and the sun would shine once again. But Job was adamant: his suffering was not the result of his sin (which was true -- see Job 1-2). However, as the book moves on and Job continues to defend himself against his friends' accusations ("you must have done something, Job"), Job's tone because to take a haughty and prideful air. One begins to get the sense that Job wants God to take a the stand.
But then in Job 38-41, God speaks. He tells Job to man up (38:3) and get ready to defend his foolish and haughty words (38:2). He ask Job if he knows where the snow is stored (38:22), if he knows how to stop waves (38:11) or move stars in the sky (38:31-33). He reminds Job of his position as created being and God's own role as creator/sustainer of all things.
When the dust settles, Job is thoroughly humbled. No longer does he call God to account. No more does he shake his fist in defiant challenge. He admits he had no clue what he was talking about. God never tipped his hand to Job as to the reasons for Job's pain and suffering. And he rarely does with us either. At times, our cluelessness about our predicament can give rise to anger, resentment and their air of spiritual pride that says, "Who are you to allow this into my life, God? I don't deserve this. You've got the wrong guy!"
But right along with Job, we need to remember who's God and who's not (that's us). We need to remember that God's not obligated to give us answers. In reality he gives us something better: himself. He offers a deeper relationship with him and sustaining grace through the midst of our pain. It's not easy to be humbled by God, but being fashioned into God's image was never promised to be easy.
Be willing to let God humble you today. Take a few moments to ask him how your thinking about him or your circumstances might be wrong. Ask him to reveal the blind spots in your spiritual life. Be willing to admit when you're wrong or when you've sinned. Repentance was the only balm that could bring healing to Job and it will do the same for you and I.

When was the last time someone in your small group or that accountability partner confessed a deep and painful struggle with the sin of . . . idolatry? It's not one of those sins that we are often mindful of yet it's undoubtedly something that knocks on our door on a daily basis. Yet it may be closer to your doorstep than you think.
But what is it and how do I know if it's infiltrated the ranks of my heart? An idol is "whatever claims that loyalty which belongs to God alone (Is. 42:8)."1 It could be sports, food, hobbies, reading -- even great things like serving in church or your family.
So in the spirit of Jeff Foxworthy, it might be idolatry if...
 1) ...you find yourself face down on the floor paying homage to a carved, painted or otherwise fashioned statue, picture or some other object. I'm stating the obvious, but thought it shouldn't be left unsaid.
2) ...you find that you spend a disproportionate amount of money on it
3) ...you find that you spend more time with it than you do with God
4) ...you are not "complete" without it
5) ...you find yourself constantly worrying about it
6) ...you get angry when you can't have it
7) ...you want it really, really badly (Ephesians 5:5, Colossians 3:5)
8) ...you can't stop thinking about it (Philippians 3:19)
The great news of the Gospel is the hope that it offers. Freedom from the shackles of sin. Be it anger, porn, laziness or idolatry; I don't have to enslaved. And one of the greatest remedies to idolatry is getting a fresh look at God and beginning to see him as the great treasure that he is. He truly is much better than idolatry. He is unbelievably more satisfying that that addiction, that hobby that's taken over or that fear that grips you. Spending time with him really will gratify your urges far more than your idol.
Don't settle for idolatry and may you see him as the great God that he is.

 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ (Philippians 3:8)

  
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1 J. A. Motyer, "Idolatry" In , in New Bible Dictionary, ed. D. R. W. Wood, I. H. Marshall, A. R. Millard et al., 3rd ed. (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1996), 496.

 And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” (Jeremiah 31:34, ESV)
We've all forgotten things -- sometimes important things: dentist appointments, deadlines at work, or the precise location of our car keys. Sometimes it's something very important such as your wife's first name or day in which you proclaimed your undying love to her at the alter.
Well don't feel too badly, you're in good company (never mind, feel bad about the first name thing). Did you know that God forgets stuff too? Ok, here's where the similarities end. We forget because we're mortal. We have limitations which cause us to come up short at times. God forgets because he chooses to.
When we confess our sin to God, he chooses to forgive us and just like that, it has been stricken from the record. It will never come up again as ammo in an argument. He's not going to rehash it or dangle it over us to stir up feelings of guilt and remorse.
It is gone. It is forgotten. Praise God for that!