After twenty years of preaching faith, a painful reality settled in I had a lot of academic faith but precious little practical faith. I decided one of two things was true: either God was making a fool of me, or there were some simple things about faith I had overlooked. A burning desire to "re-learn" faith resulted in this book. I took a new approach to Scripture study. Instead of customarily reading the Bible to confirm what I already believed, I began to read the Bible just to see what it said. As I re-read the Bible "for the first time," the simplicity of the message overwhelmed me.When we focus on Christ, faith flourishes like flowers after a spring rain. When we focus on ourselves, trusting God becomes an unnecessary struggle. The "What about me?" culture we live in makes man the center of the universe. Man-centered thinking and the cross of Christ are at eternal odds with each other. Self doesn't need improvement-it needs the cross. We don't need more faith-we need a new focal point. When we make Christ the beginning, the center and the end of everything in our lives, self will take its rightful place on the cross and faith will become instinctive.