THE ONSET OF FAITH

Scripture citations are to the NIV-UK (1984)

Distilling Faith to its purest and particular application, it is primarily a religious faculty, succinctly defined as mental appreciation of and heart's reliance upon God.

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THE NECESSITY FOR Faith can be traced to the fall of Man into sin and away from the fellowship of his Creator. Adam, the first man, had no doubt about the existence of God (Gen 3: 8), but he did need to exercise heart's reliance that aspect of Faith which trusts the integrity and dependability of the One who made him.

Consequent on Adam's fall into sin, which affects the entire human race to the present day, God withdrew His fellowship. Mankind became a dying race, thrust into a hostile and increasingly dangerous environment. Over succeeding generations, as deaths and dangers accumulated, Fear and Doubt set in, and the confidence that God was benign receded. The benevolent Creator was increasingly viewed with suspicion and disdain by those whom He had made, and humanity was at length separated from Him by a chasm too wide to bridge by synthetic pagan theology.

Although God had cursed and rejected humanity, He had not abandoned the race, as St. Paul tells us in Rom. 8: 20, 21:

[Humanity] was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

From this we learn that although God turned away His face (favour) from the human family, He nonetheless built into them the compensating quality of Hope an element of Faith with a view to their eventual recovery.

The Object of Faith

Christ's death redeems (purchases) the believing sinner in an elegant demonstration of God's justice. Adam, the perfect man, sinned and God passed the sentence of death on him. Jesus, the perfect man, offered Himself in place of Adam, thus releasing Adam and his offspring from death. This is the ʻransom for allʼ mentioned in 1 Tim. 2:

5 There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,

6who gave himself as a ransom for all men the testimony given in its proper time.

Paul lays emphasis on this principle of equivalence in 1 Cor. 15:

22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. [emphases added]

That is to say, all those affected by the curse on Adam – the entire human family, past, present and future will be given an opportunity to benefit from the saving merit of Christ's death. Some will avail themselves of the privilege now; the vast majority will take their opportunity later, in Christ's earthly Kingdom, after the general resurrection.

Only the sacrifice of Christ provides the basis for forgiveness and eternal life, and guarantees an opportunity for all to become right with God through Faith and to enter into a contract of grace. There can be no salvation outside this arrangement.

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July 2017

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