Christian Foundations: Faith
Introduction
Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”
Faith implies that there is something we can’t see. The totality of reality does not consist in what man can see, hear, or touch. There is something outside the human field of vision. What is not seen is part of the true actuality. Thus, part of human existence is that some certain share of us can’t be nourished by merely the visible or the tangible. The temptation of men of all ages is to reduce the world down to what is seen. Faith is resistance to this inclination. Faith is crossing from the tangible to the intangible realm, repenting from partial reality to embrace the depths of existence.
And what are the depths of existence? Jesus Christ himself. His crucifixion. His resurrection. His ascension. His New Society and New World, which is dependent upon his glorious grace. So it is that John Calvin defines faith as, “A firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”[1]
Object of Faith
Christian belief is about how the gulf between the visible and the invisible, the separation of the temporal and eternal, is bridged by God as man. This is God’s self-revelation, as John 1:18 says, “No one has ever seen God; God the only Son, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known.” Jesus makes God known so we can see and touch him. The problem is that when they did see Jesus, they didn’t believe in him (Jn. 6:36). He did many signs for them, but they still didn’t believe in him (Jn. 12:37). By seeing Jesus’s signs and rejecting him, they proved that they hated both God the Father and the Son, establishing that they were guilty of sin (Jn. 15:24). They didn’t even believe Jesus when he was raised from the dead (Lk. 16:31). This is why Jesus denounced “the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent” (Mt. 11:20). Jesus “marveled at their unbelief” (Mk. 6:6).
In other words. Christ’s incarnation led to the death of God, killed by man. Since man kills God, it seems to conceal God’s revelation and obscure Christ’s divinity. How can man kill God? Can man believe in a God he has killed? The answer is yes, we must, as the Centurion taught us (Mk. 15:39). Otherwise, man remains in an apparently closed world, a “domain of darkness” as Paul calls it (Col. 1:13), which is more unreliable than believing in the death of God. People reject faith for its apparent uncertainty, only to experience the uncertainty of unbelief. Without the crucified Christ, reality is reduced to an only materialistic claim, which the soul knows is screamingly false.
So, while faith is knowledge (see below), it is more than knowledge. It is entrance into the totality of reality from which meaning is bestowed. The spiritual and physical parts of man, including his decisions and actions, are based on this reality, this bestowed meaning. Faith is entrusting yourself to the King who upholds the world (Heb. 1:3). When you enter into this reality, there is a firm ground for standing; there is a stable metaphysics for living. Since human existence depends on the Creator, the Logos, the Word made flesh, faith is receiving the Creator, as John says, “He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn. 1:11-13). Receiving what? Receiving Christ. More particularly, receiving and accepting that Christ provides the meaning of the universe. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said the West’s problem was that it had forgotten God. But that doesn’t mean the solution is to merely remember God. The Apostle Paul taught that real understanding isn’t merely knowing that God exists. It’s about knowing God’s will in all spiritual wisdom (Rom. 12:2; Col. 1:9, 4:12; Eph. 5:17).
So, here you are, you’ve expressed that Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, is the object of your faith. How will Christ judge your profession of faith? In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus will say to those who enter the kingdom. “‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”
Jesus judges if your faith is the real deal by assessing how you look upon the least of men. Do you see those who need your help and discover Christ?[2] To have faith in Christ, rather than merely professing it, is to recognize the needy person as worthy of receiving the love of Christ through you. A profession of faith in Christ, when genuine, leads to a commitment to serving and helping people. Put again, faith in Christ without love of man is not real Christian faith. What Jesus teaches in Matthew 25:31-46 is said plainly elsewhere, for example, Galatians 5:6 speaks of “faith working through love.”
Faith and Forgiveness
Jesus repeatedly linked healing with faith. When the friends lowered the paralytic through the roof, Jesus saw their faith, forgave the man, and he was healed (Mt. 9:2-8; Mk. 2:1-12; Lk. 5:17-26). Jesus healed the bleeding woman, saying, “Your faith has made you well” (Mt. 9:20-22; Mk. 5:25-34; Lk. 8:43-48). Jesus healed the two blind men, saying, “According to your faith let it be done to you” (Mt. 9:27-31). When the Syrophoenician woman asked Jesus to remove the unclean spirit from her daughter, Jesus said, “‘O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you desire.’ And her daughter was healed instantly” (Mt. 15:21-28). Jesus healed blind Bartimaeus, saying, “‘Go your way; your faith has made you well.’ And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him on the way” (Mk. 10:46-52). When Jesus healed the ten lepers, all ten were cleansed, but only one’s faith is commended, suggesting something more than physical healing. Jesus tells him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well” (Lk. 17:11-19). For the Centurion’s servant, healing happens at a distance based on the centurion’s faith, saying, “Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith” (Mt. 8:5-13). Jesus raises Jarius’ daughter from the dead, telling Jarius, “Do not fear, only believe” (Mk. 5:21-43). With the epileptic boy, the disciples fail to drive out the unclean spirit because of their lack of faith. But Jesus tells the boy’s father, “All things are possible for those who believe” (Mk. 9:14-29).
Faith in Christ leads to forgiveness, and forgiveness leads to healing. So, man becomes most human when he is forgiven. This is because the healing that comes by faith restores people to the covenant community. The centurion believes for his servant. The friends believe for the paralytic. Jarius believes for his daughter. Faith is a communal activity, occurring within relationships. So, the woman’s cleanness means she can return to the community, just as the healed lepers can return to their town.
So, faith is the point of contact between the human and divine. Jesus says, “Your faith has healed you,” not because faith has magical powers, but because of what faith is, namely, receiving the extended hand of Christ. Faith in Christ heals a physical disease, but it’s the healing of the spiritual disease, as is emphasized in the paralytic’s story of Mark 2:1-12, that shows the deeper problem and the deeper healing. It restores you to fellowship with God and man.
Faith and the Spirit
Faith is a fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:22f), produced by the Holy Spirit. All of salvation is a gift of God, including faith (Eph. 2:8f). Belief is something that is granted (Phil. 1:29), something obtained by divine allotment (2 Pet. 1:1). Confessing Jesus as Lord requires the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3) and without the Spirit people can’t accept spiritual truth (1 Cor. 2:14). The new birth, which includes faith, comes from the Spirit (Jn. 3:5f; 1 Jn. 5:1). The Spirit gives spiritual life, at the center of which is faith in Christ (Jn. 6:63). Faith is the result of divine opening, where God opens the heart (Acts 16:14). The Spirit enlightens the heart to revelation, enabling faith (Eph. 1:17f). Everything we have is received, including faith (Jn. 1:12f), which means it is not self-generated (1 Cor. 4:7).
Faith by Hearing
“Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17). What does this mean? It means that faith is not like a philosophy that results from reflection. Faith does not come by thinking it out. Faith is the reception of something heard rather than the result of something thought. This doesn’t remove thinking from faith. It means the thinking is over something you’ve heard and received.
This is what happened with the Samaritan woman at the well. She meets Jesus and hears his words about living water. She hears him reveal the private details of her life. She hears his claim to be Messiah, and she believes (Jn. 4:7-26). Then, she testifies to what she heard, telling the people in the town (Jn. 4:28f). The Samaritans hear the woman’s testimony, and they believe (Jn. 4:39) and want to hear from Jesus directly (Jn. 4:40-42). As the Pslamist says, the sheep will hear God’s voice and not harden their hearts (Ps. 95:7f; Jn. 10:27).
Cornelius faith came from hearing Peter speak (Acts 10:44). Lydia’s heart was opened when she heard Paul speaking (Acts 16:14). The 3000 at Pentecost heard Peter’s sermon and were cut to the heart, repented, and were baptized (Acts 2:37-39). The Thessalonians received the word, which they heard from Paul’s missionaries (1 Thess. 1:5-6; 2:13). Faith comes by hearing with divinely opened ears (Mt. 13:16; Jn. 6:44f; 8:47; Eph. 1:17f). As the prophet writes, hearing leads to salvation (Is. 55:3).
So, faith is receiving the Word of God. This reception changes your life. Previously, your thoughts and desires took precedence over everything. Now, the Word takes precedence over your thoughts and desires. The Word lays an obligation that doesn’t change the fact that you think and feel. It obligates your thoughts and feelings to conform. Conformity implies community. Individual Christian faith is communal because everyone in the church is being conformed by the same Spirit and the same Word.
Different Uses of the Word “Faith”
There is a wide semantic range of the word “faith” in the New Testament. Faith is often used to mean personal trust or confidence. For example, Galatians 2:20 talks about new life “by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” John 3:16 says, “Whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” So, faith is directed toward the person of Jesus Christ (Acts 20:21).
Faith is also used as belief or conviction in propositional truth. Hebrews 11:6 says that “Whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” In this case, faith believes two propositions. God exists, and God rewards those who seek him. Romans 10:9 requires confessing that “Jesus is Lord” and believing “that God raised him from the dead.” In this case, faith believes in two more propositions. The Lordship and resurrection of Christ. Romans 10:9 adds that this belief occurs in your heart, which means it’s not a probability bet. It is a belief where you stake your life on it.
Faith is also used to mean faithfulness, for example, Galatians 5:22, “The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.” Or 1 Thessalonians 3:2, Paul sends Timothy “to establish and exhort you in your faith.” Timothy’s job is to strengthen them to fulfill faith as an enduring commitment, that they may “walk by faith, not by sight” as 2 Corinthians 5:7 puts it. In Revelation 2:13, they did not deny their faith but held fast to the name of Christ, remaining faithful to Christ under persecution.
Faith is sometimes used as “the faith” referring to a body of Christian doctrine. So, Jude 3 encourages Christians to “contend for the faith,” and 1 Timothy 4:1 says some will “depart from the faith,” meaning they are abandoning orthodox teaching. When Paul turned to Christ, he began “preaching the faith” (Gal. 1:23) and many of the Jewish priests converted and “became obedient to the faith” (Acts 6:7).
The various semantic usages of faith continue beyond this. For instance, faith is also a spiritual gift, as in a set-apart ability (1 Corinthians 12:9). It is assurance, or certainty, as said in Hebrews 10:22 and 11:1. Whatever the particular usage, the key is to see that faith is covenantal throughout. Just like love is multidimensional, so is faith. Whatever the semantic usage, it involves a personal relationship with God himself.
What sort of faith does God require?
Persevering Faith
Christians are under the covenant demand of persevering faith, which is why many verses teach that true saving faith perseveres until the end. Philippians 1:6 says, “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” Colossians 1:22-23a says, “He has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith.” Hebrews 3:6 says, “We are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.” Hebrews 3:14 says, “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.” Second Peter 1:10 says, “Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.” First Timothy 2:15 says, “Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.”
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints is framed by conditional clauses. To receive the promises of the gospel requires—is conditioned upon—an enduring faith in Christ. This does not undermine God’s unconditional election (Eph 1:3-14; Rom. 9:1-23; 2 Tim. 1:9f), but complements it. Just like God ordains the means of someone coming to faith, he ordains the means of them continuing in the faith. God has ordained to keep his elect (Jn. 6:39; 17:11f; Phil. 1:6; Rom. 8:29f; 1 Cor. 1:8f; 2 Thess. 3:3; Jude 24f). In John 10:28, Jesus said, “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” That means that your trials and temptations, your tribulations and troubles, cannot destroy your faith. Rather, they further it (James 1:2-4).
Knowledgeable Faith
“For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me” (Jn. 17:8). The order is that they received the words, they came to know in truth, and they believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Elsewhere, Peter confessed, “We have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (Jn. 6:69). The order here is reversed. They believe, and then they know. In John 10:38, Jesus says, “Even though you do not believe in me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” Here, the order is that they believe, know, and understand. But then in John 16:30 the disciples say, “Now we know that you know all things and do not need anyone to question you; this is why we believe that you came from God.” The order here is knowledge and then faith. In John 8:31-32, Jesus says, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” The order here is abiding in God’s word, which refers to obeying in faith (2 Pet. 1:5-8), then knowing truth.
What are we to make of this complicated relationship between faith and knowledge? It seems the surest conclusion is that knowledge and faith are interwoven in a mutually dependent way. The order varies. Sometimes belief precedes knowledge (Jn. 6:69). Sometimes knowledge precedes belief (Jn. 17:8). The point is that they are inseparable. Faith and knowledge can be distinguished as two different things. But they can’t be distinguished temporally. Real faith includes growing knowledge of Christ. Real knowledge of Christ includes growing faith. John Calvin put it this way, “Faith rests not on ignorance, but on knowledge.”[3]
As faith starts small and grows big (see below), so does knowledge (2 Pet. 3:18). John’s Gospel is written that they may believe (Jn. 20:31). Knowledge of the life and teachings of Christ is part of believing in Jesus. Paul prays that the believing Ephesians would grow in knowledge (Eph. 1:17-19). Paul’s own faith leads him to want to know Christ (Phil. 3:8-10). He knows whom he has believed (2 Tim. 1:12). And as knowledge grows, obedience grows (Col. 1:9-10). This pursuit of knowledge is spiritual in nature because it is dependent upon divine illumination (2 Cor. 4:6). It’s a knowledge that centers on Christ the Lord (Heb. 8:11). It’s a covenantal knowledge (Jer. 31:34). Within the covenant, faith seeks knowledge while knowing that too precise a knowledge would, at some point, no longer be faith, as Thomas learned (Jn. 20:24-28). Thus, faith requires the humility to admit that my own ignorance is true knowledge when standing before incomprehensible mystery.
Satisfied Faith
John 6:35, “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.’” Faith in Jesus means that spiritual hunger and thirst are satisfied. Christians are the beneficiaries of an undeserved bounty, which, consequently, produces contentment with all that God is for you in Jesus. When Christ turns the peasant into a prince, there is gratitude and satisfaction such that the new prince can only think of praising the Lord. Psalm 63:3 and 5 says, “Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you … my soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips.”
Personal Faith
Faith is not based on belief in something, but Someone, the God-man Jesus Christ. Encountering Jesus is experiencing the meaning of the world, not as a Fate, but as a person. Jesus speaks not his will, but the Father’s will (Jn. 5:30). Since the Father is invisible (Col. 1:15; 1 Tim. 1:17), Jesus is the witness to the intangible. When God takes on human flesh, the invisible God is made visible, the distant God is made near, the transcendent God is made imminent, and the eternal realm is brought to earth.
Why did God become incarnate? “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3:16). In other words, when the invisible God is made visible in Christ, when the meaning of the world appears as a person, it is to witness God’s love to the world (1 Jn. 4:7-12). Life is worth living because of the incomprehensible love of God to man (Eph. 3:17-19).
Scripture says that Christ is the foundation of the world (1 Cor. 3:11; Eph. 2:20; 1 Pt. 2:6). Scripture also says we should seek and find (Dt. 4:29; Jer. 29:13; Mt. 7:7f; Lk. 11:9f; ),[4] which means faith is finding the foundation that upholds the universe, namely, God’s love manifest in the person of Jesus Christ. We enter God’s Kingdom when we entrust ourselves to God like a child knowing he is safe in his mother’s arms (Mk. 10:13-16). So, if God is a person, that means our faith in him is of a personal character. He loves us by taking the form of a man, “born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal. 4:4-5). We love him by obeying him in faith (1 Jn. 3:23f).
Faith will one day become sight. “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known” (1 Cor. 13:12). That which we believe now will be seen then. “For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience” (Rom. 8:24f). Faith is what you know when you can’t see. It’s the hope of what you will one day see, namely, the King of Creation who knows you by name (Is. 43:1; Jn. 10:3; Lk. 10:20; 2 Tim. 2:19).
Obedient Faith
An obedient faith is, to use the words of the Westminster Confession of Faith Chapter 16, one that does good works as “the fruit and evidence of a true and lively faith.” John Calvin says that “Paul defines faith as that obedience which is given in the gospel.”[5] And “Faith can in no wise be separated from a devout disposition.”[6] What is Calvin talking about?
Paul says that the “righteous requirement of the law” is “fulfilled” in those who “walk …. According to the Spirit” (Rom. 8:4), “live according to the Spirit” (Rom. 8:5), subject their “mind …. To God’s law” (Rom. 8:7), do not “live according to the flesh” (Rom. 8:13), “put to death the deeds of the body” (Rom. 8:13), and “suffer with him” (Rom. 8:17). These things represent the “obedience of faith” (Rom. 1:5; 16:26). Paul’s goal in evangelism was “to bring the Gentiles to obedience—by word and deed” (Rom. 15:18). This is what happened when Paul preached the gospel to the Romans, they became “obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed” (Rom. 6:17). What is the “standard of teaching”? It’s the gospel.
It’s not that the apostles don’t care about faith. It’s that the goal of evangelism is faithfulness. And faithfulness is a life of faith that includes things like confessing your sin. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:9). Faithfulness is not work-righteousness. Faithfulness is not earning your salvation. It is all of grace to trust God and follow him. This is why in Acts, believers and disciples are synonymous (Acts 6:1-2, 7; 9:1, 10, 19, 25f, 36, 38; 11:26, 29; 13:52; 14:20, 28; 15:10).
Growing Faith
Faith starts small and grows big. Jesus said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you” (Mt. 17:20). The mustard seed is, proverbially speaking, the smallest of seeds (Mark 4:31). So, faith can be small—very small—and it can be big—very big, “larger than all the garden plants” (Mk. 4:31). Thus, not all faith is equal in size. Some faith is small and immature. Other faith is large and mature. Those with weak faith are expected to coexist alongside those with strong faith (Rom. 14-15).
Abraham’s life demonstrates that faith does not arrive fully mature. His faith begins by believing God’s call and promise (Gen. 12:1-8). But it's an immature faith. He lies about Sarah twice. He takes Hagar and scoffs at God’s promise. Despite his small faith, he is declared righteous by faith. Justification is by faith alone, or perhaps more accurately, justification is by mustard seed faith alone. Abraham is the patron saint of faith (Gal. 3:6-9). He is the father of all who believe (Rom. 4:11) and obey (Rom. 4:12). By faith Abraham received the promise, and so too for all those “who share the faith of Abraham” (Rom. 4:16). Abraham’s faith grows through testing, notably the near sacrifice of his son Isaac (Gen. 22). The paradigm of faith, modeled by Abraham, is that it starts small and grows. This is the ordinary way of justifying faith. Israel’s problem was that it didn’t follow the pattern of Abraham. Their faith shrank rather than grew. They were saved from slavery by miracles, but their faith was hardened by idolatry (Hebrews 3-4).
Faith can be small but genuine (Mt. 17:20) and powerful (Mk. 11:22-24; Lk. 17:6). Jesus likens faith to a seed for a reason (Mt. 17:20). The same seeds produce different outcomes. Some seed “hear the word and accept it and bear fruit” (Mk. 4:20). Other seeds die. Elsewhere, faith is contrasted with doubt (Mt. 14:22-33; Mk. 9:24), showing that real faith can be weak and genuine faith can waver. This is why the disciples ask Jesus to “increase our faith” (Lk. 17:5). Yet Jesus reminds them that though faith can be little or great, it’s ultimately measured based on whether it is alive or dead (John 15:1-11).
The pattern throughout the New Testament is that faith grows. Consider the disciples who scattered at Jesus’ arrest, then boldly preached the gospel at Pentecost (Acts 2). Their faith grew significantly. Paul tells the Thessalonians, “Your faith is growing abundantly” (2 Thess. 1:3). He notices that the Corinthians’ “faith increases” (2 Cor. 10:15), and the Philippians have “progress and joy in the faith” (Phil. 1:25). The faith of the Corinthians started “partial.” It was a faith “in part.” It was faith that saw “in a mirror dimly” (1 Cor .13:9-12). But Christian faith doesn’t remain partial. It grows “From faith to faith,” which speaks to the direction of Christ-life as a trajectory of increased righteousness (Rom. 1:17).
Question 21 of the Heidelberg Catechism describes faith in its most mature form, saying, “True faith is not only a sure knowledge by which I hold as true all that God has revealed to us in his Word; it is also a wholehearted trust, which the Holy Spirit works in me by the gospel, that God has freely granted, not only to others but to me also, forgiveness of sins, eternal righteousness, and salvation. These gifts are purely of grace, only because of Christ's merit.”
Fully formed faith involves knowledge, assent, and trust, but it doesn’t begin that way. The seed of faith begins as a “relational posture of trust toward another person.”[7] It lacks the propositional, detailed, or articulated form of mature faith, much like the acorn lacks the height, roots, and leaves of an oak tree. It’s relational, like the helpless trust exhibited by the infant in his mother’s arms. Psalm 22:9-10 teaches that covenant infants don’t just trust their mother, they trust God, “You made me trust you at my mother’s breast. On you was I cast from my birth and from my mother’s womb you have been God.” Babies are born relational creatures capable of relational trust, which, when fully formed, includes the ability to articulate propositional knowledge.
So, it’s not the case, as Baptist theologian Paul Jewett argues, that “the Bible always speaks of repentance and faith…in terms of a change of mind, an enlightening of the understanding, a renewal of the will, which comes by hearing the Word and issues in a conscious commitment to Christ.”[8] Faith is not always fully formed. It does not always include conscious knowledge, cognitive comprehension, or verbal articulation. Sometimes in Scripture, a person can trust the Lord from before birth (Ps. 71:5f). Indeed, in the mind of Jesus, the faith-filled child is illustrative of the entire category of covenant children (Mt. 18:6).
Too critical an inquiry into infant faith obscures the fact that when matured, this trust will have knowledge and assent as its companions. Until then, it’s a faith that breathes in the Spirit as warmly as it's given. God is a God who can be trusted by the weak and praised by the learned academician. God’s gift of faith can be granted as a partial propensity that, over time, will be gloriously colored with knowledge and assent.
Calvin wrote, “The age of infancy is not utterly averse to sanctification.”[9] What began in faith continues in faith. Faith is perfected, that is, completed, through works (James 2:18, 22). Faith matures across lifetimes. It can grow in leaps and bounds. But ordinarily, growing faith is like a race of endurance (Heb. 12:1-2). It must be refined (1 Pet. 1:7) and disciplined (Heb. 12:3-17), like Edmund, whose first trip to Narnia is stumbling and profane. But by the last battle, he’s a king who trusts Aslan completely. Faith grows because people are transformed.
Conclusion
Justification is by faith alone. The characteristic of faith that makes it the instrument of justification is, as the Westminster Confession of Faith chapter 11 says, “Receiving and resting on Christ and his righteousness.” This “is the alone instrument of justification.” As it relates to justification, faith is receptive. It is the “instrument” of receiving God’s righteousness, which “is only of free grace.”
Jason Cherry is an elder at Trinity Reformed Church in Huntsville, Alabama, as well as a teacher and lecturer of literature, history, and economics at Providence Classical School in Huntsville. He graduated from Reformed Theological Seminary with an MA in Religion and is the author of the books The Culture of Conversionism and the History of the Altar Call and The Making of Evangelical Spirituality.
[1] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:8.
[2] This is consistent with a biblical Christology. Christ is the “last man” (1 Cor. 15:45), which means Christ is the real man and the future man who is gathering to himself the last men, such that to be on Christ’s side is to be on the side of these last men.
[3] John Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:2.
[4] The Reformation formula was fides quaerens intellectum, faith seeking understanding.
[5] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:6.
[6] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:8.
[7] Rich Lusk, Paedofaith: A Primer on the Mystery of Infant Salvation and a Handbook for Covenant Parents (Athanasius Press, 2005), ii.
[8] Paul K. Jewett, Infant Baptism and the Covenant of Grace (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1978), 268.
[9] John Calvin, Institutes, 4.16.18.
Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”
Faith implies that there is something we can’t see. The totality of reality does not consist in what man can see, hear, or touch. There is something outside the human field of vision. What is not seen is part of the true actuality. Thus, part of human existence is that some certain share of us can’t be nourished by merely the visible or the tangible. The temptation of men of all ages is to reduce the world down to what is seen. Faith is resistance to this inclination. Faith is crossing from the tangible to the intangible realm, repenting from partial reality to embrace the depths of existence.
And what are the depths of existence? Jesus Christ himself. His crucifixion. His resurrection. His ascension. His New Society and New World, which is dependent upon his glorious grace. So it is that John Calvin defines faith as, “A firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”[1]
Object of Faith
Christian belief is about how the gulf between the visible and the invisible, the separation of the temporal and eternal, is bridged by God as man. This is God’s self-revelation, as John 1:18 says, “No one has ever seen God; God the only Son, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known.” Jesus makes God known so we can see and touch him. The problem is that when they did see Jesus, they didn’t believe in him (Jn. 6:36). He did many signs for them, but they still didn’t believe in him (Jn. 12:37). By seeing Jesus’s signs and rejecting him, they proved that they hated both God the Father and the Son, establishing that they were guilty of sin (Jn. 15:24). They didn’t even believe Jesus when he was raised from the dead (Lk. 16:31). This is why Jesus denounced “the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent” (Mt. 11:20). Jesus “marveled at their unbelief” (Mk. 6:6).
In other words. Christ’s incarnation led to the death of God, killed by man. Since man kills God, it seems to conceal God’s revelation and obscure Christ’s divinity. How can man kill God? Can man believe in a God he has killed? The answer is yes, we must, as the Centurion taught us (Mk. 15:39). Otherwise, man remains in an apparently closed world, a “domain of darkness” as Paul calls it (Col. 1:13), which is more unreliable than believing in the death of God. People reject faith for its apparent uncertainty, only to experience the uncertainty of unbelief. Without the crucified Christ, reality is reduced to an only materialistic claim, which the soul knows is screamingly false.
So, while faith is knowledge (see below), it is more than knowledge. It is entrance into the totality of reality from which meaning is bestowed. The spiritual and physical parts of man, including his decisions and actions, are based on this reality, this bestowed meaning. Faith is entrusting yourself to the King who upholds the world (Heb. 1:3). When you enter into this reality, there is a firm ground for standing; there is a stable metaphysics for living. Since human existence depends on the Creator, the Logos, the Word made flesh, faith is receiving the Creator, as John says, “He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn. 1:11-13). Receiving what? Receiving Christ. More particularly, receiving and accepting that Christ provides the meaning of the universe. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said the West’s problem was that it had forgotten God. But that doesn’t mean the solution is to merely remember God. The Apostle Paul taught that real understanding isn’t merely knowing that God exists. It’s about knowing God’s will in all spiritual wisdom (Rom. 12:2; Col. 1:9, 4:12; Eph. 5:17).
So, here you are, you’ve expressed that Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, is the object of your faith. How will Christ judge your profession of faith? In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus will say to those who enter the kingdom. “‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”
Jesus judges if your faith is the real deal by assessing how you look upon the least of men. Do you see those who need your help and discover Christ?[2] To have faith in Christ, rather than merely professing it, is to recognize the needy person as worthy of receiving the love of Christ through you. A profession of faith in Christ, when genuine, leads to a commitment to serving and helping people. Put again, faith in Christ without love of man is not real Christian faith. What Jesus teaches in Matthew 25:31-46 is said plainly elsewhere, for example, Galatians 5:6 speaks of “faith working through love.”
Faith and Forgiveness
Jesus repeatedly linked healing with faith. When the friends lowered the paralytic through the roof, Jesus saw their faith, forgave the man, and he was healed (Mt. 9:2-8; Mk. 2:1-12; Lk. 5:17-26). Jesus healed the bleeding woman, saying, “Your faith has made you well” (Mt. 9:20-22; Mk. 5:25-34; Lk. 8:43-48). Jesus healed the two blind men, saying, “According to your faith let it be done to you” (Mt. 9:27-31). When the Syrophoenician woman asked Jesus to remove the unclean spirit from her daughter, Jesus said, “‘O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you desire.’ And her daughter was healed instantly” (Mt. 15:21-28). Jesus healed blind Bartimaeus, saying, “‘Go your way; your faith has made you well.’ And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him on the way” (Mk. 10:46-52). When Jesus healed the ten lepers, all ten were cleansed, but only one’s faith is commended, suggesting something more than physical healing. Jesus tells him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well” (Lk. 17:11-19). For the Centurion’s servant, healing happens at a distance based on the centurion’s faith, saying, “Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith” (Mt. 8:5-13). Jesus raises Jarius’ daughter from the dead, telling Jarius, “Do not fear, only believe” (Mk. 5:21-43). With the epileptic boy, the disciples fail to drive out the unclean spirit because of their lack of faith. But Jesus tells the boy’s father, “All things are possible for those who believe” (Mk. 9:14-29).
Faith in Christ leads to forgiveness, and forgiveness leads to healing. So, man becomes most human when he is forgiven. This is because the healing that comes by faith restores people to the covenant community. The centurion believes for his servant. The friends believe for the paralytic. Jarius believes for his daughter. Faith is a communal activity, occurring within relationships. So, the woman’s cleanness means she can return to the community, just as the healed lepers can return to their town.
So, faith is the point of contact between the human and divine. Jesus says, “Your faith has healed you,” not because faith has magical powers, but because of what faith is, namely, receiving the extended hand of Christ. Faith in Christ heals a physical disease, but it’s the healing of the spiritual disease, as is emphasized in the paralytic’s story of Mark 2:1-12, that shows the deeper problem and the deeper healing. It restores you to fellowship with God and man.
Faith and the Spirit
Faith is a fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:22f), produced by the Holy Spirit. All of salvation is a gift of God, including faith (Eph. 2:8f). Belief is something that is granted (Phil. 1:29), something obtained by divine allotment (2 Pet. 1:1). Confessing Jesus as Lord requires the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3) and without the Spirit people can’t accept spiritual truth (1 Cor. 2:14). The new birth, which includes faith, comes from the Spirit (Jn. 3:5f; 1 Jn. 5:1). The Spirit gives spiritual life, at the center of which is faith in Christ (Jn. 6:63). Faith is the result of divine opening, where God opens the heart (Acts 16:14). The Spirit enlightens the heart to revelation, enabling faith (Eph. 1:17f). Everything we have is received, including faith (Jn. 1:12f), which means it is not self-generated (1 Cor. 4:7).
Faith by Hearing
“Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17). What does this mean? It means that faith is not like a philosophy that results from reflection. Faith does not come by thinking it out. Faith is the reception of something heard rather than the result of something thought. This doesn’t remove thinking from faith. It means the thinking is over something you’ve heard and received.
This is what happened with the Samaritan woman at the well. She meets Jesus and hears his words about living water. She hears him reveal the private details of her life. She hears his claim to be Messiah, and she believes (Jn. 4:7-26). Then, she testifies to what she heard, telling the people in the town (Jn. 4:28f). The Samaritans hear the woman’s testimony, and they believe (Jn. 4:39) and want to hear from Jesus directly (Jn. 4:40-42). As the Pslamist says, the sheep will hear God’s voice and not harden their hearts (Ps. 95:7f; Jn. 10:27).
Cornelius faith came from hearing Peter speak (Acts 10:44). Lydia’s heart was opened when she heard Paul speaking (Acts 16:14). The 3000 at Pentecost heard Peter’s sermon and were cut to the heart, repented, and were baptized (Acts 2:37-39). The Thessalonians received the word, which they heard from Paul’s missionaries (1 Thess. 1:5-6; 2:13). Faith comes by hearing with divinely opened ears (Mt. 13:16; Jn. 6:44f; 8:47; Eph. 1:17f). As the prophet writes, hearing leads to salvation (Is. 55:3).
So, faith is receiving the Word of God. This reception changes your life. Previously, your thoughts and desires took precedence over everything. Now, the Word takes precedence over your thoughts and desires. The Word lays an obligation that doesn’t change the fact that you think and feel. It obligates your thoughts and feelings to conform. Conformity implies community. Individual Christian faith is communal because everyone in the church is being conformed by the same Spirit and the same Word.
Different Uses of the Word “Faith”
There is a wide semantic range of the word “faith” in the New Testament. Faith is often used to mean personal trust or confidence. For example, Galatians 2:20 talks about new life “by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” John 3:16 says, “Whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” So, faith is directed toward the person of Jesus Christ (Acts 20:21).
Faith is also used as belief or conviction in propositional truth. Hebrews 11:6 says that “Whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” In this case, faith believes two propositions. God exists, and God rewards those who seek him. Romans 10:9 requires confessing that “Jesus is Lord” and believing “that God raised him from the dead.” In this case, faith believes in two more propositions. The Lordship and resurrection of Christ. Romans 10:9 adds that this belief occurs in your heart, which means it’s not a probability bet. It is a belief where you stake your life on it.
Faith is also used to mean faithfulness, for example, Galatians 5:22, “The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.” Or 1 Thessalonians 3:2, Paul sends Timothy “to establish and exhort you in your faith.” Timothy’s job is to strengthen them to fulfill faith as an enduring commitment, that they may “walk by faith, not by sight” as 2 Corinthians 5:7 puts it. In Revelation 2:13, they did not deny their faith but held fast to the name of Christ, remaining faithful to Christ under persecution.
Faith is sometimes used as “the faith” referring to a body of Christian doctrine. So, Jude 3 encourages Christians to “contend for the faith,” and 1 Timothy 4:1 says some will “depart from the faith,” meaning they are abandoning orthodox teaching. When Paul turned to Christ, he began “preaching the faith” (Gal. 1:23) and many of the Jewish priests converted and “became obedient to the faith” (Acts 6:7).
The various semantic usages of faith continue beyond this. For instance, faith is also a spiritual gift, as in a set-apart ability (1 Corinthians 12:9). It is assurance, or certainty, as said in Hebrews 10:22 and 11:1. Whatever the particular usage, the key is to see that faith is covenantal throughout. Just like love is multidimensional, so is faith. Whatever the semantic usage, it involves a personal relationship with God himself.
What sort of faith does God require?
Persevering Faith
Christians are under the covenant demand of persevering faith, which is why many verses teach that true saving faith perseveres until the end. Philippians 1:6 says, “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” Colossians 1:22-23a says, “He has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith.” Hebrews 3:6 says, “We are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.” Hebrews 3:14 says, “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.” Second Peter 1:10 says, “Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.” First Timothy 2:15 says, “Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.”
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints is framed by conditional clauses. To receive the promises of the gospel requires—is conditioned upon—an enduring faith in Christ. This does not undermine God’s unconditional election (Eph 1:3-14; Rom. 9:1-23; 2 Tim. 1:9f), but complements it. Just like God ordains the means of someone coming to faith, he ordains the means of them continuing in the faith. God has ordained to keep his elect (Jn. 6:39; 17:11f; Phil. 1:6; Rom. 8:29f; 1 Cor. 1:8f; 2 Thess. 3:3; Jude 24f). In John 10:28, Jesus said, “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” That means that your trials and temptations, your tribulations and troubles, cannot destroy your faith. Rather, they further it (James 1:2-4).
Knowledgeable Faith
“For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me” (Jn. 17:8). The order is that they received the words, they came to know in truth, and they believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Elsewhere, Peter confessed, “We have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (Jn. 6:69). The order here is reversed. They believe, and then they know. In John 10:38, Jesus says, “Even though you do not believe in me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” Here, the order is that they believe, know, and understand. But then in John 16:30 the disciples say, “Now we know that you know all things and do not need anyone to question you; this is why we believe that you came from God.” The order here is knowledge and then faith. In John 8:31-32, Jesus says, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” The order here is abiding in God’s word, which refers to obeying in faith (2 Pet. 1:5-8), then knowing truth.
What are we to make of this complicated relationship between faith and knowledge? It seems the surest conclusion is that knowledge and faith are interwoven in a mutually dependent way. The order varies. Sometimes belief precedes knowledge (Jn. 6:69). Sometimes knowledge precedes belief (Jn. 17:8). The point is that they are inseparable. Faith and knowledge can be distinguished as two different things. But they can’t be distinguished temporally. Real faith includes growing knowledge of Christ. Real knowledge of Christ includes growing faith. John Calvin put it this way, “Faith rests not on ignorance, but on knowledge.”[3]
As faith starts small and grows big (see below), so does knowledge (2 Pet. 3:18). John’s Gospel is written that they may believe (Jn. 20:31). Knowledge of the life and teachings of Christ is part of believing in Jesus. Paul prays that the believing Ephesians would grow in knowledge (Eph. 1:17-19). Paul’s own faith leads him to want to know Christ (Phil. 3:8-10). He knows whom he has believed (2 Tim. 1:12). And as knowledge grows, obedience grows (Col. 1:9-10). This pursuit of knowledge is spiritual in nature because it is dependent upon divine illumination (2 Cor. 4:6). It’s a knowledge that centers on Christ the Lord (Heb. 8:11). It’s a covenantal knowledge (Jer. 31:34). Within the covenant, faith seeks knowledge while knowing that too precise a knowledge would, at some point, no longer be faith, as Thomas learned (Jn. 20:24-28). Thus, faith requires the humility to admit that my own ignorance is true knowledge when standing before incomprehensible mystery.
Satisfied Faith
John 6:35, “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.’” Faith in Jesus means that spiritual hunger and thirst are satisfied. Christians are the beneficiaries of an undeserved bounty, which, consequently, produces contentment with all that God is for you in Jesus. When Christ turns the peasant into a prince, there is gratitude and satisfaction such that the new prince can only think of praising the Lord. Psalm 63:3 and 5 says, “Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you … my soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips.”
Personal Faith
Faith is not based on belief in something, but Someone, the God-man Jesus Christ. Encountering Jesus is experiencing the meaning of the world, not as a Fate, but as a person. Jesus speaks not his will, but the Father’s will (Jn. 5:30). Since the Father is invisible (Col. 1:15; 1 Tim. 1:17), Jesus is the witness to the intangible. When God takes on human flesh, the invisible God is made visible, the distant God is made near, the transcendent God is made imminent, and the eternal realm is brought to earth.
Why did God become incarnate? “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3:16). In other words, when the invisible God is made visible in Christ, when the meaning of the world appears as a person, it is to witness God’s love to the world (1 Jn. 4:7-12). Life is worth living because of the incomprehensible love of God to man (Eph. 3:17-19).
Scripture says that Christ is the foundation of the world (1 Cor. 3:11; Eph. 2:20; 1 Pt. 2:6). Scripture also says we should seek and find (Dt. 4:29; Jer. 29:13; Mt. 7:7f; Lk. 11:9f; ),[4] which means faith is finding the foundation that upholds the universe, namely, God’s love manifest in the person of Jesus Christ. We enter God’s Kingdom when we entrust ourselves to God like a child knowing he is safe in his mother’s arms (Mk. 10:13-16). So, if God is a person, that means our faith in him is of a personal character. He loves us by taking the form of a man, “born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal. 4:4-5). We love him by obeying him in faith (1 Jn. 3:23f).
Faith will one day become sight. “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known” (1 Cor. 13:12). That which we believe now will be seen then. “For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience” (Rom. 8:24f). Faith is what you know when you can’t see. It’s the hope of what you will one day see, namely, the King of Creation who knows you by name (Is. 43:1; Jn. 10:3; Lk. 10:20; 2 Tim. 2:19).
Obedient Faith
An obedient faith is, to use the words of the Westminster Confession of Faith Chapter 16, one that does good works as “the fruit and evidence of a true and lively faith.” John Calvin says that “Paul defines faith as that obedience which is given in the gospel.”[5] And “Faith can in no wise be separated from a devout disposition.”[6] What is Calvin talking about?
Paul says that the “righteous requirement of the law” is “fulfilled” in those who “walk …. According to the Spirit” (Rom. 8:4), “live according to the Spirit” (Rom. 8:5), subject their “mind …. To God’s law” (Rom. 8:7), do not “live according to the flesh” (Rom. 8:13), “put to death the deeds of the body” (Rom. 8:13), and “suffer with him” (Rom. 8:17). These things represent the “obedience of faith” (Rom. 1:5; 16:26). Paul’s goal in evangelism was “to bring the Gentiles to obedience—by word and deed” (Rom. 15:18). This is what happened when Paul preached the gospel to the Romans, they became “obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed” (Rom. 6:17). What is the “standard of teaching”? It’s the gospel.
It’s not that the apostles don’t care about faith. It’s that the goal of evangelism is faithfulness. And faithfulness is a life of faith that includes things like confessing your sin. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:9). Faithfulness is not work-righteousness. Faithfulness is not earning your salvation. It is all of grace to trust God and follow him. This is why in Acts, believers and disciples are synonymous (Acts 6:1-2, 7; 9:1, 10, 19, 25f, 36, 38; 11:26, 29; 13:52; 14:20, 28; 15:10).
Growing Faith
Faith starts small and grows big. Jesus said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you” (Mt. 17:20). The mustard seed is, proverbially speaking, the smallest of seeds (Mark 4:31). So, faith can be small—very small—and it can be big—very big, “larger than all the garden plants” (Mk. 4:31). Thus, not all faith is equal in size. Some faith is small and immature. Other faith is large and mature. Those with weak faith are expected to coexist alongside those with strong faith (Rom. 14-15).
Abraham’s life demonstrates that faith does not arrive fully mature. His faith begins by believing God’s call and promise (Gen. 12:1-8). But it's an immature faith. He lies about Sarah twice. He takes Hagar and scoffs at God’s promise. Despite his small faith, he is declared righteous by faith. Justification is by faith alone, or perhaps more accurately, justification is by mustard seed faith alone. Abraham is the patron saint of faith (Gal. 3:6-9). He is the father of all who believe (Rom. 4:11) and obey (Rom. 4:12). By faith Abraham received the promise, and so too for all those “who share the faith of Abraham” (Rom. 4:16). Abraham’s faith grows through testing, notably the near sacrifice of his son Isaac (Gen. 22). The paradigm of faith, modeled by Abraham, is that it starts small and grows. This is the ordinary way of justifying faith. Israel’s problem was that it didn’t follow the pattern of Abraham. Their faith shrank rather than grew. They were saved from slavery by miracles, but their faith was hardened by idolatry (Hebrews 3-4).
Faith can be small but genuine (Mt. 17:20) and powerful (Mk. 11:22-24; Lk. 17:6). Jesus likens faith to a seed for a reason (Mt. 17:20). The same seeds produce different outcomes. Some seed “hear the word and accept it and bear fruit” (Mk. 4:20). Other seeds die. Elsewhere, faith is contrasted with doubt (Mt. 14:22-33; Mk. 9:24), showing that real faith can be weak and genuine faith can waver. This is why the disciples ask Jesus to “increase our faith” (Lk. 17:5). Yet Jesus reminds them that though faith can be little or great, it’s ultimately measured based on whether it is alive or dead (John 15:1-11).
The pattern throughout the New Testament is that faith grows. Consider the disciples who scattered at Jesus’ arrest, then boldly preached the gospel at Pentecost (Acts 2). Their faith grew significantly. Paul tells the Thessalonians, “Your faith is growing abundantly” (2 Thess. 1:3). He notices that the Corinthians’ “faith increases” (2 Cor. 10:15), and the Philippians have “progress and joy in the faith” (Phil. 1:25). The faith of the Corinthians started “partial.” It was a faith “in part.” It was faith that saw “in a mirror dimly” (1 Cor .13:9-12). But Christian faith doesn’t remain partial. It grows “From faith to faith,” which speaks to the direction of Christ-life as a trajectory of increased righteousness (Rom. 1:17).
Question 21 of the Heidelberg Catechism describes faith in its most mature form, saying, “True faith is not only a sure knowledge by which I hold as true all that God has revealed to us in his Word; it is also a wholehearted trust, which the Holy Spirit works in me by the gospel, that God has freely granted, not only to others but to me also, forgiveness of sins, eternal righteousness, and salvation. These gifts are purely of grace, only because of Christ's merit.”
Fully formed faith involves knowledge, assent, and trust, but it doesn’t begin that way. The seed of faith begins as a “relational posture of trust toward another person.”[7] It lacks the propositional, detailed, or articulated form of mature faith, much like the acorn lacks the height, roots, and leaves of an oak tree. It’s relational, like the helpless trust exhibited by the infant in his mother’s arms. Psalm 22:9-10 teaches that covenant infants don’t just trust their mother, they trust God, “You made me trust you at my mother’s breast. On you was I cast from my birth and from my mother’s womb you have been God.” Babies are born relational creatures capable of relational trust, which, when fully formed, includes the ability to articulate propositional knowledge.
So, it’s not the case, as Baptist theologian Paul Jewett argues, that “the Bible always speaks of repentance and faith…in terms of a change of mind, an enlightening of the understanding, a renewal of the will, which comes by hearing the Word and issues in a conscious commitment to Christ.”[8] Faith is not always fully formed. It does not always include conscious knowledge, cognitive comprehension, or verbal articulation. Sometimes in Scripture, a person can trust the Lord from before birth (Ps. 71:5f). Indeed, in the mind of Jesus, the faith-filled child is illustrative of the entire category of covenant children (Mt. 18:6).
Too critical an inquiry into infant faith obscures the fact that when matured, this trust will have knowledge and assent as its companions. Until then, it’s a faith that breathes in the Spirit as warmly as it's given. God is a God who can be trusted by the weak and praised by the learned academician. God’s gift of faith can be granted as a partial propensity that, over time, will be gloriously colored with knowledge and assent.
Calvin wrote, “The age of infancy is not utterly averse to sanctification.”[9] What began in faith continues in faith. Faith is perfected, that is, completed, through works (James 2:18, 22). Faith matures across lifetimes. It can grow in leaps and bounds. But ordinarily, growing faith is like a race of endurance (Heb. 12:1-2). It must be refined (1 Pet. 1:7) and disciplined (Heb. 12:3-17), like Edmund, whose first trip to Narnia is stumbling and profane. But by the last battle, he’s a king who trusts Aslan completely. Faith grows because people are transformed.
Conclusion
Justification is by faith alone. The characteristic of faith that makes it the instrument of justification is, as the Westminster Confession of Faith chapter 11 says, “Receiving and resting on Christ and his righteousness.” This “is the alone instrument of justification.” As it relates to justification, faith is receptive. It is the “instrument” of receiving God’s righteousness, which “is only of free grace.”
Jason Cherry is an elder at Trinity Reformed Church in Huntsville, Alabama, as well as a teacher and lecturer of literature, history, and economics at Providence Classical School in Huntsville. He graduated from Reformed Theological Seminary with an MA in Religion and is the author of the books The Culture of Conversionism and the History of the Altar Call and The Making of Evangelical Spirituality.
[1] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:8.
[2] This is consistent with a biblical Christology. Christ is the “last man” (1 Cor. 15:45), which means Christ is the real man and the future man who is gathering to himself the last men, such that to be on Christ’s side is to be on the side of these last men.
[3] John Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:2.
[4] The Reformation formula was fides quaerens intellectum, faith seeking understanding.
[5] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:6.
[6] Calvin, Institutes, 3:2:8.
[7] Rich Lusk, Paedofaith: A Primer on the Mystery of Infant Salvation and a Handbook for Covenant Parents (Athanasius Press, 2005), ii.
[8] Paul K. Jewett, Infant Baptism and the Covenant of Grace (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1978), 268.
[9] John Calvin, Institutes, 4.16.18.
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