TAKING FAITH SERIOUSLY

WHAT IS FAITH? A WORD THAT SLIPS AND SLIDES

Theologians rise up to affirm that, in idea at least, faith goes beyond mere orthodoxy (belief of truth) to orthopraxy (living out that truth in worship and service, love to God and man)—and in saying this they are right so far. But when some think orthodoxy sanctions behavior that others see orthodoxy as ruling out, it is clear that agreement about the truth we live by is lacking, and that is what we have to look at now.

so that in modern Western speech faith has become a vague term, a warm fuzzy slipping and sliding from one area of meaning to another all the time.

In the New Testament, however, faith is a Christian technical term, specific in meaning as our secular technical terms (computer, dividend, airplane, spanner, appendectomy, syllabus, for example) are specific in meaning, and its New Testament meaning remained specific for Christians till about a century ago. It is something we need to get back to.

What did the apostolic writers have in mind when they spoke of faith? Nothing less than what they took to be the distinctive essence of Christianity: namely, a belief-and-behavior commitment to Jesus Christ,

the divine-human Lord,

who came to earth,

died for sins,

rose from death,

returned to heaven,

reigns now over the cosmos as his Father’s nominated vice-regent, and

will reappear to judge everyone and to take his own people into glory, where they will be with him in unimaginable joy forever

So faith, that is, believing, is in the New Testament a “two-tone” reality, a response to God’s self-revelation in Christ that is both intellectual and relational.

The object of Christian faith, as the apostolic writers, the creeds, and the basic Anglican formularies (Articles, Prayer Book, and Homilies) present it, is threefold

first, God the Three-in-One, the Creator-become-Redeemer, who throughout history has been, and still is, transforming sinners into a new humanity in Christ

second, Jesus Christ himself, God incarnate and Savior, now absent from us in the flesh but personally and powerfully present with us through the Holy Spirit; and

third, the many invitations, promises, commands, and assurances that the Father and the Son extend to all who will receive Jesus as their Savior and Lord and become his disciples, living henceforth by his teaching in his fellowship under his authority.

In the Bible, faith is a matter of

knowing the facts of the gospel (the person, place, and work of Jesus Christ),

welcoming the terms of the gospel (salvation from sin and a new life with God), and

receiving the Christ of the gospel (setting oneself to live as his follower by self-denial, cross-bearing, and sacrificial service).

Believing the biblically revealed facts and truths about God and trusting the living Lord to whom these facts and truths lead us are the two “tones,” the intellectual and relational aspects of real faith, blending like two-part harmony in music.

This is the understanding of faith that needs to be reestablished.

When the church ceases to treat the Bible as a final standard of spiritual truth and wisdom, it is going to wobble between maintaining its tradition in a changing world and adapting to that world, and as the wobbles go on, uncertainty as to what is the real substance of faith and the proper way of embracing it and living it out will inevitably increase.

WHAT IS THE BIBLE? FAITH AND THE TALKING BOOK

The Bible consists of

sixty-six separate pieces of writing,

composed over something like a millennium and a half.

The last twenty-seven of them were written in a single generation:

they comprise four narratives about Jesus called Gospels,

an account of Christianity’s earliest days called the Acts of the Apostles,

twenty-one pastoral letters from teachers with authority,

and a final admonition to churches from the Lord Jesus himself,

given partly by dictation and partly by vision.

All these books speak of human life being supernaturally renovated through, in, with, under, from, and for the once crucified, now glorified Son of God, who fills each writer’s horizon, receives his worship, and determines his mind-set at every point

Through the books of the Bible runs the claim that this Jesus fulfills promises, patterns, and premonitions of blessings to come that are embodied in the thirty-nine pre-Christian books.

These are of four main types

history books, telling how God called and sought to educate the Jewish people—Abraham’s family—to worship, serve, and enjoy him, and to be ready to welcome Jesus Christ when he appeared

prophetic books, recording oracular sermons from God conveyed by human messengers expressing threats, hopes, and calls to faithfulness;

poetry books, containing songs to and about God (Psalms) and celebrating love between a man and a woman (Song of Solomon); and

wisdom books, which in response to God’s revelation show how to praise, pray, live, love, and cope with whatever may happen.

Testament means covenant commitment

Old Testament

The first edition extended from Abraham to Christ

New Testament

The second edition extends from Christ’s first coming to his return and is the grand full-scale edifice for which the foundations were originally laid.

Christians see Christ as the true center of reference in both Testaments, the Old always looking and pointing forward to him and the New proclaiming his past coming, his present life and ministry in and from heaven, and his future destiny at his return; and they hold that this is the key to true biblical interpretation. Christians have maintained this since Christianity began.

Christians call the Bible the Word of God—“God’s Word written” for two reasons:

The first is its divine origin

The second reason is its divine ministry of revealing God’s mind to us as the Holy Spirit gives understanding of what its text says, and thus makes us “wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus”

Christianity expresses the thought of Scripture as the standard by calling it the canon. This is a Greek word, meaning a measuring rod, and thus a rule.

There is no good reason for doubting (1) that our Old Testament canon was established in Palestine before Jesus was born, and (2) that the first churches were right to see documents authored and/or approved by apostles as carrying God’s authority and complementing the Old Testament, and (3) that they were also right to claim the Old Testament as Christian Scripture and to interpret it as foreshadowing Jesus Christ the Messiah, and the kingdom of God and the new life that came with him.

The Bible is thus experienced as a book that talks, speaking for itself by pointing us to the Father and the Son, who speak for themselves as they offer us forgiveness and acceptance and new life. The authority of Scripture is not just a matter of God putting our minds straight, but of God capturing our hearts for fully committed discipleship to the Lord Jesus. So the Bible is to be approached with reverence, handled with care and prayer, and studied, not to satisfy curiosity in any of its forms, but to deepen responsive fellowship with God who made us, loves us, seeks us out, and offers us pardon, peace, and power for righteousness through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The modern world knows virtually nothing of this approach to Scripture. It is vital that the church recover it, follow it, and proclaim the need for it everywhere.