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The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Third-day, December 31, 1867

THE IMPORTANCE OF FAITH.

The word from which faith in the New Testament is in every case translated, with only one exception, is thus defined by the lexicons: “Belief, firm persuasion of the truth and veracity of any one.” — Greenfield. “Firm persuasion, confiding belief in the truth, veracity, reality of any person or thing. As in classic Greek, 1. Properly and generally, faith, belief. . . . In the N. T. πίστις [faith] is used specially in reference to God and divine things, to Christ and his gospel, and thus becomes in some sense a technical word, particularly in the writings of Paul; denoting that faith, that confiding belief, which is the essential trait of Christian life and character.” — Robinson. “A being persuaded, faith, belief. It generally implies such a knowledge of, assent to, and confidence in, certain divine truths, especially those of the gospel, as produces good works.” — Parkhurst. To these we add one of the definitions given by Cruden in his Concordance unabridged: “Justifying faith is a saving grace wrought in the soul by the Spirit of God, whereby we receive Christ as he is revealed in the gospel to be our prophet, priest, and king, trust in and rely upon him and his righteousness alone for justification and salvation. This faith begets a sincere obedience in the life and conversation. The apostle to the Hebrews calls faith the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Heb. xi, 1. It assures us of the reality and worth of eternal, invisible things, and produces a satisfaction and assured confidence that God will infallibly perform what he has promised, whereby the believer is as confident of them as if they were before his eyes, and in his actual possession.”

Every age of the world has its present truth; and living faith is, according to the above definitions, implicit confidence in, and obedience to, that truth. In addition to general truths, in which the devils believe and tremble, it includes confidence in the special leadings and dealings of God in respect to his people at any given time. In this sense we use the term in this article.

Faith is one of the fruits of the Spirit, Gal. v, 22, and it is one upon which the Scriptures place an especial value. This we learn from various considerations:

1. The want of it is severely censured. In Deut. xxxii, 20, God threatens to hide his face from those who forget him, because they are “children in whom is no faith.” On various occasions Christ reproved his disciples for having so little faith. See Matt. vi, 30; viii, 26; xvi, 8; xiv, 31; Mark iv, 40. Those who have it not are styled unreasonable and wicked men. 2 Thess. iii, 2.

2. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. Heb. xi, 6. It is thus shown to be the basis and groundwork of all religious experience. Without it, the word of truth cannot profit us. Heb. iv, 2. We may hear, but faith alone makes the word effectual.

3. The work that is accomplished by it. By it, we overcome the world. 1 John v, 4. By it, we purify our hearts. Acts xv, 9. By it we are sanctified. Acts xxvi, 18. By it, we obtain righteousness. Rom. iii, 22. By it, we are justified. Rom. v, 1. By it, we have access to God. Eph. iii, 12. By it we stand. Rom. xi, 20. By it, we become children of God. Gal. iii, 26. By it, we obtain salvation, and inherit the promises. 1 Pet. i, 9; Eph. ii, 8; Heb. vi, 12. There is not a Christian work which we can perform, or a heavenly promise which we can obtain, without this grace.

Faith is to be of especial value in the last days. A commodity is valuable according to the proportion between the demand and supply. When gold becomes scarce, it immediately rises to a premium. Now faith, in the last days, is to be a rare excellence. Said Christ, Luke xviii, 8, “When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?” This we take to be a declaration put in the interrogative form to give it greater intensity, that faith, at the time the Lord appears, will be a virtue scarcely to be found upon the earth. It will be therefore proportionably valuable. Hence the many exhortations to the people of God to follow faith, keep the faith, hold fast the profession of our faith, &c.

Again, an expression made by the apostle Paul, shows the infinite importance of faith to the people of God in the last days. He is speaking of the trials of the remnant church, Heb. x, 37–39, and says: “For yet a little while, and he that shall come, will come, and will not tarry. Now the just shall live by faith; but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.” We have italicised two words in the foregoing quotation, to show the place faith occupies in this work. This language applies at the time when the Lord is about to appear. He will come, and will not tarry. And now, at this time, the just shall live by faith. Faith, in a spiritual sense, is all their living. And further, they do not draw back at the perplexities and trials of the way, but believe, have faith, to the saving of the soul. It is evident from this, that belief and confidence in the special work of God for this time, is included in faith; for a person might still believe in God and the general features of the plan of salvation, and yet draw back from following the special work of God in the last days, so as to fail of a preparation to meet the Lord at his coming. But believing and following on in the work of the Lord, our salvation is sure; failing to have faith in it, our perdition is certain. In language which applies to the same time, the prophet says, Hos. vi, 3, that we shall know, if we follow on to know the Lord, that his going forth is prepared as the morning, and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.

From these considerations, it is easy to see why the faithful and true Witness, should specially counsel the last church to buy of him the gold tried in the fire that they might be rich, Rev. iii, 18; or, in other words, to secure that faith, which, taking hold of God, and all his work, will anchor us to the present truth, and qualify us to encounter the peculiar perils we are to meet in these closing days of time.

To complete our argument on the importance of faith, it is now only necessary for us to show that faith is the chief element in the gold which the true Witness gives us this especial counsel to buy of him. There cannot be too much importance attached to that which we are counseled to obtain first of all, by Him who so well knows our cases, the demands of this time, and the momentous events of the future.

1. We may remark then, first, that faith well answers to this gold which the church lacks, in that we do not naturally possess it. We read of children in whom there is no faith. Deut. xxxii, 20. The children of Israel, whose experience is held up for a warning to us, failed to be profited by the gospel which was preached unto them, because there was not on their part the requisite faith to make it effectual; or as Boothroyd says, it was “not accompanied by a heart-affecting belief of the truth.” They lacked faith; and we are exhorted to fear lest we come short after the same example. Heb. iv, 1, 2. Christ often reproved his disciples for their lack of faith.

2. The true Witness, of whom we are counseled to buy the gold, is the one to whom we are to apply for faith. He is its author. Heb. xii, 2. The disciples of our Lord appealed to him for faith. “Lord,” said they, “increase our faith.” Luke xvii, 5. They lacked faith, and naturally turned to the Lord of faith for an increase of that heavenly grace. Again, when a certain one besought the Lord in behalf of his son who was possessed of a dumb spirit, and the Lord had told him that if he could believe, all things would be possible to him, he cried out, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.” That is, give me faith in place of all doubts or unbelief. “It is equivalent,” says Cobbin, “to saying, ‘strengthen my weak faith.’”

3. As a person, to be rich in this world, must possess gold or its equivalent, so the grace which the Bible expressly takes to represent spiritual riches, is faith. “Hearken, my beloved brethren, hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him?” Jas. ii, 5.

4. The comparison between faith and gold is still further most strikingly and beautifully carried out, by the former being subjected to tests and trial, and the latter to the process of refining. This is not a comparison we are obliged to institute ourselves; the Scriptures furnish it to our hand. We are to buy gold tried in the fire. Is there any Christian grace that goes through a process which may justly be represented by the refining of gold by fire? There is only one of which we have any information in the Scriptures; and that is faith. Peter says, “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and glory and honor, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” 1 Pet. i, 7. Here, the trial to which our faith is subjected is expressly likened to the refining process to which gold is submitted. And as gold is made more precious by being refined, so are we to esteem the trial of our faith of great value. And not only is the comparison here made between pure gold and tried faith, but the language applies to the time that just precedes the appearing of Jesus Christ, the very time when the true Witness counsels us to buy of him gold tried in the fire. The comparison alone which Peter makes is enough to show that faith is the grace which is represented by the term “gold,” in Rev. iii, 18; but when, in addition to this, we take into account the time to which both passages apply, and find it to be the same, that conclusion is placed beyond all further question.

We feel assured that great importance should be attached to the language of Paul, which we have already quoted: “Now the just shall live by faith.” Heb. x, 38. The connection in which it stands here, as well as in the prophecy of Habakkuk, from which Paul quotes it, shows that it applies to the remnant church, who are waiting for the coming of Christ. Can anything be more important, or occupy a more prominent position, than that by which we are to live through these perilous days, and by which we are to secure our souls’ salvation in the end? As in a worldly sense, gold, or its equivalent, constitutes our living,—as by it we secure the necessities, comforts, and conveniences of this life, so faith is the medium through which we secure all the graces and elements of spiritual life. None of them are to be found where faith is wanting; all flourish and grow when faith is in lively exercise.

Chief among the graces which grow from faith, as a stalk from its root, or a branch from its trunk, is love. Faith worketh by love; and without works it is dead. Gal. v, 6. With the requisite faith, love will be in perfect exercise; we shall have unfeigned love of the brethren, loving them with pure hearts fervently. 1 Pet. i, 21, 22. So inseparably are these two graces connected together, that they are both taken to represent the same piece of the Christian armor. Let us, says Paul, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breast-plate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.

We need more faith and love among us. We need the gold which the true Witness counsels us to buy of him. There are some who are beginning to show their lack of this in an alarming degree; some of whom it may be said that the prospect of their believing to the saving of the soul is growing fearfully dim, and the danger of their drawing back to perdition increasingly imminent. The counsel of the true Witness is timely. Will they disregard it, and in their unconscious wretchedness perish forever? or will they heed it, and secure the heavenly riches, faith in the work of God, and a title to the eternal inheritance, upon which the overcomers soon will enter?

In connection with this article, the reader may remember a previous number of the Review, in which the claims of love to the position we here assign to faith were strongly urged. This is not written for controversy; and in reference to that, we have only to say, May all who read that, get love; and may all who read this, get faith. We shall then be still more closely united; for the two work together, and are linked to each other with sacred and indissoluble bands.