WHAT ARE WE TO DO BY FAITH?
By Uriah Smith
According to the Scriptures, everything. One passage says, “We walk by faith;” another says, “Now the just shall live by faith;” and of the ancient worthies it is recorded, “These all died in faith,” or, as the margin reads, “According to faith;” and to live, walk, and die covers pretty much all the ground. “Now,” says the apostle, “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” This is the Bible’s brief and comprehensive definition of faith; and this has called forth some thoughts on the subject from devout men, which are worthy of consideration. A. Vinet, D. D., and E. M. Goulbourn, D. D., have spoken most instructively on this subject. Mr. Vinet says: “The first of the gifts of the new covenant is faith. The property of faith is to attach itself before all and above all, to what God has said, be it command, instruction, or promise. To believe is to repose entirely on the infallibility and faithfulness of God. It is to place his testimony above all kinds of certainty or guarantee. It is to regard every word proceeding from his mouth as more substantial and real than the reality itself. It is, in practice, to regard duty, in the form in which God has enjoined it, as the clearest and most imperative of all obligations. It is, consequently, to go forward with unflinching eye, and meet the coming events as we would meet God himself. It is to renounce the tyrannical domination of the senses, and uniformly look to the foundation, the very essence of the truth, instead of looking to the external accidents or signs. It is to prefer the invisible, which is eternal, to the visible, which passes away; and the possession of the sovereign good to the sensible signs of its presence.” Mr. Goulbourn, in his “Pursuit of Holiness,” speaking of the supreme reason we have to exercise faith in God, says: “Throw into one great sum total, all that you have ever experienced, or can conceive of, of wisdom and power, the most far-sighted discernment of results, with most absolute control over them, the keenest intuition into character, with every conceivable influence for molding it,—think of a providence not of this earth, which no opposition can surprise, and no device counterplot, calmly and serenely evolving its designs from the perverse agencies of man, and turning the very arm which is raised to defeat it, into a minister of his will,—imagine a being so wonderfully endowed that the whole keyboard of nature, providence, and the human heart, lies under his hand, and, smitten by his mystic fingers, gives forth the harmony which pleases him; and then invest him, in your conception, with an intensity of love which is not discouraged by the deepest moral degradation in its object, and which clings to the person of the sinner, with unchilled devotion, even while it condemns his sin with an abhorrence no less than infinite,—imagine such a being, and imagine him accessible to man, and you imagine one to whom, in their hour of need, all the world, unless, indeed, the spell of some deadly fascination were laid upon them, would be resorting continually for guidance, help, and comfort. But this is no imagination; it is a reality. God is such a Being as we have labored to describe. He not only permits but invites, not only invites but commands, the approach to him of every comer.” The declaration that “the just shall live by faith,” is called “the great Pauline watchword;” and as the eleventh of Hebrews is the great mine from which we draw examples of the workings and the results of faith, let us glance briefly at the record, and note the variety and extent of its operations. To the Hebrews, to whom Paul wrote, these heroes and martyrs to whom the apostle refers, were a pride and glory; and to turn it all to good account, Paul had only to show that their fortitude and heroism were but the outcome of their faith; and as the same conditions exist to the end of time, we can make these same examples an inspiration to ourselves. Faith, or this firm confidence of which the apostle speaks, makes that which is desired and hoped for, the same as if, in actual substance, it was already present. Out of the midst of the present, faith10reaches over into the future; from the seen over to the unseen; and the unseen becomes so sure, on God’s authority, that those things stand out before us, palpable and real, and become as influential upon our affections and movements as are the material objects of our senses. Such faith can not be called fancy; it is self-evidence. By faith we lay hold of the great facts of creation, and understand that the things which our senses apprehend were not made out of themselves; that is, the world was not made out of matter that had pre-existed from all eternity. But the matter itself was then brought into existence by the fiat of the Almighty. How this thought must elevate and enlarge every one’s ideas of the creative power. By faith we learn how to worship; how to look upon sacrifices, as illustrated in the course of Abel. There is no object nor efficiency in sacrifices, except as they show forth the Mediator, through whom, as slain, we draw nigh to God. This is why Abel’s offering was acceptable to God, and Cain’s was not. Abel’s offering contained blood, without which is no remission, and pointed forward to the Lamb that was in due time to be offered for the sins of the world. Cain’s offering could just as well have been made while the world was in a state of innocence. It recognized no guilt, and hence no need of a mediator. It was a daring act of unbelief, and opposition to God, and was doubtless so designed. Abel took God at his word, perceived the awful breach made by sin; and so he brought a sacrifice adapted to make atonement, thus offering, through faith in the unseen Lamb, a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. Faith gives a tongue to righteous example for all coming time; and so Paul adds that Abel, though “dead, yet speaketh.” Faith has to do with our separation from the world, as in the case of Enoch. It leads us to make preparation for judgments to come, as in the case of Noah. It leads us to forsake, if need be, home and kindred, and go forth, not knowing whither, as in the case of Abraham, who thus became not only the father of the faithful, but the father of the missionary spirit and movements. It teaches us to have no object of affection above God, but to be willing to surrender all to the Lord, as when the patriarch, prefiguring the action of the Father in the gift of his Son, offered up his only son, Isaac. It moves us to transfer our hopes, interests, affections, and treasures to a land that is described as a “better country,” where the eye of faith beholds “a city which hath foundations,” whose builder and maker is the One whose hand fashioned the world itself. In the light of this faith the future absorbs all the expectations of the soul, attracts all the gaze. There faith locates the coveted blessings, as in the case of Jacob blessing the children of Joseph: it enters the domestic circle, and leads to the protection and care of infants, as in the case of Moses; decides our choice between the world and greatness that belongs to the world, on the one hand, and poverty and reproach with the people of God on the other, as in the case of this same Moses when he had come to years, and made his own choice in reference to his future course. It leads men to brave the wrath of the mightiest earthly powers, when those powers stand in the way of God’s work, as Moses withstood the power and wrath of Egypt when it said No to the deliverance of the Hebrew people. It leads persons to have a care and regard for the servants of the Lord, as in the case of the woman who sheltered the spies who came from the camp of Israel, and gave them directions that enabled them to evade their enemies. And it fortifies men and women against disaster and defeat, and the pains and sufferings of torture and death, because what it holds out as the ultimate prize is so much greater than all that can be balanced against it that there is no ground for doubt in regard to the choice that should be made. So, in the smallest as well as in the greatest things of life, faith enters in, and should be given control. Faith is the most useful of all the graces for the welfare of man; for without it, it is impossible to please God. It is the root from which springs all living and lasting obedience. “Faith is higher than sight; for it is sight become creative. It sees in darkness, is certain of impossibilities, grapples with, and forces, the blank, dark, empty nothingness, into substance, and consistency, and reality, and life. It is the reflection, almost too bright for frail human nature, of the divine power that can create ex nihilo.”—Illingworth, Sermons. Faith implies an effort, a movement of the will toward God. It is not idle, but active. It asks, “What wilt thou have me to do?” Praise is valueless except it express faith; and in every act of worship and service “whatsoever is not of faith is sin.” U. S.