As Christians, the Bible teaches us to have faith in Christ and in His finished work. But is the fact that we have faith, or exercise it in Christ, considered to be a work...a meritorious work? If having faith in Christ is a work, would it be carried out by God or by us? Also, can someone, for example, boast in their greater possession of faith in Christ than their fellow brother or sister? And, contrary to this, is salvific faith in Christ a gift from God? If none of these apply, then what is faith? These questions, and more, will be the focus of this article.
Faith Defined
According to theologian Wayne Grudem, in his Systematic Theology book, faith is "trust or dependence on God based on the fact that we take Him at His word and believe what He has said." Greek scholar William Mounce, in his Complete Expository Dictionary, states that faith means "belief, trust, and confidence." And according to theologian Millard Erickson, in his Christian Theology book, it is "a fastening of the heart upon the Divine Word of promise, a leaning upon the power and faithfulness of God...to believe what someone says, to accept a statement as true; belief in and commitment to something or someone." And philosopher Norman Geisler adds, in his Systematic Theology text, "[Faith] is the kind of belief that has trust and confidence in Christ for salvation and thereby implies a commitment to follow and obey Him."
It is important to remember that our faith is not "blind," as some would say. Although we ourselves have not seen Jesus or God, we can rely on the testimony of those who did walk with Jesus, those who beheld His glory (John 1:14). The apostles all recorded that Jesus not only validated the Scriptures (which confirm God's everlasting faithfulness), but He fulfilled the Scriptures, as He Himself is Yahweh in the flesh. Therefore, our faith rests on the person of Jesus Christ, who actually lived, died, and rose again on this earth. It is not without evidence or good reason.
Work Vs. Gift
In order to understand the questions posed at the beginning, however, we must also define and draw a clear distinction between a work and a gift. A work, biblically speaking, is something we do in order to achieve something or receive something in return for our labor (Romans 4:4). For example, when an employee works his forty hours and payday arrives, he expects to be paid for his work—he earned his reward, in this case, money. A gift is something that is freely given to someone without them ever having worked for it; a gift cannot be earned, but simply received (Romans 4:5, 6:23). But in both cases, a reward and/or a gift can be disregarded or rejected.
The Bible makes it clear that God is not interested in our working toward salvation because doing so would give opportunity to those who are prideful (that is, all of us) to boast in their "amazing" works and actions (Ephesians 2:8-9)—this would inevitably demean the work of Christ in fulfilling the Law, and His work on the Cross (Galatians 2:21). And the Bible also leaves no doubt that salvation is a gift from God (John 3:16; Romans 5:15, 6:23), and that our "works of the Law" (that is, any good work we do as part of trying to follow the Law to obtain salvation) would not be enough to earn it (Galatians 2:16).
Is Faith A Work?
Now we get to our first question: Is having or exercising faith in Christ considered to be a work...a meritorious work (that is, one that merits a reward)? This is an important question to tackle because, if faith in Christ were to be a work, we would have to find out how to escape being doomed, for God does not want us to work for our salvation—but faith is required to receive salvation! This sounds like a vicious cycle indeed.
Not only that, if faith in Christ were to be a work, then a few questions come to mind: Is our faith in Christ God's work, or our work to perform? If it's God's work, in whom does He accomplish it, on the willing or the unwilling, or both? If on the willing, wouldn't we need to have faith in Him in the first place—wouldn't we need to trust Him that He would give us this gift? That seems absurd, and like an extra step. But if faith in Christ is God's work on the unwilling, how would God not violate people's free will by having them believe in someone in whom they do not want to willfully trust? But the Bible says that it is a willful trust in God that He desires us to express (Joshua 24:15).
Conversely, if faith in Christ is our work to perform in order to achieve salvation, how much of it would be necessary? Sure, some would say, "only a faith the size of a mustard seed would be needed," but how much is that? It seems rather impossible to measure how much faith one needs to possess or exhibit in order to gain salvation, if it were a work we had to do. In our fallen nature, we would constantly be preoccupied with thoughts like: "Is my faith enough? Do I have to work up my faith to be saved, to stay saved?" This would be an unfortunate conundrum, and to base one's salvation on this seems to be far too subjective and would leave most people feeling insecure about their eternal destiny.
The Bible clearly teaches that faith is not a work per se—it is a non-work. Scripture does this by always contrasting works with faith (Ephesians 2:8-9; Romans 3:28, 4:2-5; Galatians 3:10-11; Philippians 3:9). The two concepts are never used interchangeably, nor even as "two sides of the same coin." The works of the Law (and any other work we attempt to gain God's favor) and faith are basically diametrically opposed to each other. The very fact that the Bible does not see faith as a work should be sufficient reason to believe it is not indeed a work, according to God.
As the article image demonstrates, when a father is playing with his child by throwing him up in the air, the child is trusting (having faith in) his father to catch him and be strong enough to sustain him (save him). The one actually doing the work is the father, who alone is holding his child up or catching him—the child is simply believing in his dad. The same goes for us and our heavenly Father through Jesus. He is the author and guarantor of our salvation if we simply believe in His Son. We're not working for our salvation by believing...we're not even holding on (John 10:28-29)!
To illustrate the fact that faith is not a work, theologians often use the example of a poor man accepting a gift from another man. While it is true that the poor man has to reach out and receive the gift (have faith), in no way can his action be counted as a meritorious work he did in order to earn that gift! He did not work for the gift nor achieve possessing it on his own, he simply accepted the gift that the giver worked for and freely offered him. Just as praise and gratitude would rightly be demonstrated to the man who gave the poor man money, all the praise and glory should be demonstrated to the Giver who offers His gift of salvation to us through Christ, who alone perfectly accomplished the work required to give us the gift.
Giving praise and glory to God for giving us this gift (salvation) is exactly what God is after—remember, the purpose of Man is to glorify God. One of the ways—if not the best way—that we glorify His name is by believing in Christ, who He says is His Son and the Savior of the world. Believing in Christ puts God in the position of being able to "make good" on His Word (saving us through Christ), thus giving Him His due glory. John Piper puts it well when he says: "Faith in God’s promise obligates Him to save the believer not because the quality of faith is meritorious, but because faith is the one human act which calls attention alone to God’s merit, honor, and glory, and his unswerving commitment to maintain that glory."
Well, Is It A Gift?
So now, in opposition to the above, if faith is not God's work nor ours, is it a gift from God? Many people like to use Ephesians 2:8-9 to support this belief: "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast" (NIV). The proponents of the idea that faith is a gift take the phrase "and this is not from yourselves" to be referring to faith as the gift. But this is incorrect and can be proven by analyzing the grammar of the original Greek. For an in-depth study of the Greek in these verses, click here.
The Greek language designates gender to its nouns, much like Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, German, etc. do as well. The three genders are: masculine, feminine, and neuter. The word "grace" and "faith" are feminine in gender, but the word "this" is neuter in gender, therefore its antecedent cannot be "grace" or "faith," for the genders must agree. Most Greek scholars concur that the phrase "and this is not from yourselves" refers to salvation itself, so that it is salvation that is the gift that is not from ourselves, not faith.
Others use 1 Corinthians 12:8-9 to support their view that faith is a gift from God, specifically from the Spirit: "For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit." But, if one reads these verses in their context, it will become very clear (v. 7) that this list includes gifts that are for believers, not for unbelievers in need of faith.
And something else to think about: If faith in Christ were to be a gift from God to unbelievers so that they would believe, wouldn't God—being the good God that He is—give this gift to all people so that they would believe in Christ and be saved? But this is not, and has not been, the case throughout history; and espousing such a view would inevitably lead either to Limited Atonement (the belief that God arbitrarily saves only the elect, and possibly condemns the rest) or Universalism (the belief that God saves everyone, regardless of their faith in Christ or not). But faith in Christ is a condition for salvation which all people can exercise, but people are also free to reject belief in Christ. This fact betrays the notion that faith in Christ is a gift from God; it simply is not.
What, Then, Is Faith?
Since we have seen that faith is neither a work nor a gift, the only question left is: what, then, is faith? Well, as we stated in the definition of the term, faith is basically trusting someone or something; it is a decision we can make or not. The Bible says that our faith is to be in God, in Christ alone. Jesus is what theologians call the "object" of our faith. He is what we place our trust in because He alone perfectly accomplished the work required of God; therefore, He alone truly has the power to save.
Christ's work on the Cross is what makes our faith in Him even valid. Suppose Christ's work was not efficacious; then our trust and belief in Him would be null. We can have faith in many things that claim to save us, but if that thing cannot save, we would not blame it on our lack faith, as if our measure of faith in the object affected its ability to save. No, we would blame our perishing on the thing which could not save, for it was powerless to do what it said it could—but thank God that He is strong enough to save us. Therefore, it is clear to see that having faith is not a "work" in the sense that it achieves our salvation in and of itself. But neither is it a gift.
Faith is essentially a decision we make, a response we have, after coming into contact with the grace and love of God, which move us to trust and believe in Him because He is who He says He is, and He does (and has done) what He says He's going to do. Our faith in Christ is the means, the instrument, by which we receive (not achieve) His salvation, much like prayer is the means by which God affects our hearts. Our expression of faith in God is the result of our awareness that we cannot work for our own salvation, and that we need His grace. And thank God for His grace!
May God bless you as you ponder upon His grace, mercy, love, and on His Son's finished work. Find your rest in Him (Matthew 11:28-30; Hebrews 4:9-10).
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