A word about "faith", and about Christ

Here I want to look closely at one word in the New Testament: "faith". That word is important to Christians, and to Christian life and thinking. As we look at "faith", I'd like to look at one passage in particular that says something striking about faith -- or nothing at all, depending on the translation.


The New Testament has come down to us in Greek, even if some works may have been written in other languages originally. It is from the Greek that we translate into the languages that we use ourselves. The main Greek word for "faith" is πίστις (or Strong's G4102, for searching with that method). It is used 244 times in the New Testament, and in the AV (King James) it was translated almost always as "faith". Of those 244 uses, it was translated 239 times as "faith", 3 times as forms of "belief" or "believe", once as "fidelity", and once -- only once -- as "assurance". It is a word which was almost always taken to mean "faith" as used back in the day when that translation was made. In some modern translations we also see other words like "trust" used to translate that some word. "Trust" is particularly apt in many cases. Still, it is the once  -- only once -- that the AV translates it as "assurance" rather than "faith" that I want to look at more closely:

He (God) has given ______ to all by raising him (Christ) from the dead. (Acts 17: 31)

What exactly has God given to everyone by raising Christ from the dead? The translators of the King James here decided against the normal translation of "faith", instead turning towards "assurance" (AV). The old NIV went with "proof of this", which is not at all how they typically translated that Greek word. These special and unusual translations of the word are probably because the translator was firmly convinced that the sentence "God has given faith to all by raising Christ from the dead" makes no sense. Of course the words make sense; but who thinks Paul could have really meant that? Let's look a little more at translations of that word, and that it does have more than one meaning as we would see it in English, before we get back to this question.

Paul, the righteousness of God, and faith: Romans

Many people know more than one language, and know that translations can be tricky. For any word in one language, there can be several different words with different shades of meaning in another language. This creates a pair of problems: not only which word to choose, but also how to show that there was not such a huge difference between the concepts for the original writer.

With that in mind, let's look at "faith" and we'll start with a less controversial sentence, I hope: Paul's topic sentence in writing to the Romans:

For the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written: "The righteous will live by faith." (Romans 1:17)

The AV sticks with "from faith to faith" even though that's hard to understand in English. The NIV drops "from faith to faith" entirely and tries to find the meaning, saying "by faith from first to last".  But the more I read Romans and follow the train of thought and the line of argument, the more I think "from first to last" is not what Paul meant. Let's watch Paul develop his train of thought, then, and come back to "from faith to faith". The whole book of Romans is worth re-reading but I will hardly quote the whole thing here. I'll quote from the parts that are most directly developing the topic of faith, and hope that the reader reads along for more than is directly quoted here.

1.  Here Paul contrasts human lack of faith with God's faithfulness.

What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God's faithfulness? May it not be! Let God be true, and every man a liar. (Romans 3:3)

Paul contends that God is true: he is constant in his faithfulness, unchanged by our lack of faith.

2. Here Paul speaks of Abraham's example of faith, and we read Paul's introduction and concluding remarks about Abraham's example:

What does Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." (Romans 4:3)

Yet he (Abraham) did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. That is why "it was credited to him as righteousness". (Romans 4:20-22)

Paul argues that Abraham's faith consisted in trusting that God could keep his promises. Abraham thought that God was trustworthy and faithful. "Faith" is what you call that attitude towards someone when you consider them to be trustworthy and faithful.

3. Here Paul explains how Christ fits into the picture of the righteousness that is by faith:

But the righteousness that is by faith says, "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?' (that is, to bring Christ down) or 'Who will descend to the deep?' (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? "The word is near you: it is in your mouth and in your heart", that is the word we are proclaiming. That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. As the Scripture says, "Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame." For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile -- the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Romans 10:6-13)

Again we see Paul proclaiming God's faithfulness: that the one who trusts in God will not be put to shame, that he blesses all who call, that all who call on him will be saved. So God's faithfulness is the basis of our faith.

Paul has already mentioned Christ in the passage that we just read, about how Jesus is Lord, and how God raised him from the dead. Here he continues about how we come to faith:

Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Romans 10:17)

It is in Christ that we know God's faithfulness: his love for creation, his commitment to heal, his promise of resurrection, the justice to come at the last day, the mercy of forgiveness.

4. So back to Paul's topic sentence for the letter to the Romans:

For the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith ...

Based on how Paul develops his thoughts on "faith" throughout the letter, I expect Paul was using more than one sense of the word here. The same word means "faith" and "faithfulness". I think he was saying that God has proven himself to be faithful (trustworthy) towards us, and that God's trustworthiness is the basis for our trust in him. Once we grasp God's righteousness, once we understand God's faithfulness, that is what it means to have faith in him. And so our faith consists in our understanding of God's goodness, in our conviction that he has promised a good thing and will accomplish it as he said. And that faith is credited to us as righteousness. That is how there is something "revealed": The righteousness of God is revealed in his faithfulness, which gives us faith (from faith, to faith).

By raising Christ from the dead

So what should we say?

He (God) has given ______ to all by raising him (Christ) from the dead. (Acts 17: 31)

You can fill in the blank with "assurance" or "proof" if you like. But when we resist saying "faith" here, it is because in our language we do not think of "faith" in the way Paul did, where God's raising Christ from the dead was the full demonstration of God's trustworthiness and faithfulness toward the world, seen as proof enough for the world of how right it is to hope in God through Christ. It was seen as proof enough for the world of everything that the message of Christ entails: hope of the world to come, new life, resurrection from the dead, justice and mercy. Christ's resurrection is the ultimate mind-opening, heart-opening, hope-inspiring event of all time. It is our message, and it is the message that brings faith.

What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God's faithfulness? May it not be! Let God be true, and every man a liar. (Romans 3:3)

Some people will say that faith is a gift of God (Eph 2:8, and assuming that the gift being referred to is faith).  But when we see a passage that says that same thing is given to all by a generally known event -- Jesus' resurrection, arguably the most momentous event in the world's history -- what will we say? Will we say that God has given faith to some but not others? Does God's act in establishing our faith consist in something more than putting proof (or assurance) right before our eyes? Granted that some do not have faith; but God is still faithful, and has still shown it to all.

That is how people come to faith: "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." Consider also that Jesus said that, when the Son of Man is lifted up (on the cross), he will draw all to himself (John 12:32). Because

God has given _______ to all by raising Christ from the dead.

When we hear that God gives us faith, and that God draws us, time and again we hear that it is through the message of Christ. I wonder very much: Is it right to look for any other giving and drawing, or is it all in the message of Christ? Regardless of how you translate that one word here, we can be sure that there is something unique that God has given to all in raising Christ from the dead. How exactly should we understand that unique thing that God has given to all in raising Christ? And why would Paul choose that word for it?

Grace from the foundation of the world

The usual disclaimer in posts which mention Genesis and creation: I offer these comments hoping they are helpful regardless of whether the reader views that as historic or symbolic, because either way it is food for thought.  

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Among Christians, it seems generally agreed that God loved the world at its creation, and has loved the world from its foundation. That's directly on topic when it comes to God's grace, so let's take a closer look.
 
Grace is established in the act of creation

God's goodwill towards creation was not an afterthought. In its natural state, the world is good. God intended creation to be good, and he created it to be good, and then he recognized it as good. Now anyone who makes or creates does that by bringing things out of themselves. As Jesus said on another occasion: The one who is good out of the treasures of his heart brings forth what is good. In the same way, out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks -- or the mind imagines and speaks and creates. So creation's goodness is a natural outcome of God's goodness. God's goodwill towards creation comes from his own goodness: it was from the original treasures of his goodness that he created, which caused the natural goodness of what he has made. That is to say: God's grace towards the world is established in the act of creation.

Grace is the natural order of things

It follows that God's goodwill towards what he made -- grace -- is the natural order of things. "Grace" and "nature" are not meant to be separate. While "nature" speaks of the things and their natural workings, "grace" speaks of their natural relationship to their creator. From the original state of creation, it is a mistake to think that nature is lacking something unless grace is added to it, as if this adding was an uncertain outcome, as if grace was not part of the act and purpose of creation. Instead, nature is intended to exist in God's grace, and it was created in God's grace. In the same way, we should not think that human nature in the original state of creation is lacking something unless grace is added to it. Again, grace is the intended natural state, and the lack of grace is the unnatural state.

So the desire for grace permeates the world

In this imperfect world, the idea of creation can seem distant to us. Still, in every good thing, and so often in the natural world, we catch a glimpse of that undiluted goodness, that undiminished glory that reminds us of how things might be. Every good thing draws us and calls us back towards our original state of grace. Every good thing is, then, a preparation for grace.

Even the bad that we experience is a sharp reminder of what we wish we had, a call to return to what is good. Every loss, every fear, every worry, every hurt directs us to look back to what we lost, or forward to what we might regain. Every petty or hateful thought that runs through our minds, every unkind word or even cruel action, causes us shame for what we have become, and calls us to pray to God to create in us a clean heart. We live in a world where day by day things steadily increase this restlessness and desire. As Augustine once said, "Our hearts are restless until they rest in You." This restlessness, this longing for grace, is a constant part of our world, part of the human experience. Because of all this, there is a general tendency of things to turn our thoughts toward God. Life contains a steady stream of occurrences that prompt us to look for God.

And the promise of grace permeates our hopes

We do not think of paradise as lost beyond hope. We look forward to paradise as the intended future. From early times, religion has spoken not only of the breach between heaven and earth, but also of its restoration. There has been a promise of reconciliation between heaven and earth, God and man. To greater or lesser extent, this thought is found in every religion that I have yet reviewed. In each faith there is the promise of renewal or paradise or reunion with the infinite. Sometimes that promise also looks for some great future man of God or presence of God in the world. In the Jewish faith with its deep and nourishing visions of paradise, we find the promise of the coming kingdom of God linked to the hope of the Messiah who will bring restoration to the world.

Religion exists in part to keep human hope alive. These hopes take firmer shape wherever the promises of the prophets are read and studied. And now, for roughly 2000 years, we have celebrated how those early promises have made their actual beginnings in our world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, in his healing and in his teaching and most of all in his resurrection. What happens in Jesus is directly connect to both our primal thoughts of a world without corruption, and our persistent longing for a future where that world is realized. But what grounds do we have for thinking about this promise of grace as reality?

Paul once said that God has given faith* (or proof* or assurance*, if you'd rather) to all by raising Jesus from the dead. In his resurrection, we have God's open, on-the-record demonstration to the world of the reality of those promises, the reality of the hope to which we are called.

And it is our part to hold out the promise of hope and renewal to the world. Starting from Jesus' resurrection, we have the message he sent us to proclaim of repentance and forgiveness in his name. Everyone can know the reality of that hope. We have the honor of explaining God's love for the world, his faithfulness to what he has made, and the redemption that has begun in Jesus.

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* This is the topic of the next post, already written and posting immediately after this one, looking into the relationship between grace and faith.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ

This is the start of a series of meditations on grace. The series starts by considering some of the ideas about grace in theology and in the Bible.

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Grace comes through Christ. This seems like something on which all Christian should agree. Grace is God’s goodwill, his benevolence. God so loved the world that he sent his son, and sending his son was the most significant, irrevocable act of grace since creation itself, the very foundation of God’s grace towards a people who had lost the true knowledge of God.

So why do we talk about conditional election or unconditional election instead of Christ? Why do we talk about limited atonement and unlimited atonement instead of Christ? Why do we talk about irresistible grace or prevenient grace, instead of the grace that comes through Christ? When we talk about “irresistible grace”, we’re not talking about “God sending Christ into the world.” When we talk about “prevenient grace”, we’re not talking about “God sending Christ into the world.” That “grace” is some other means of grace, some other way in which God relates to us, besides Christ.  

Are we so sure that there really is another “grace” apart from the grace that comes through Christ? Sure, “grace” is a word with plenty of history and several meanings, but when we’re talking about receiving God’s love and favor, is there another grace apart from Christ? Irresistible grace is said to be some kind of electing grace that comes to us before Christ and apart from Christ, to lead us to Christ. Prevenient grace is much the same, just resistible. Both think of grace as some hidden thing that does not come through Christ, and in that sense is disconnected from Christ.  

But what if the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is the only such grace there is? What if it comes to us not in some mysterious inexplicable way, but by hearing the message of Christ? When we teach about God’s love and grace, what if we resolved to know nothing except Christ and him crucified? What if baptism is a sign to us that we’re united with Christ in his death and will be united with him in his resurrection? What if baptism proclaims the message that we’re forgiven and God calls us his children? What if the Lord’s Supper tells us that Christ’s body was broken for us and his blood was shed for us for the forgiveness of sins, and that we are welcome at his table? What if the good news of Christ is itself the power of God for our salvation?

Personal note: Once a week

For the first nearly 7 years of this blog, my schedule held reasonably constant and I had a posting schedule of twice a week. My schedule has changed -- and it seems likely to stay that way for at least a couple of years. I think I can probably only update once a week for the foreseeable future.

Thanks for reading. :)

Teenage Sunday School on Jesus as the Good Shepherd

It has been awhile since I posted any individual Sunday school lessons. This one in particular worked well with a class that is currently a mix of young teens and late pre-teens.This lesson is designed for Good Shepherd Sunday, but could be used at any time.

Opener: Game

Explain that the class will start with a game. Everyone will close their eyes. The teacher will move around the room quietly, and touch someone on the shoulder. That person will say "Good morning" (or choose any phrase that seems good), and the other students will raise their hands if they know whose voice it was. The teacher will call on someone who raised a hand to see if they can correctly identify whose voice they heard. The first time the teacher taps your shoulder you must use your own natural voice. After that, you may try to fool your classmates with other voices. (Do one example with everyone's eyes open to start the game.)

First Bible reading

Read John 10:1-5.

Ask the class to explain how that is like our game of recognizing voices. 

Recognizing Jesus' Voice

Explain that you are going to read a series of sayings, and most of them are things that Jesus said, but one is not. After each saying, the class should raise their hands if they think the words are from Jesus, and not raise their hands if they think someone else said the words.

Sample sayings:

"Love one another as I have loved you." (Jesus, though you don't tell the class that until they have raised their hands or not)

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." (Jesus)

"If the scholar is not grave, he will not call forth any veneration, and his learning will not be solid." (Confucius)

"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God." (Jesus)

Second Bible reading: Good Shepherd

Jesus calls himself the shepherd, and calls us his sheep. Have the class read Psalm 23 and tell them in advance they should look at what Jesus was saying when he called himself our shepherd. Work with the class on their understanding of Jesus as the one who restores our souls, provides for us even when we have enemies around us, guides us in the right way, and takes us safely through death.

A mother's prayer

Lord, thank you for (names)

Let them see the good in you, and love you for it, and follow you all their days. May they know your word, and understand the good to which you have called them. May they see the acts of beauty that they are meant to incarnate with their lives, and live lives of beauty that draw those around them to you.

Exactly How Focusing on Good Works Creates Hypocrisy

Picture a bowl of fruit in your kitchen, filled with apples or oranges or whatever you like. Picture the plant that grew the fruit, and yourself next to the plant. Now imagine the growing season, and you are trying to make the fruit grow big and sweet. You have a clear idea of what size the fruit should be, and how it should taste. Imagine trying to make the fruit grow bigger by measuring its shortcomings in comparison to better fruit, and treating the fruit directly in the hopes of growing bigger, tastier, more plentiful fruit.

Except it doesn't work that way. You can't cheerlead the fruit and expect that to make them grow. You can't guilt-trip the tree and expect that to work either. You have to have healthy roots, and healthy pruning, and all the things that go into a healthy plant. When that is done, the fruit takes care of itself with time.

So how exactly does focusing on good works create hypocrisy? If someone focuses on results but ignores the factors that matter -- the basic underlying health -- then good results won't happen, except by luck or accident. But when it comes to morality, good works are disturbingly easy to counterfeit. Sometimes there is a temptation to lower the bar, and rather than asking for love as Jesus asks us, instead we may be asked for some set of works that is attainable without love -- like not drinking, or praying a certain number of times a day, or not playing cards. We may be glad for the approval we obtain by fulfilling those requirements, glad to have the satisfaction that we achieve, and we may not ask whether it was a good thing to set our sights on a set of works that is attainable without love. I would compare those works to a bowl full of plastic fruit. We may even get a bumper crop of plastic fruit. Anyone who is measuring by appearance will be completely satisfied with a bowl of plastic fruit. It sure looks good, but the appearance without the substance is the heart of hypocrisy.

How does religion keep falling into the trap to become "rules taught by men"? How often has that pattern repeated itself? We fall into that temptation to demand a set of works we can attain without love. Jesus told the hypocrites of his day that they strained at gnats and swallowed camels. They even tithed from their little herb gardens, every tenth sprig of mint. That's devotion to the letter of the law. That desire for a set of rules we can follow without love, without any thought to justice and mercy: that's the camel.