John Gill · 6 of 53

Chapter 6. Of Faith in God and in Christ · Part 1

Faith is another branch of inward experimental religion and godliness, for “with the heart man believeth unto righteousness”; and of internal worship, and without which external worship cannot be performed in a manner acceptable to God, for “without faith it is impossible to please him”: there is no drawing nigh to God m any part of worship without it; if a man prays to God he must “ask in faith, nothing doubting”; for it is the “prayer of faith” that is availing and saving; if a man hears the gospel, unless the word is “mixed with faith” by them that hear it, it is not profitable; and both a profession of faith and the exercise of it, are necessary to a due subjection to the ordinances of the gospel. As to baptism, “if thou believest with all thy heart thou mayest”, said Philip to the eunuch desiring baptism; and so for the ordinance of the supper, a previous examination whether a man has faith, and the exercise of it, are requisite to eating of it; and without this a man cannot discern the Lord’s body, nor answer the ends and design of that ordinance; concerning which may be observed,

1. The kind of faith to be treated of; for faith is a word of different use and signification, and there are divers kinds of faith.

1a. It sometimes signifies the veracity and faithfulness of God; as when the apostle says, “Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?” (Rom. 3:3, 4), yea faith sometimes signifies veracity and fidelity among men, and is no other than a virtue belonging to the moral law, and is one of the weightier matters of it (Matthew 23:23).

1b. It is sometimes used for the doctrine of the gospel, the word of faith, which the apostle preached, though he once destroyed it as much as in him lay (Gal. 1:23), and is the faith once delivered to the saints, which they should earnestly contend for, and build up one another in (Jude 1:3, 20), so called, because it contains things to be believed upon the credit and testimony of God; and because it directs to the great object of faith in salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ; and because it is the means of ingenerating and increasing faith in men, for “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom. 10:8, 17).

1c. There is a divine and an human faith; a divine faith proceeds upon a divine testimony, upon the authority and veracity of God the testifier; an human faith proceeds upon the testimony of man, and upon the authenticity and truth of the witness bore by him; concerning both which the apostle John says, “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater”, by how much the greater is his veracity and faithfulness; “for this is the witness of God, which he hath testified of his Son” (1 John 5:9), namely, that life and salvation are in him and by him; and to believe this witness, and to receive it within a man’s self, is what is commonly called saving faith.

1d. There is a faith of miracles which proceeds upon a revelation some way or other made by God to a man, which he believes; either that a miracle should be wrought by him, or should be wrought for him, for his benefit and advantage; of the former sort, and which is called “faith in God” (Mark 11:22, 23), the apostle is to be understood, when he says, “Though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains” (1 Cor. 13:2; Matthew 17:20; Luke 17:6), of the latter sort was the faith of the centurion, of the woman having an issue, of Jairus, and of the Canaanitish woman (Matthew 8:8, 10; 9:18, 20, 22; 15:28), and of the lame man at Lystra (Acts 14:9, 10). The one is called active, the other passive faith; and this faith of miracles, in the first times of the gospel, was common to good and bad men, to the true disciples of Christ (Matthew 10:1; Mark 16:17-20), and to Judas, and to false teachers (Matthew 10:1, 4; 7:22, 23).

1e. There is what is called an historical faith, not because it is only giving credit to the historical part of the scripture, which is to be believed as well as other parts; nor because the scripture is read, and attention paid to it only as a common history or human testimony; for men, with this faith, believe it to be a divine testimony, and regard it as such; it may rather be called a theoretic faith, a speculative one, receiving all things in the theory but reducing nothing to practice; or a bare naked assent to the truth of what is contained in the word concerning God and Christ, and divine things; it is a faith common to good men and bad men; it must be and is where true faith is, and there can be no true faith without it; but if a man stops here and goes no further, it falls short of spiritual, special faith, or the faith of God’s elect, and is no other than the faith of devils, and of bad men.

1f. There is also a temporary faith, which continues only for a time, in some persons, as in the stony ground hearers, “Who for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away” (Luke 8:13), this sort of faith differs from the former, in that it is not a mere assent to truth, but is attended with affection, joy, and gladness, as in Herod, who heard John gladly, and did many outward things (Mark 6:20 and in those the apostle speaks of, “who tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come” (Heb. 6:5), all of a natural and superficial kind, arising from a principle of self-love, and from the novelty, harmony, and connection of truths, and from a false presumptuous hope of future happiness in consequence of their assent unto them; and so is different likewise from the faith of devils, who believe and tremble, but have no joy; and it differs also from true faith, because it is without the root of grace in the heart, and is loseable, is only for a time, for when trouble and persecution arise because of the word, such who have it, drop their profession of it; whereas where there is true faith, such do not “draw back”, but continue “to believe” to “the saving of the soul” (Heb. 10:39).

1g. There is a special faith, which is peculiar to God’s elect, and is by some called saving faith, though strictly speaking salvation is not in faith, nor in any other grace, nor in any duty, only in Christ; there is no other name but his under heaven whereby we must be saved; he only is the author of eternal salvation; and yet there are some things in scripture which seem to countenance such a phrase; as when Christ said to the woman who repented of her sins, and had the forgiveness of them, loved Christ, and believed in him, “Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace” (Luke 7:50), unless the object of faith should be meant; and certain it is that salvation is promised to faith, and connected with it, “He that believes shall be saved”, and is what faith issues in; true believers receive “the end of their faith, even the salvation of their souls” (Mark 16:16; 1 Pet. 1:9), and this is the faith that is to be treated of; and next will be considered,

2. The objects of it, and acts of it on those objects. The objects of it are not bare axioms or propositions; for, as Dr. Ames observes, the act of the believer does not terminate at an axiom but at the thing; for axioms are not formed, but that by them knowledge may be had of things; the principal term to which the act of a believer tends is the thing itself, which is chiefly regarded in the axiom; and so promises are not to be considered as objects unless in a tropical and metonymical sense, being put for the things promised; so the Old Testament saints, “not having received the promises”, the things promised, “but having seen them afar off”, that is, by faith, “were persuaded of them, and embraced them” (Heb. 11:12), nor even the benefits of Christ, or the blessings of his grace, no otherwise than as they are the “end” faith has in view in receiving him; he is viewed and dealt with as the object of faith in order to enjoy the good things which come by him: or they may be considered as motives encouraging to acts of faith on him, and are the fruits and effects of it received thereby from him. The proper and formal object of faith is twofold, God and Christ; God as the first primary and ultimate object of faith, and Christ as mediator is the mediate object of it, “Ye believe in God, believe also in me” (John 14:1).

God is the principal object of faith (Mark 11:22; Titus 3:8; 1 Thess. 1:8), which act of faith on him is not barely to believe there is a God, and but one; which is “credere Deum”, and which the devils themselves believe; nor is it merely to believe whatever he delivers in his word, as prophecies, promises, doctrines, &c. this is “credere Deo”, to give credit to God, believe what he says; but “credere in Deum,” Medulla Theolog, l. 1. c. 3. f. 15. by believing to cleave to God, lean upon him, and acquiesce in him as our all sufficient life and salvation (Deut. 30:20), and so it is not merely to believe there are three persons in the Godhead, but to go forth in acts of faith and confidence on them, in things relative to our welfare and happiness here and hereafter. And,

2a. First, on God the Father, “Ye believe in God”, that is, in God the Father, the God of Israel, as distinct from Christ, for it follows, “in my Father’s house are many mansions” (John 14:1, 2), and so our Lord further says, “He that believeth on me”, that is, not on him only, nor does his faith stop and terminate there, “but on him that sent me”, that is, on the Father of Christ (John 12:44 and it is also observed, that Christ was raised from the dead and had glory given him, that the “faith and hope” of his people “might be in God”, in God his Father, who raised him (1 Pet. 1:21).

2a1. On him as the creator, though not only on him as such; so runs the first article in the creed commonly called the apostles’ creed, “I believe in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth”; to believe the creation of all things out of nothing by the word, even out of things which did not appear, is an act of that faith in God which is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen (Heb. 11:1, 3), besides, a true believer in God fetches arguments to strengthen his faith in God, for relief, help, support, and supply from him with respect to things spiritual, as well as temporal, from his being the maker and creator of all things; “My help”, says David, “cometh from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Ps. 121:1, 2), and it is a special act of faith believers are directed to under sufferings, to “commit the keeping of their souls to” God “in well doing, as unto a faithful creator” (1 Pet. 4:19 and so likewise on him as the preserver and savior of men, for he is “the Saviour of all men, especially of those that believe”; and therefore saints put their trust in him, the living God, as such (1 Tim. 4:10). But more especially,

2a2. Faith is exercised on God the Father as the object of it, as having loved his people in Christ before the foundation of the world; that the Father, as distinct from Christ, has loved his people with a free, sovereign, unchangeable, and everlasting love, is certain; “Now God, even our Father, which hath loved us and given us everlasting consolation” (2 Thess. 2:16), of which they may be most comfortably assured, and may most firmly believe, by his appearing to them as he did to his church of old, saying, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love” (Jer. 31:3), by his spirit witnessing it to their spirits, and by shedding it abroad in their hearts, and giving them some feeling sensations of it, so as to comprehend with other saints, the height and depth, the length and breadth of it; by remembering to them his former lovingkindness, the favour he bears to his own people; and by acts of love done in eternity, as choosing them in Christ, &c. and by giving him for them in time, and by commending his love towards them through Christ’s dying for them, while they were yet sinners; and by quickening them by his Spirit and grace when dead in trespasses and sins, and all because of the great love wherewith he hath loved them; and by drawing them with lovingkindness to himself, as well as by his word and oath, the two immutable things in which he cannot lie (Isa. 54:9, 10). So that there is good and sufficient reason for the acting and exercise of faith, on the everlasting love of the Father; and what a strong act and expression of faith is that of the apostle with respect unto it; “I am persuaded”, I firmly believe it, that nothing, “nor any creature” whatever, “shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord?” (Rom. 8:38, 39), this is to be “rooted and grounded in love” (Eph. 3:17).

2a3. Faith is exercised on God the Father, as having chosen his people in Christ to grace and glory from the beginning, from everlasting, before the world began (Eph. 1:3,4; 2 Thess. 2:13, 14) this is the act of the Father of Christ, “Elect, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father” (1 Pet. 1:2), and this election of God is to be known by the gospel coming not in word only but in power, by being effectually called, for “whom he did predestinate, them he also called”; and by their having the faith of God’s elect, for “as many as were ordained to eternal life believed” (Rom. 8:30; Acts 13:48), wherefore this may be most firmly believed, as it was by the apostle Paul, both with respect to himself and others, for which he blessed God, and gave thanks to him (Eph. 1:3, 4; 2 Thess. 2:13), and our Lord exhorts and encourages his disciples to “rejoice because their names were written in heaven” (Luke 10:20), which supposes knowledge of it, and faith in it.

2a4. God, as the covenant God of his people, is the object of their faith; the covenant runs thus, “I will be their God, and they shall be people”; and this is made to appear in effectual calling, when they who were not the people of God, not known to be so, are openly such; then it is God makes good his promise, “I will say, It is my people; and they shall say, The Lord is my God” (Zech. 13:9), as David did, “I trusted in thee, O Lord; I said, Thou art my God” (Ps. 31:14), and so may every believer say, and be assured, that this God is their God, and will be their God and guide unto death, for covenant interest always continues; it was a noble act of faith in the sweet singer of Israel a little before his death, “Although house be not so with God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure” (2 Sam. 23:5).

2a5. God, as he is the Father of Christ, so he is the Father of all that believe in him; “I ascend”, says Christ, “to my Father and your Father” (John 20:17). So God, in the covenant of his grace, has declared himself, “and will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord almighty” (2 Cor. 6:18), and as such faith is to be exercised on him with joy and wonder, saying, “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God” (1 John 3:1), of the truth of which the leadings and witnessings of the Spirit are an evident proof, from whence he is called the Spirit of adoption; “for as many as are led by the Spirit of God”, off of themselves to Christ, and by him to the Father, “they are the sons of God”; and who also “receive the Spirit of adoption, whereby they cry, Abba, Father; the Spirit itself beareth witness with their spirits, that they are the children of God” (Rom. 8:14-16), so that their faith is grounded on good authority, on a divine testimony, true, sure and firm; this blessing of adoption is revealed to faith, the witness of it is received by it, and so believers become openly and manifestly “the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus”; for to “as many as receive him, to them gives he power”, authority, right, privilege, “to become the sons of God, even to them that believe in his name” (Gal. 3:26; John 1:12), and henceforward it is enjoined them that in the exercise of faith they call God their father, and not “turn away from” him, by giving way to an evil heart of unbelief, but say to him, “Doubtless thou art our Father” (Isa. 63:16), and they are directed in all their addresses to God at the throne of grace to say, “Our Father, which art in heaven” (Matthew 6:9).

2a6. God is the object of faith as a God forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin for Christ’s sake; and in him he has proclaimed his name as such, and there is none like him on that account; he has promised pardon in covenant, saying, “I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins, and their iniquities will I remember no more” (Heb. 8:12). He has set forth Christ in his purposes to be a propitiation through faith in his blood for the remission of sin; and he has sent him to shed his blood to obtain it, and has exalted him as a Saviour to give it, and to him give all the prophets witness, that whosoever believes in him shall receive it; and he applies it to them, saying, Son or “daughter, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee; I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins” (Matthew 9:2; Isa. 43:25). Hence upon such acts and declarations as these, the believer has sufficient ground to make God, as a forgiving God, the object, of his faith, and to call upon his soul and all within him to bless his holy name (Ps. 103:1-3), such an act of faith David put forth on God as a forgiving God, when, having acknowledged his sin, and confessed it before the Lord, added, “And thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin” (Ps. 32:5).

2a7. Faith deals with God as a justifier; its language is, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? it is God that justifieth” (Rom. 8:33; 3:30), and faith is exercised on him as he that “justifieth the ungodly”; and therefore not by works, nor on account of any good dispositions and qualifications in men; and they come to him not as workers, but as ungodly and sinners, and believe on him as justifying them without works, and that by imputing the righteousness of his Son unto them; “even as David, also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works” (Rom. 4:5, 6). Christ of God is made to them righteousness; and they are made the righteousness of God in him; that is, by his gracious imputation of Christ’s righteousness to them: and thus God appears to be a just God and a Saviour: just, while he is “the justifier of him that believes in Jesus”; and as such he is the object of faith; what Christ the federal head of his people, in whom they are all justified, said, his believing members may say, “He is near that justifieth me, who will contend with me?” (Isa. 50:8).

2a8. The God and Father of Christ is “the God of all grace”; it has pleased him, the Father, that all fulness of it should dwell in Christ as Mediator; he has made large provisions of it, and stored the covenant of grace with it; and is the author, giver, and implanter of all grace in the hearts of his people by his Spirit; and as he is able to make all grace to abound towards them, so he grants them a supply of it from time to time: now as such he is the object of faith; faith deals with him as such, and the believer applies to the throne of his grace, that he may obtain mercy, and find grace to help him in time of need.

2a9. Lastly, God, as a promising God, is the object of faith, he has made many exceeding great and precious promises, and these are all yea and amen in Christ, and God is faithful who has promised, and is able also to perform; and though promises themselves are not, strictly speaking, the object, rather the things promised, yet especially a promising God is the object faith is concerned with (Heb. 10:23).

2b. Secondly, God the Son is the object of faith; which faith lies not merely in believing that he is the Son of God, which is most certainly to be believed; it was not only the confession of the faith of Peter, “Thou art Christ the Son of the living God”; which faith, or rather the object of it, is the Rock on which the church of Christ is built, and against which the gates of hell shall never prevail; but it was the faith of all the disciples, and which they express with the strongest assurance; “We believe and are sure that thou art that Christ the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16, 18; John 6:69 and it was with respect to this article that the eunuch expressed his faith in Christ previous to his baptism; “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God” (Acts 8:37), and all things relating to Christ, his doctrines, and his miracles, were written by the evangelists, “that men might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God; and that believing, they might have life through his name” (John 20:31), but true faith is not barely a believing that Christ is the Son of God, but a believing in him as such; according to the question put by Christ to the blind man; “Dost thou believe on the Son of God?” (John 9:35). “And this is his commandment”, the commandment of God, “that we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ”. And again, “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself” (1 John 3:23; 5:10). Believing in him is a going forth in acts of faith and confidence, and is called “faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:28). Christ, as the Son of God, is the true God and eternal life; he is God equal with the Father, and as such is equally the primary object of faith; which is strongly expressed by Thomas; “My Lord and my God!” and therefore our Lord says, “Ye believe in God”, in God the Father, “believe also in me” equally as in him, he being equal with him in nature, perfections, power, and glory. But Christ, as Mediator, Redeemer, and Saviour, is the mediate object of faith, or in and through whom men believe in God; thus the apostle Peter, speaking of Christ as Mediator, being foreordained before the foundation of the world; but made manifest in human nature in these last times for the sake of his people, described by him as such, “Who by him do believe in God” (1 Pet. 1:21). As Christ is the Mediator through whom all grace is communicated to his people, so it is through him that all grace is exercised on God, and particularly faith; “Such trust have we through Christ to Godward”, says the apostle (2 Cor. 3:4). So believers reckon themselves “alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:11). Now faith in Christ as the Redeemer and Saviour includes in it the following things, and is expressed by a variety of acts, which show the nature of it.

2b1. First, I shall consider the various parts of faith in Christ, or what is requisite to constitute it.

2b1a. Knowledge of Christ is necessary to the exercise of faith on him, for “How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?” and if they have not so much as heard of him, they cannot know him, and consequently cannot exercise faith upon him; and “How shall they hear without a preacher” to make him known unto them? (Rom. 10:14). When our Lord put the question to the man who had been blind, “Dost thou believe on the Son of God? he answered and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him?” upon which Christ made himself known unto him, “Jesus said unto him, Thou hast seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee”; his eyes had been opened to see him, and his ears now heard him, and both being true in a spiritual sense he immediately expressed his faith in him, saying, “Lord, I believe”, and as a proof and evidence of it, “worshipped him” (John 9:35-38). Previous to faith in Christ, as a Saviour, there must be knowledge of the want of him; as such a man must be made sensible of the sinfulness of his nature, and of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, and of the just demerit of it, and of the miserable state and condition it has brought him into, out of which none but Christ the Saviour can deliver him; and therefore he then applies to him as the apostles in distress did, saying, “Lord, save us, we perish!” (Matthew 8:25), he must be made acquainted with his impotency to save himself; that his own right hand, his works and services, cannot save him; that if ever he is saved it must be by the grace of God, through the blood and righteousness of Christ, and not by them; he must have knowledge of the fulness and abilities of Christ as a Saviour; he must have seen him full of grace and truth, as having all the fulness of the blessings of grace in him suitable to his wants, whose redemption is plenteous, his salvation complete, he being made everything to his people they want, and able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him; and he being just such a Saviour they need, and his salvation so suitable to them, they that know his name, Jesus the Saviour, put their trust in him; and the more ready they are to do this, as they are fully convinced there is no other Saviour; that salvation is in him, and in none else; that it is in vain to expect it from any other quarter from the works and services of the creature, and therefore determine upon it they shall not be their saviors; but say, with Job, “Though he slay me yet will I trust in him—he also shall be my salvation!” (Ps. 9:10; Job 13:15, 16). Hence knowledge being so requisite to faith, and included in it, faith is sometimes expressed by it (Isa. 53:11; John 17:3), both in spiritual knowledge and special faith, eternal life is begun, and with which it is connected; and so knowledge and faith are joined together as inseparable companions, and as expressive of the same thing; “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us”, are firmly persuaded of it (1 John 4:16), and some of the strongest acts of faith in the saints have been expressed by words of knowledge; “I know that my Redeemer liveth, &c. I know in whom I have believed”, &c. (Job 19:25; 1 Tim. 1:12).

2b1b. An assent unto Christ as a Saviour, enters into the true nature of faith; not a bare naked assent of the mind to the truth of the person and offices of Christ; that he is the Son of God, the Messiah, Prophet, Priest, and King, such as has been yielded to him by men destitute of true faith in him, as by Simon Magus and others, yea, by the devils themselves (Luke 4:34, 41).

“Of all the poison, says Dr. Owen, which at this day is diffused in the minds of men, corrupting them from the mystery of the gospel, there is no part that is more pernicious than this one perverse imagination, that to “believe in Christ” is nothing at all but to “believe the doctrine of the gospel!” which yet we grant is included therein.’’

Such a proposition, that Christ is the Saviour of the chief of sinners, or that salvation is alone by him, is not presented merely under the notion of its being “true”, and assented to as such, but under the notion of its being “good”, a suitable, acceptable, and preferable good, and to be chosen as the good part was by Mary; as being both a “faithful saying” to be believed as true, and as “worthy of all acceptation”, to be received and embraced as the chiefest good. Faith is an assent to Christ as a Saviour, not upon an human, but a divine testimony, upon the record which God has given of his Son, and of eternal life in him. Some of the Samaritans believed on Christ because of the saying of the woman; but others because of his own word, having heard him themselves, and knew that he was indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world: true faith, in sensible sinners, assents to Christ, and embraces him not merely as a Saviour of men in general; but as a special, suitable Saviour for them in particular: it proceeds upon Christ’s being revealed “in” them, as well as “to” them, by the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, in the knowledge of him as a Saviour that becomes them; it comes not merely through external teachings, by the hearing of the word from men; but having “heard and learned of the Father”, such souls come to Christ, that is, believe in him (John 6:45), not the doctrine of him only, but in him himself.