Some thoughts on faith
People often use the
word “faith” in a way that convinces me they don’t have a clear conception of
its meaning, but think of it as a vague hope that things will get better on
their own, or turn out the way they wish. Thus, the admonition to “have faith”
is often little more than an encouragement to think positively.
Some people have said
that we should “believe in the power of faith” or even “have faith in faith.”
They seem to think that if we only believe something strongly enough, it
will come to pass. The impression is given that the object and content of faith
alike are immaterial. But this is quite a different understanding of faith than
what we find in Scripture.
A
Biblical Definition
The closest thing we find in Scripture
to a definition of faith is found in Hebrews 11:1.
Now faith is the assurance of things
hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
The first thing to note here is that even
though this verse is written in prose, it contains an instance of a prominent
feature of Hebrew poetry called synonymous parallelism.[1] This is a literary device involving the
repetition of an idea in different words in two or more successive lines. There
are many examples of this in Scripture, but here’s one from the 8th
Psalm:
When
I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have
set in place…
One can easily see that the first half
of each line corresponds to the other. The “your heavens” of the first line
corresponds to “the moon and the stars” in the second. Likewise, the second half of each line corresponds to
the other. The poetic portions of the Old Testament are filled with this sort
of thing, and it often carries over into prose in both the Old and New
Testaments.
An extended synonymous parallelism
occurs in Luke 6:27, where Jesus says, “Love your enemies, do good to those who
hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Lk.
6:27). Here we find the parallelism
continuing through four lines. If we arrange the lines like this, we can get a
clear view of their parallel structure:
|
Love
|
your enemies
|
|
do good
|
to those who hate you
|
|
bless
|
those who curse you
|
|
pray
|
for those who abuse you
|
The four imperatives on the left are
more or less synonymous with each other, as are the objects on the right.
The parallelism of Hebrews 11:1 can be
illustrated like this:
|
Now faith is
|
|
|
the
assurance of
|
things hoped for,
|
|
the
conviction of
|
things not seen.
|
These two statements affirm
essentially the same thing about the nature of faith, but they do so in
different words. What exactly do they
affirm? I think the key to grasping it lies
in understanding what is meant by “things hoped for.” And here it’s important to understand that in
the Bible hope is not a mere ungrounded wish, as in, “I hope I win the lottery,”
or “I hope my team wins the championship,” or “I hope tomorrow is a bright and
sunny day.”
In Scripture, hope is tied to a
promise of God. Put another way, it’s an
anticipation of receiving what God has promised. Whereas a mere wish is grounded in nothing but
one’s own desire, hope is grounded in the word of God.
Faith, then, is tied to the hope inspired
by the promise of God. The writer of Hebrews explains the tie this way, “Faith
is the assurance of things hoped
for.” That is, faith is a settled confidence
that God will prove true to his word and do what he has promised. This point is amplified in the second line,
that faith is “the conviction [i.e., the certainty] of things not seen.” What things?
The things hoped for through God’s promise but which have not yet been
received. “Hope that is seen is not hope,” Paul says. He means the thing hoped for from God is no
longer hoped for if it has already been received. “For who hopes for what he
sees [what he already has]?” (Rom. 8:24)
There is always a lapse of time
between promise and fulfillment. For
Abraham it was 25 years between the promise of a son and the time of Isaac’s
birth. It was four generations between
the promise of land and the time Abraham’s descendants took possession of
Canaan. The promises concerning the
coming of the Messiah were given over thousands of years before they were
fulfilled.
It is because of this lapse of time
between promise and fulfillment that the writer of Hebrews encourages us to be
“imitators of those who through faith and
patience inherit the promises” (Heb. 6:12).
Faith lays hold of the promise of God, being firmly convinced that he is
both willing and able to do what he has said.
The promises God has made to us
encompass not only spiritual things pertaining to our eternal
salvation—including some things already received (e.g., the forgiveness of sins
and the gift of the Spirit), and others yet to come (e.g., our resurrection on
the last day)—but also things that pertain to life here and now. Regardless of what God has promised, however,
the one who believes feels an assurance within himself that he will receive it;
he is convinced, even before he sees the promise fulfilled. This is why Jesus
teaches us to pray with great confidence:
“I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received
it, and it will by yours” (Mk. 11:24).
Conclusion
You will sometimes hear people say, “I
relied on my faith to get me through” or “I believe in the power of faith.” And how often do we hear the moniker, “People
of faith,” with the object and content of faith left unexpressed, as if these
were irrelevant so long as one believes…something.
Biblical faith, however,
has God as its object, his word and character as its content. Scripture
presents faith as a personal trust in the goodness, wisdom, and power of God,
who faithfully keeps his word.
[1]
There are other kinds of parallelism; for instance, antithetical (which sets forth a contrast, e.g. Ps. 1:6) and synthetic (in which the second line
builds upon the first, e.g. Ps. 103:13)
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