What is faith?
I've been working on this definition for about six or seven years now. I'm curious what you all think. Here's a paragraph from my sermon this Sunday where I flesh that out:
What does it mean to “serve the Lord”? Serving the Lord begins first with faith in Jesus Christ. But what is faith? Faith includes two things: belief and trust. Faith must include trust because if it is only belief, then it does not lead to action. And the book of James says that faith without works is a dead faith (James 2:26). But trust must also have belief lest we put our trust in the wrong thing. Faith is both belief and trust. And faith is also belief and trust in spite of uncertainty. When we have faith our uncertainty does not necessarily go away. If we were entirely certain then we would not need faith. And because faith is in spite of uncertainty, faith is a graced belief and trust. God’s grace works in us and helps us to have faith. It is something that is both God’s work in us and our response to God. Thus, faith is a graced belief and trust in spite of uncertainty.
posted by Tom Arthur at 1:05 PM
9 Comments:
Tom, I feel like you did not get to the depth of what faith is adequately in your definition. I think you need to clarify what belief is and also acknowledge that belief is inherent in faith, since we can't trust something without possessing beliefs about it. I think you confuse this a bit with your helpful comments about "in spite of uncertainty." Very Tillichean. But I think you need to be clear that you are saying that we act upon beliefs about which we admit a degree of uncertainty. But also I think you need to capture what we mean by belief better. More on that below.
I have revised and shared my own notes on faith that I synthesized after immersion in Doug Campbell's work. It is by far my most extensive thinking about the nature of faith.
Tom: you will note at the end comments about baptism that I perceive to be quite similar to the position of J. Wesley in terms of the way faith operates in the community. What do you think?
My notes need inspection by our community. I welcome correction . {Wilson: I acknowledge in advance any blackhearted protestantism that you are able to detect in what follows.}
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As N.T. Wright and other interpreters have noted, faith is not a cause of salvation, but a marker of it. The body of Christ is identifiable by the faith they manifest. Again, salvation is not an effect of faith. Faith is not a cause or a work but a marker. That means it is not a work.
The faith of the individual is not the criterion for baptism properly, but rather is the gift that, in faith, we as a community hope and trust the Spirit will bestow or has already bestowed.
Regarding the nature of faith, I think it best to go straight to Scripture to see how Paul uses the term. The key texts seem to be Romans, Galatians, and Phillipians, with Romans 1-4 and 9-11 being our primary texts. The roughly quoted sections in what follows are from an yet unpublished manuscript of Duke’s Doug Campbell (The Deliverance of God). It’s important to note that Paul most often speaks of the faith of Christ in his discussion of salvation. Occasionally he speaks of the faith of Christians, but always that is by analogy to the faith of Christ. For example, the word pistis (Rom 9:30, 32; 10:6,8) “would have been understood by those hearing Paul’s letter to Romans performed with reference to Christ. The key qualifier is Paul’s messianic use of Habakkuk 2:4, a text Paul reads as “the righteous one through fidelity will live.” ” So the faith of Christ denotes the fidelity or faithfulness of Christ to the Father to the point of death. “Paul also uses the verb, pisteuw to refer to the faithful acts of Christians” (9:33b, 10:11, but see also 10:4, 9, 10, 14, 16, and 17). He qualifies these with allusions to Gen 15:6 and Is 28:16.
Through Paul’s allusion to Abraham and to Isaiah’s word of trust in a precious cornerstone, we discover, as noted above, that (1) faith functions as a marker of salvation. ‘It is a marker of participation in the faithful and resurrected Christ, which thereby guarantees for the Christian a future participation in the resurrection that Christ has already achieved.’ There is thus a ’symmetrical correlation between the fidelity and resurrection of Christ and those of the Christian.’ Faith is not the mere fulfillment of a condition, as though in a contract to which God responds with a promised future resurrection. Rather, (2) the faith of a Christian is participation in the Faithful One and indicates that resurrection is therefore guaranteed, not because of a contract with God, but because, when our participation in Christ’s life and death is present, so too is our participation in his resurrection. That participation in Christ’s resurrection, to be sure, is eschatological. But it is the presence of that eschatological reality here and now in the spiritual gift of hope that propels us forward, enabling us to love God and our neighbor in the present.
So what is faith? We have already seen that it denotes a participation in relation to Christ, and is not merely an intellectual acceptance of propositions about Christ. The word Paul uses denotes fidelity, trust, confession, and belief, and all of these are present in Paul’s usage. Belief, however, is participatory. ‘Believing is the process in which new beliefs characterize the Christian condition, mapping the transformation that is taking place through the action of the Holy Spirit. Christians believe that they are liberated by Christ from Sin and Death (Rom 6:7-8) and are now ruled by God. They believe they will “live in him,” and, importantly, they are characterized by those beliefs. And when they are characterized by these beliefs in their christological transformation, they participate in that process’ (Rom 12). So these beliefs “mark” authentic Christian involvement and participation in the salvation given in and through Christ.
So faith is the basic theological posture of the Christian. Notice, however, that it clearly presupposes that one must be already in receipt of the gift of that posture in order to understand it. It is inherently retrospective; we can understand that we have faith only after we have been grasped by God and given the gift of faith and look back upon our previous life and see how faith has changed us. That’s why faith is a sign, analogous to circumcision for the Hebrews, of our adoption into the Household of God. It is not a criterion or a cause of membership, but a sign of that membership.
When we baptize an infant, we express our trust, belief, and confession that the Spirit will answer our prayer that the gift of faith that is already a present reality in our community will be given that child. We confess and signify what the Spirit has already given or will give to that child.
Craig,
I agree with one of your points but not the second. I think you recommend fleshing out what "belief" means, or what is believed (I believe in God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth...). I was attempting to be brief in my definition and provide a simple summary (which I am sure is the bane of Wilson). So yes, belief in what is a good point.
But second, I'm not sure I think faith is just a marker. I didn't follow all your thoughts above, but I do want faith to be some kind of real response or real commitment (one preveinently provided). I used to say faith is a commitment in spite of uncertainty. But I think that wasn't quite right. It didn't get at God's work in faith. Thus I have added the word "graced" at the beginning to try to suggest the paradox of faith being both a gift (it is a graced) and a work (it is a real response of belief and trust freely given back to God).
Tom, I was not really thinking about sermon advice as much as commenting on the definition you give. I wish you would re-read what I wrote because i have the sense that you didn't follow it in the first reading and I think it is an important issue.
On belief: my remarks don't focus on the content of belief as much as the nature of it.
On marker: this is hugely important. To say that faith is a marker is to speak about it with reference to our understanding of salvation. It means that faith does not contribute to salvation in the sense of a causal relationship.
The following draws upon Campbell more to explain this important point:
There are many who seem uncomfortable with the unconditional nature of the good news of what God in Christ has done for humankind. Like the Teachers at Galatia, they introduce additional criteria as conditions for sharing in the blessings of eternal life in relation to God. For Paul, this is always a repudiation of God’s gift of identity in Christ.
A common example of this is to introduce “faith” as a condition that earns salvation. The logic in this false teaching is “If a human does A, then the effect caused by act A is B. If a human confesses faith, then the effect caused by faith is salvation.” But Paul is quite clear that faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit; salvation is not an effect of human faith. When we say with Paul (Rom 10:9) “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”, we are not expressing a cause and effect relationship. Rather, the grammar of conditionality expresses a correlation of the protasis with the apodosis. If A is present, then B is present also; A is the condition that, if present, results in the further correlation of B. We learn from this conditional claim that belief in and confession of Christ is correlated with salvation. If faith is present in Israel, then salvation is present also. (Note also that belief in and confession of her Lord is not something new for Israel - belief and faith in her Lord was always to be present in Israel (see Dt 30: 10-16, which Paul is echoing here). As N.T. Wright and other interpreters have noted, faith is not a cause of salvation, but a marker of it. The body of Christ is identifiable by the faith they manifest.
Also, you seemed not to notice that I gave you several ways in which faith is used by Paul: I invite your attention to this point: "The word Paul uses denotes fidelity, trust, confession, and belief, and all of these are present in Paul’s usage. Belief, however, is participatory. " To get at this rich meaning of faith, I think you need to speak of all four of these meanings, just as Paul develops them in the passages cited. All four are essential elements of faith.
A thought: perhaps your "in spite of uncertainty" comments are best discussed under the "fidelity" meaning of faith.
Dear Craig,
I have, as you suggested, gone back and slowly and carefully read your first comment. I think I followed the gist of your comments overall the first time around and understand the details of them better the second time. Though I am not sure I see any different "gist."
I want to disagree with your exegesis of Roman 10:9. I guess I am a judiazer. I want to say that faith is the participation that you speak of when you say, "the faith of a Christian is participation in the Faithful One." Now I also want to say that that participation is only made possible because of God's grace. So in one sense when one backs up far enough, it is all God's doing. But is all God's doing across the board for everyone. Everyone is given the possibility to really be able to participate or cooperate with God's grace. In this respect, everyone is able, by God's grace, to participate by responding to God's faithfulness with faith. So I think I still disagree with your "marker" idea at its origin. At the same time, I think that I agree with its results. Yes, one who is "saved" (or as I would want to say "being saved") shows faith. But they show faith because they responded with faith in the first place. Faith is the means. But faith continues to be present once the "end" has been attained (or justification has been given). Thus, I think I disagree with you when you say, "It is not a criterion or a cause of membership, but a sign of that membership." I think it is both. But both in a "graced" or "by God's grace" kind of way.
I like when you say, "The word Paul uses denotes fidelity, trust, confession, and belief, and all of these are present in Paul’s usage." I saw the word "trust" in my definition implying action. Its certainly there in the bigger paragraph. I suggest trust is important because belief without trust leads to no action and and as James tells us, faith without action (or works) is a dead faith.
I'm pulling the "in spite of uncertainty" more from something like 1 Cor 13: "We know now only in part...We see through a mirror dimly..." I'm also pulling it from my own experience. Uncertainty has never gone away for me. I am always aware that I could be wrong about everything. Yikes! But the grass isn't greener on some other side of the fence.
Tom,
I think you are in good company. Certainly John Wesley seems to agree with you and you may well be intentionally sticking with his language.
Here's is our fundamental disagreement: you are sticking with the "justification" model and I am trying to articulate the New Perspective reading of Paul on faith that I find compelling. With Hays and NT Wright (and your fellow Wheatie, TJ), I claim the notion that we are justified by our individual faith (in the sense that our faith is the "means" of our faith) follows from a misreading of Paul. I am not worthy to present my exegesis on this - what I gave was from Doug Campbell. These are irreconcilable positions.
There is a great divide in the evangelical world along this line, though the language used varies. It is hugely important in terms of ethics. Campbell's forthcoming book "The Deliverance of God" is extraordinary in blowing away the case for the justification model with mountains of exegesis (TJ worked on the book BTW). I hope you will read it and allow it to challenge you on this. For now, I commend to you a book by Roger Olson of Baylor, "Reformed and Always Reforming: The Postconservative Approach to Evangelical Theology." This is someone from a more conservative perspective making a case similar to the one I have embraced here.
Craig,
I'm only passingly familiar with Campbell's work. By the way, Hays said in my Matthew class ("on record) that he is not convinced by Campbell's argument that Paul in the first couple of chapters of Romans is stating his opponents' argument. And John Wesley might say something like, "It is new and has never been heard of under the sun." Not to mention that the Catholic church and the Lutherans now agree with one another on justification by faith (that's some pretty heavy hitting ecclesiology going against Campbell).
One of the things I see inherent in what you were presenting was opening a rather big door for universalism (or the Duke kind of universalism which copies Barth's, and Wainwright's, "Well, I'm not a universalist because then that doesn't allow for free-will and God doesn't make anyone love God who doesn't want to." Is this where Campbell is going? Is this where you're heading as well?
Thanks for your response, Tom.
I spoke to both Hays and Campbell about Hays' work. Hays emailed me a response which I posted on this blog sometime last summer. The bottom line is that he thinks Campbell has a lot of exegesis to do to convince anybody of his claims, and he is particularly concerned with exactly what you mention. But that is a reference NOT to "The Deliverance of God" but to "The Quest for Paul's Gospel." The latter is a work principally on Galatians but it briefly sketches Campbell's theory on Romans. The latter delivers mightily on the need for exegesis on Romans. I think it will be as big as Barth's commentary on Romans in terms of its effect on our community. I suggest that once you read Romans as Campbell suggests in his exegesis, you can never read it again according to the way of federal calvinists, which is the dominant form we find among conservative evangelicals (and distinct from Luther's more sophisticated reading). Again, according to Campbell, Hays had not read his exegesis of Romans as of about March this year. So we need to qualify his remarks. We can count on Hays to engage it in helpful ways. So, too, will Bishop Wright.
As for the Lutheran-Catholic statement, I compared this statement to Campbell's work this spring, while I was reading it. I did not find it exclusive or incompatible with Campbell, really, and I did not expect to. The point is not that there is no such thing as "justification" but rather that the central point of the gospel is not about the question, "How are humans justified?" The central point of the gospel is instead that God has acted towards humankind to establish the kingdom of God and all persons are invited to participate in it. The major contribution of Campbell is to show that, in Romans, Paul presents a retrospective and not a prospective soteriology. Atonement is unconditional. God is acting to reconcile creation to God and all humans are called to participate in that by participating in Christ's work.
Hays in unequivocal about this. Our theological nomenclature, inherited from Reformation battles, is problematic. It's hard to keep track of terms like justification, sanctification, and salvation in the various works of Wesley and his antecedents. But if by justification we refer to the act in which the creature is reconciled to the Creator, Hays in unequivocal in saying that was done by Christ and that we contribute nothing to it (the pistis Christou argument). He then notes that we often get lost in our efforts to talk about whatever salvation means (i.e., our faith surely has a role in our sanctification, I think).
This leads to your question about universalism. This is another term with wide meaning. I make two observations here. First, I refer you to Tillich's ontological argument, which I find compelling. If God is acting to reunite all being, then all being is being reunited by definition. This is worth reading and only a few pages. So I am logically predisposed to sympathy with Barth's doctrine of election. I don't think the question, "is everybody saved?" is the right or even a very interesting question, however. The key question is "what do we know about God's essential posture towards us?" And my answer is that, because of Christ, we know that we live with a God who has decided in advance always to be in relation to us. That is true for all humans - it is universally true. We can not on our own -recreate ourselves such that we become some kind of creature that is not in relation to God. We can not fall so low that God will choose to be no longer in relation to us. For me, that is the good news of the Gospel.
Craig,
Much of what you say is very foreign to me. I'll have to pick up Campbell's book and work my way through it.
Peace,
Tom
The book will be published next year, but I think you might snag a copy of it from the mail room at Duke or get Doug to give you the PDFs (that's how I read it). I suggest that a fruitful path would be to engage TJ in discussion on this. He's a helluva lot smarter than me and was involved in the project (he's even footnoted in it!). Also, Matt Marston would be a great dialogue partner on this.
Thanks for the discussion. I find it quite fun and stimulating.
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