CHAPTER XIII.

FAITH TOWARD THE LORD JESUS CHRIST.

I. 1. Third Step in the Subjective Disclosure of Salvation: The two great Offices of Christianity.-2. The Act of the Soul which we call Faith, and the State of the soul exercising it, peculiar to the New Creature.-3. The Work of Divine Grace in Man: neither properly Miraculous, nor properly Natural-but Supernatural.4. Every Exercise of Faith an Act and Manifestation of the New Life in Man. II. 1. Divine Definition and Illustration of Faith.-2. Faith is the Substance of Things hoped for.-3. Faith is the Evidence of Things not seen.-4. Faith is a Grace of the Spirit: With the Heart Man believeth unto Righteousness.-5. To be Effectual, Faith must be what the Scriptures make it out.-III. 1. The threefold Aspect of Saving Faith-as a Condition of the Covenant of Redemption—as a special Grace of the Spirit-as a peculiar Habit of the Renewed Soul.-2. Nature, Use, and Effect of Faith.-3. The Divine Saviour and the Revelation of him, the exclusive Objects of Faith.-4. Faith is neither an Efficient, nor a Meritorious Cause.—IV. 1. Relation of Faith to the Word of God, and to the Means of Grace: Results thereof.-2. Assurance of Faith real: but not of the Essence of Faith.—3. The Spiritual Helplessness of the Natural Man.-4. The Moral Bondage of the Natural Man.-5. Boundless Compass of Faith.

1.—1. THE great thought of God which I have traced through two stages of its manifestation in the two preceding Books, now requires us to advance another step in our attempt to follow the Way of Life. In the First Book of this Treatise I have endeavoured to determine the exact circumstances and manner in which the knowledge of God is subjectively applied to the salvation of men that knowledge of God to the demonstration of which as mere knowledge, the First Part of Theology was devoted. The Second Book of this Treatise I have devoted to the actual application of that knowledge of God, practically and personally to man in his salvation; and in its successive chapters I have traced and laid open the work of God toward man, and the progress of man under that divine working, from the moment of our first awakening, to the completion of grace and the commencement of glory in this life. In both the preceding Books, following the method of the inspired writers, I have kept strictly

to the pursuit of the main subject, as from point to point it opened itself alike to human thought and in human experience, under the method disclosed by God. One necessary effect of this simple and strict way of treatment, was the exclusion of whatever was not directly involved in the divine conception I was striving to trace; and even the exclusion of whatever was incidentally involved in it, from any further treatment than was demanded by the great and immediate enquiry. In salvation every thing depends on our union with Christ. Out of that springs our communion with him both in grace and in glory. Out of that also springs our communion with each other in Love. And so all social as well as individual idea of God's saving work amongst men-every conception of the individual Christianevery conception of the Church of God-is grounded there. This communion with each other resulting from our mutual union with Christ, we are not yet prepared to discuss: for as yet the individual aspect of the matter is not complete, till we shall have disclosed the individual working of this new life wrought in man, under the power of this subjective knowledge of God unto salvation. It has been carefully shown how this new life is begotten, sustained, and advanced; and how it will finally result. We must now observe more particularly how it acts, how it manifests itself, what are its duties, its endeavours, its offices, its fruits, its trials, and its triumphs. This is that third step which I have just said we must now take, in disclosing our salvation considered as strictly practical and individual: disclosing it in the personal offices more immediately relevant to God, which are inseparable from the existence of that new life which all who are united to Christ share with him. This is the subject-matter of this Third Book. And I commence it with a more complete development than it has yet been proper to attempt, of the two great offices of Christianity-the two fundamental, characteristic, and universal graces, duties, and manifestations of the New Creature. Saving Faith will be discussed in this Chapter, Repentance unto Life in the next.

2. Faith is frequently spoken of as mere belief on testimony. An act of the mind not different, in itself, when applied to spiritual and divine things, from similar acts of the mind when applied to other things: the difference being exclusively in the nature of the things believed, and in the nature of the testimony

on which they are believed. The term saving added to Faith is, according to this mode of viewing the subject, merely intended to signify that the particular Faith thus designated, has the word of God for the testimony on which it rests, and those things which immediately concern salvation as its object. If this is the whole account of the matter, it is not easy to see how Faith can be truly called a grace of the Spirit: nor how the state of mind out of which it proceeds, is in the least degree different from its natural and ordinary state: nor how any quality or condition of the soul beyond such as all men naturally possess, can be necessary in order to the exercise of Saving Faith. If, on the other hand, this account of Faith is intended to apply, exclusively, to acts of the renewed mind, and to belief of the testimony of God concerning spiritual things: then, in the first place, the whole object of this method of explaining the matter is defeated, as soon as any one demands an explanation of that supernatural renewal of the mind, which enabled it to believe thus: and, in the second place, even on the supposition of the renewal of the mind, the explanation is neither true nor sufficient since the gracious acts of Faith of the renewed mind are essentially different from its natural acts of belief. The gracious act of Saving Faith by which the New Creature rests on the divine Redeemer crucified for him, and whereby he receives peace and grows in holiness; is not identical with, nor even similar to, the natural act of belief by which the same person in his unrenewed state, gave credit to the story of Christ, on the divine testimony of its truth, and thereby merely increased in knowledge. And all glosses which tend to show that such acts of the renewed and the unrenewed mind, result either from the same state or the same exercise of that mind, are founded in a denial of the regeneration of man.

3. It is as idle as it is irreverent in us to handle the mystery of God's grace deceitfully, in the vain expectation of reconciling the Spirit and the flesh, and satisfying cavils whose foundation lies in that very pollution which that grace proposes to cleanse. The Scriptures teach us in the plainest manner, the ruin of man and the absolute necessity of his new creation. They do not permit us to doubt that the means provided in the plan of salvation, are precisely adapted to the work of our complete restoration to God. That work in us is not properly miraculous;

because it proceeds continually by the intervention between God and the result, of means which are appropriate to that result. Neither is the work properly natural; because the means used are not, of themselves, efficacious in the production of the result, after the manner in which means are naturally efficacious-but are made efficacious only in a supernatural manner. The whole work of God's grace in man has a distinct character of its own, neither properly miraculous nor properly natural; but combining elements, some of which are divine and some of which are human -the work itself is properly supernatural, and the effects are supernatural. When this work is finally complete in us, though our nature, and our self-conscious, identical existence have been preserved throughout; we are as utterly changed from what we were in our natural estate, as we were different in that estate from the perfect condition of our original creation. That man could fall by natural means, and yet cannot recover himself by natural means, is an ultimate necessity of dependent existence itself: because in one case, infallible dependent existence is impossible-being self-contradictious: and because in the other, spontaneous good out of evil, or truth out of falsehood, is impossible, being self-contradictious. Now at every stage of the progress of this wonderful transformation of man, from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God; means exist of ascertaining the reality of the progress, and of distinguishing the stage reached. Vital manifestations continually occur: evidence of the existence and growth of the new life, perpetually disclose themselves. The earliest, the most constant, and the most decisive of them all, is Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ.1

4. Every act of Faith by us, is an act of the New Creature. Let the act be performed as it may, if it be gracious it is an act of the New Creature. All these acts are, no doubt, our acts; as much as any other acts we perform. But if that expressed the whole, or even the chief part of the matter, these acts of Faith could have no more effect upon our spiritual condition, and could afford no more evidence of our spiritual state, than any other mental act of ours. Indeed, less, by far, than most others; since what a man will do or forbear to do, depends directly on his will-while what he will believe or disbelieve, what he will love or hate, depends upon his will only very indirectly. To sce 1 Heb., xi. passim.