Faith - lesson 6

Okay, we are in lesson six. We're talking about the essence of faith and we did a fill-in on question one. We took a look at Hebrews 12, 1 and 2 and now we're focusing on Hebrews 2 that Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of our faith. We're concentrating now on author, finisher, that kind of thing. And the other thing in Hebrews 2, or 12.2, is that verse 2 says, fixing our eyes upon Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, we discover that the word our is not there. But the word that is there is the death-net article, the, which points to a specific faith.

And so we were talking about what does the specific, when you see the word the, I used the example that I could say there's a house on South Holly Street, and it could be any of the houses, but if I said the house, I would be talking about a specific house. When you're talking about faith, we're through the class going to talk about four aspects of biblical faith, but now we're using the word the, the faith, so what are we talking about, the faith?

That's a connection we didn't make last week, I don't think. Yeah, it was kind of all-encompassing. A lot of different things. The Gospel. Think about this. If we have just spent two months on discussing the essence of faith, right? And one of the things we discovered about that is that it didn't have anything to do with you and me. It had to do with facts. the substance of things, of God's things, and the ability to see what God's things are, they're hoped for and they're not seen by the natural man. It has nothing to do with my input. The essence of faith is true whether you believe it or not, whether you even know about it or not.

Having that in place, and now the word says the faith, what do you think it's referring to? The essence of faith. The difference is this, that the faith can refer to the whole thing, all the revelation of God to us, or can refer to a specific part of it. As an example, you could say the faith when it has to do with just the gospel. the salvation message. You could refer to it as the faith.

So the essence of faith would always be the entire package that we've been discussing, all the things of God at every time? Yeah. So there has sometimes been the faith and the essence of faith are the same thing? That's exactly right. So could you say it's the Bible, the Word of God, the Bible? It is.

But I think you need to distinguish now from a dispensational standpoint, exactly what's your faith built on? Our faith today is built on the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, things that have been accomplished. Our faith isn't focused in on the Ten Commandments, or the Lord Jesus in Palestine, or any of the promises made to Abraham. Abraham is used as an example of a man who was justified by his faith.

Well, what did he believe? He believed in a person and work of Christ and death, burial and resurrection? Heck no, he didn't even know about it. But he was accounted righteous because he believed what God told him. So could I say, if I lived back then, that Abraham believed in the essence of faith? Yeah, he did. How much of the revelation of God was given by that?

So my question was, the faith, I thought, always involved Jesus Christ. The faith, in particular, just to Jesus Christ. Whereas the ethic of faith has to do with the faith of God. But it's not specifically about Jesus Christ in the essence of faith. What is it? It's mostly about Jesus Christ because he's the one that God has put forward to demonstrate and manifest his glory. We're going to talk about that today. Why does God do anything that he does? Because he wants to glorify himself, right? And through Christ we get salvation, right? And does that redound to the glory of God? Absolutely it does. Absolutely it does. And so when you understand that God does everything to glorify himself, to manifest his glory, and we'll talk about that in a minute, then it makes a lot more sense in terms of the essence of faith is what God's all about and what He's doing.

It may or may not affect me and in the essence of faith itself, in Hebrews 11.1, it has nothing to do with me or you or any human being. It has everything to do with what God is. See that?

Listen, I know how hard it is. to even think about the subject of faith without being anecdotal about it. Without making it my faith. Personal. But essence of faith is not personal. It's not. I was going to go way off again. This is how I kind of wrap my head around it though.

Because we say, oh it's all for God's glory. He does it for his own glory. It makes them seem like narcissistic, but if you change it to all about truth, right? Because God is truth and the glory is in that God is truth in everything. So it's not like bringing it to me as a person, I'm your God. It's more like this is This is everything. This is reality.

It's a step up from just being right about everything. You just hate a person who's right about everything. It's not that they're right. It's that they intimate that you're not. It's more than that. Just by the virtue of the fact that they're right and they want you to know they're right means that you ain't. And you're just not up to the task.

But you forget that the sum total of God's intrinsic attributes, His glory, the first one is love. And it's agape love. It means that it comes out of Him towards you and His creation in spite of what you are. He does His loving because of who He is. And so as we learn, we grow in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus. Originally, our carnal mind looks at the glory of God narcissistically, but then we find out, gee, this is the God of love.

Oh, He gave His Son to die. And He did do that. He died. For what? To satisfy him, but also to save me. That starts to change the reference or the apprehension of who God is. He's not narcissistic. He doesn't have to be on Facebook. he loves. And the fact that he loved each one of us individually to the point that it cost him the life of his only son should say an awful lot about who he is. And he knows who he is and he wants you to know who he is.

And that includes nothing less for us than all that. You probably couldn't stand us not having that so that his glory is the love and truth and all that. He says in Ephesians that we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, right? Any of them missing?

He says all. For what purpose? To glorify himself. Do you see that? He does that. He blesses us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies. Why? So that the whole world can see who He is. You and I wouldn't do it. Well, our view of that is from a creature looking at the creator, not the creator. That's right.

And a creature who's been infected with the sin nature. I think the other thing to put in perspective, going back to John 17, given me, I've given to them. He not only knocks you over. Yeah, I mean the glory which he is receiving, he's also given to us. Yeah. That just is a finite mind trying to understand that. Yeah.

So as far as narcissistic, he gave us, he's sharing his glory with So how narcissistic is that when he's sharing his glory with us? Do you see what an awesome job the Holy Spirit has to change our mind about some things? The fact that in the Millennial Kingdom all of us in this room will be walking around with the radiant glory of Christ coming out of us. And we're going to be really excited that it's His glory and not ours. We couldn't do that now. If I had a little bit of glory coming out of me, I'd try to take it into myself. I might even take a shower.

So, faith in Scripture can refer to the essence of faith. Here's a good way to look at it. It's the totality of God's revelation to man. It's the totality of God's revelation to man. What is he revealing? Well, we like to spend our time talking about what he's revealing rather than who he's revealing. The who is more important than the what. Think about this.

2 Corinthians 3.18 says you can behold the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ reflectively face-to-face now. That's kind of cool. That's way more than a kind of cool.

But we sort of sweep that away as though it's not really that relevant. But Mike, isn't it necessary to have head knowledge before you can have heart knowledge? Well, that's why in the diagram we're talking about the essence of things hoped for, the reality of things unseen. Yeah, you've got to know, because your faith has to have an object. And the object, what's interesting about faith is that it starts out as things, and it graduates to a love and affection with a person.

You see that? It's all part of the transformation. That's right. But you've got to have a renewed mind to apprehend the Lord Jesus. So you've got to find out some facts. So here come the facts of salvation. the gospel. Jesus died on the cross for your sins. He was buried. He was resurrected. And you think, oh, that's nice. What so what?

If you believe that, God will save you for all eternity. And so we know the facts that somebody delivered them to us, or we read them, or someone. And we exercise faith in those facts. Later on, we start this intimate fellowship with the Savior See that? The facts are about the Savior. Through the Holy Spirit. He's the only one. He does all the work. Right. Yeah, that's right.

So, a portion of the essence of faith, like the gospel that I mentioned to Donna, like for example, the gospel that Jesus died for our sins, the sins of the world, and was buried and rose again on the third day. That can be the faith, as far as you know. It also can be your personal faith. And let's talk about, just for a second without getting off on a tangent, how would you describe your personal faith?

What would it be? So you don't want us to go on a tangent, but you want to ask a huge old question like that. I'm looking for a specific answer based on what we already know about the essence of faith. Resting on those facts. There you go. That's a good way to say it. I put down that my personal faith is resting on the essence of faith. It's resting on the facts. And you have to put intimacy in there also? Because personal faith has to do with what he did apply to me. It seems like you have those facts and not be affected by them. Is it intimacy with the facts? Or intimacy with the person?

Yeah. But I think Bruce is right. Facts come first. Hopefully we'll get to Romans 10 today. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. It's also like a waiting though, too. It's kind of like, well, if I read the Bible and get the facts, then I will have it. But it's like the Holy Spirit gives you a time for different things to be revealed. Do you know what I mean? So maybe that's the rest is waiting too?

It's very interesting because there's way too many theologians in the world just like there are way too many lawyers. And theologians, seminary graduates, come out with their head full of facts. But if they bumped into Jesus Christ on the street, they wouldn't know him. But they got all these facts that may be right, may not be, because depending on the seminary you went to, would give you a slant. If you went to a Reformed covenant seminary, you'd come out thinking that the law was part of, and you know what the law does?

It keeps you from Christ. What does the law really, where does the law send you focus? Yourself. Yourself and how you're doing. That's not Christ. You're not Christ. But if you come out understanding grace, the great thing about grace is it frees you up to be interested in Christ, instead of you. You see that?

Grace... I always knew, you know, grace. Amazing grace, all this. But it wasn't until I started coming to church here, and I didn't get it right away, And then I have this CD by Charles Wendell, and he says that people, you don't get grace just like that. It's a process. And that he's never known a young person that really knew the meaning of grace. There are two great facts about grace that I think Joseph McCartney brought out.

The very first introduction that a human being has regarding grace is when they are presented with the gospel. And that's the hard part. You mean to tell me that all I have to do is believe these words and God will save me for all eternity? Yes. Faith is a non-meritorious act and here's the grace. So my first introduction to grace is salvation. Well, that's a whole new thing.

The next part that Macaulay made is that from that day forward, we never stop learning grace. We learn it every minute of every day up to the last minute because we don't have any history in grace. Until you're saved, you've never been under a grace system. Somebody was nice to you, but that's not the grace of God. where it's totally unmerited and it's totally unlimited and it's showered upon you because of what somebody else, the Lord Jesus Christ, did.

That's one of those tilting concepts where you think, how does that work? But that's what it is, so you learn it. And as you learn it, you begin to believe in the concept of a grace environment. And you slowly but surely, you know, you're like a puppy dog who's not quite sure, and you sort of, you know, doing one of these, and you do this, and you do this, and the Spirit's working on you, and pretty soon you step in under the umbrella. And once you're there, you don't want to ever leave. That's the work of the Spirit to make what your position already is, part of your condition. Okay?

But isn't it true that while you're drawing for your last breath, The moment that you have believed that Jesus died and was buried and resurrected, you believe in that. You're saved and you've got all you need as far as salvation goes at that point. You grow understanding more over time. Well, yeah, you get down the road with the Lord under grace and when the Lord took Hal Molloy home, he really couldn't wait to get there.

Why? Because he already knew the Lord Jesus as his life. He knew that once he left this place, that all the impediments to a full-on face-to-face intimacy would be out of the way. That's why you run like your dad, the same way. Men and women that get close to going home, it is a home going, and they know it is. That's why there isn't fear. They want to go home. You find believers who get up every morning and say, Lord, do I have to spend one more day here? I don't want out of here.

So, finisher or perfecter of the essence of faith and personal faith, is Jesus the author? and finisher or perfecter of the essence of faith and personal faith? What do you think? Is he the author and finisher of both of those things? Understand the question?

I had a hard time with that one. Probably because the question wasn't asked right. I'll read it. Maybe it's clearer that way. Is Jesus the author and finisher or perfecter of the essence of faith? and personal faith? I think if you put the Trinity together, depending on if you separated out God the Father or Jesus Christ, you'd say yes because Jesus is God. Okay. I probably should have asked question five before I asked question four. The one thing I wrote down on mine was that on the cross Jesus said it is finished. And would that be considered the perfection? I mean, it's done? It's finished? It's the perfection of His act towards us? Yeah. Let's do this, let's look at question 5 and then we'll come back to 4 and I think it will hopefully be better.

Acts 3.15 Peter is telling those Jews on Pentecost, but put to death the prince of life, the one whom God raised from the dead, a fact of which we are witnesses.

So this word prince here can mean originator, it can mean founder, it can mean prince or leader or captain. So when you say you killed the prince of life, what are you saying? Originator probably. Originator or the author of life. Which is God the Father, right? Well, yeah. No, it's the Lord Jesus Christ. I guess my notes say the originator or leader of life.

So you killed the author of life whom God raised from the dead of which we are witnesses. They're telling the Jews that what they did is they murdered the author of life. That's what he's saying to them. That's quite an indictment. So would you say that The word author can mean originator, founder, captain, leader, all these translations for this word. So Jesus is the originator of physical life. You agree with that? Sure he is. So you could say he's the prince or the author of life because he is the beginning or the originator of God's creation. There is no life without God. Do you see that? There is no existence without him. And then also there is the new creation. Let's look at question 6 for a minute.

Acts 5.31 says, The author means Prince, explain. He is the one whom God exalted at his right hand as a Prince and a Savior to grant repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sin. I think you could put the word leader in there, that he's the leader of God's salvation.

Isn't that right? Isn't that who he is? So let's go back to question four. Is Jesus the author and finisher, perfecter of the essence of faith? Answer yes. Why? Because all of those things we had up there are what? They're Him. You see that? The essence of things hoped for, I was talking to Brian, we had a neat conversation about this.

I said, you know, there is in Colossians 3.1, it says, since you have been risen with Christ, seek those things which are above. I said, what are those things?

And I said in here in Hebrews 11.1 it says that faith is the substance of things hoped for.

So we looked it up and in the Greek in Colossians 3.1 the word things isn't there. Since you be risen with Christ, seek Christ. That's what it says. Seek Him above.

So if Hebrews 11.1 says that the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, what are we talking about? We're talking about the Lord Jesus Christ. You see that? Yeah. You better be. The essence of faith is the totality of God's revelation to man.

Did Abraham know about Christ? Yeah, I think he did. Although in Genesis it doesn't talk about it, but from Adam on there was a promise of a Savior. I don't know if Abraham... No, he probably didn't know. You didn't have to know. That's where I'm just getting hung up a little bit. Well, let's look at it this way.

How did Rahab, my favorite woman in the Bible, get saved? How did she get saved? By faith, right? What did she believe? What did she believe? God. No, think about it. What specifically did she believe? She believed that these Jews who wanted to use her house as a spy place, that their God was probably the real God. And so she said, okay, you can use my house to spy on my country. And it says that she was accounted righteous. What did she believe?

Not much. Not much. She didn't have much information. And then they saved her family. That's right. So how does that connect with, like, Jesus? Because you know how it connects? She was in the line. I know she was. Yeah. Yeah, which is wonderful. Oh, yeah. So what Abraham and Old Testament saints knew and believed was less information than we have now, because Christ hadn't come yet.

But now we have a couple of things. We have the entire message of the Lord Jesus Christ, and we've got this thing called the Bible. If we go back to the definition of the essence of faith, it's the totality of God's revelation to man. Is there anything else that's going to be added to that Bible? No, it's all there. All of it's there.

Now just because you don't know it all doesn't mean God is lacking or he's fooling with us. No. But yet there's still a lot that we don't know about God that will be revealed through eternity, right? That's right. I mean, God is so inexhaustible, you know, that the minute that you leave the planet and behold him face to face, that's the least amount the least capacity you're going to have for knowing Christ, then you're never going to exhaust him in all eternity, ever. That's when Courtney talks about getting your mind around something, try getting it around that concept. You know, I know you and I've probably known you long enough.

But imagine the Lord Jesus Christ of a thousand years. You know, imagine a million years from now if there's no time, but that I'm just beginning. That amazing grace tune is so good that way. When we've been there a thousand years, bright shining as the sun, there'll be no less days to sing God's praise than when you first began.

Wow! That's what it is. When does that start, by the way? It started the day you were saved. And so to grow in the knowledge and the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ is an ongoing functioning growth for a believer every single day. Based on information? Absolutely.

I was thinking the first Corinthians 2, 12 and 13, now we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. It's the Spirit teaching us those things, and the things are Christ's, everything about Christ. But it's the Holy Spirit teaching us those things, which is Christ. And in John 15, that's what he told us. He said, I'm going to send a comforter. What's he going to do? What's a comforter going to do? He's going to tell you everything. He's going to reveal me to you.

Oh, okay. That's fine with me. I'm ready for that. That's his job. And it seems like the Godhead is pretty faithful to each other. So I think he's doing his job. And that's grace. Doesn't it say too, the work of God is to see that we believe in his son, and then the work of the Holy Spirit is to let us know his son. It's just like, all we get to do is take it in. Yeah, and he's constantly working. And that's another aspect of grace that has to be learned. Especially when we think, well I can speed it up or slow it down with my enthusiasm or my devotion.

What comes first? Devotion or worship? Or grace? Grace. Grace is always first. Devotion follows. Now let me run through these things. Personal faith is resting in the essence of faith. We talked about that. The essence of faith is the things of God. In the case of an unbeliever, there are specific things that the Holy Spirit reveals to the unbeliever. To a believer, the Holy Spirit's job description is to reveal all of the things of God to us. All of them, not just some of them.

So, you could say that personal faith is one just resting in the facts or the truth or the reality of what God has said. Personal faith is where you take ownership of what God has revealed in terms of the essence of faith. You rest in it. It becomes yours. You're the owner of it. You believe it and it's yours.

Okay, now let's expand on that a little bit. It's more than just learning the facts and say, okay, I believe and I'm moving on to the next one. There's a thing about personal faith that challenges every one of us. And the challenge is, is that God said A, B, and C, and I believe them. But over here I have X, Y, and Z circumstance in my life.

And this seems real. This doesn't. Do you see that? I have a terrible situation here where, pick on Israel, let's say Israel gets attacked from all their neighbors and they're thinking, oh my lord, what is going to happen here? The whole country is going to go in a dump.

But over here is the word of God that says, no, that's not going to happen. So what do you do? That's why you have a will. You're the one that decides what you're going to believe. Do I believe the circumstances and the noise and the bombs and all of these bad looking dudes are trying to kill me? Or do I believe what God has said? On a personal level, do I believe this garbage that goes through my mind? Or do I believe what God says about who I am?

Now, you may learn something new about who you are and your position in Christ, and you may exercise faith in it, that's the beginning. Because then the Spirit goes to work and what does he do? He makes it real, as an example. If you came to Christ, something other than in the kindergarten, there was the initial exercise of your faith in the person and work of Christ. Probably a lot of enthusiasm went along with that. But then in time, probably about two years, good old flesh is back.

And you're thinking, my goodness, I'm still doing the same old garbage I was doing before. And why can't I just get free from all of that? And oh, maybe I'm not really saved. Because if I was really saved, I wouldn't be doing all this bad stuff. So the Spirit of God works, works, works, and pretty soon, He persuades you that in spite of what's going on in your life, salvation was God's business. He saved you. You didn't save yourself. And you can trust Him, no matter what's going on. So you become totally persuaded that you're saved. Like, I'm totally persuaded I'm saved.

I don't know about you. He didn't persuade me about you, or you, or you, or you. But I'm sure about me. See? And that's what he'll do. He'll persuade you about you and your intimacy with Christ, but maybe not about me. Oh, for sure not about me. See, it's personal between you and the Lord Jesus.

So then you come along as a believer and you run into this thing called identification and it says, that my old man was crucified and I was buried and resurrected and I think, huh? It's 2015, what am I doing here? I wasn't back there. Yeah, I was. So what is it? What I think is happening today or what God says is so? Okay, I buy it. I believe you. And then what happens? The spirit of God begins to settle you in.

And over time, you get to Galatians 2.20, I have been crucified with Christ. There's no question in your mind. You were.

Mike, couldn't it be said that we actually have two advocates? One is Christ who sits at the right hand of the Father, advocating on our behalf to Him. And the other is actually the Holy Spirit who persuades us of what we're seeing in His Word. Yeah, I would say that the Lord Jesus is our advocate before the throne of God, the great throne of grace regarding our sins. But the spirit is not an advocate.

He's an advocate to us, isn't he? Convincing us of what he says is true? Yeah. Is advocate the right word? Yeah, it's okay. Yeah, I think so. He's a persuader. You know, he's Guido from Mob. He shows up one day and says... Sometimes we get hit upside the head. Like that's the first time I've ever heard the Holy Spirit referred to. I'm not going to get in trouble. We're going to get emails this week. We may have to edit something. Let's do Hebrews 7.

Hebrews 2.10. The author here means Captain Explained.

Hebrews 2.9 and 10.

But we do see him who was made a little lower than the angels, namely Jesus, because of the suffering of death. crowned with glory and honor, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through suffering." He is not only the author and originator of all physical life and the author of spiritual life look at verse 9 it says that he should taste death you see Jesus was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man the message there if you're a Jew now in the book of Hebrews was written to Jewish believers The message is that Jesus came into the world to die for the sins of the world.

That's the message. Right there. For everyone's sins. Right? Yes, He did. For every single person. Yes, He did. It's an inclusive term here in verse 9. It means that every single person He died for. Every single one. Not a group. One. Every single one. Which includes everybody. So he has died and he has paid the penalty for every man's sin.

And then in verse 10 it says, for it became, or it was fitting for him, because of what he's done, it fits, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect, or to make, or to be the captain or author of our salvation through suffering. So, really cool point here. If the Lord Jesus had not done what he did, he wouldn't be the leader or the captain of salvation. You get that? In other words, he's got to go through all of this in order to be the leader. He knows what it's like.

I remember when the Lord took my brother home. I was a little mad at God because I like my brother. Not only that, I've been a believer longer. I couldn't figure out why he'd go before me. I just lost my train of thought. Obviously the Lord didn't want you to know what that thought was.

The author and the captain of our salvation through suffering. So he's the originator of salvation just like he's the originator of life. Without him there is no salvation. And he had to go through the process. So you can say that salvation originates with the Lord Jesus Christ. It seems like he's making the point that Jesus just isn't some guy, he's God.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's very interesting the focus and the, what's another word I can use, how the word of God really does narrow down onto the person of Christ, who he is and what he's done. and what he's done and ramifications it has in terms of who he is when it comes to this issue of salvation and it comes to the issue of the object of your faith. It can't be anybody other than him. The essence of things, the reality of things, who are the things?

It's the Lord Jesus Christ. The security in your mind of your salvation is based on what he did. He's the author of it. He's the progenitor of it. He did it. So who do you trust? Him? Or you trust the Father's testimony about him? How did you unravel those feelings about your brother passing?

Oh, that brought the thought back. The thought was this, that God has specific things for me and him to do on the earth. And that the Lord Jesus loved him just like he loves me. And he was done. He'd done everything that the Lord had sent him to do. So it was time for him to go home. And so he went. And he didn't dilly-dally. He was 42 and boom, he had a brain aneurysm, he's out of here. So I thought, well that's kind of cool.

I guess I've got more to do. And everybody in this room, when the four ordained works that God has called you to do, when you do the last one, you don't even have to pack your bags, you're gone. You are gone. Now you may take some time to die, but you're still going through all things that God has got you to do, got you here to do in terms of influencing other people or whatever it is, but the minute the last one's done, you're gone. And the greatest day of your existence is the day you get to go home.

Is that one or two? Two. We'll do 9 and 10 and then we'll start in on 7. And 7 is when we'll get to start talking about the glory of God. Father, how we thank you for your grace. We thank you that you are actively involved in causing us all to enter into the fullness of the object of our faith, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray in his precious name. Amen.