Live By Faith

Issues – December 2023 – Grace & Truth Magazine

Live By Faith

Christ The Focus
Every generation of Christians must ensure that it remains faithful to the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to have a living hold on the revelation which God has given us in His holy Word concerning His Son. This grasp must be dynamic, affecting our lives; it must also be precious to us. Indeed, the preciousness is such that, by His grace, nothing should be able to separate us from it. That was a primary reason for writing The Epistle To The Hebrews. They were urged both to understand better in whom they had believed, and to focus sharply on Christ’s surpassing excellence. These factors stand in opposition to every temptation to deny Him. “Lord, help us to see afresh, with new invigorating power, that You are the altogether lovely One” (consider Song 5:16).

Saving faith is in the Lord Jesus Christ, and in Him alone. It is in no other; for God has not introduced anyone else to the world with these words: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him” (Mt. 17:5 KJV). Nothing and nobody else avails before the Holy God with whom we have to do. He either delivers the sinner, or the sinner is doomed.

Growing Faith
For those who have been saved through faith, growth in the new relationship with God, brought about by Christ’s death, should lead us to an increasingly closer walk with Him. In other words, saving faith should result in, for example, keeping faith, victorious faith, faith regarding prayer, and faith to receive divine blessings. These are precisely the kinds of evidence we meet in the men and women who appear in the glorious portrait gallery of faith of Hebrews 11.

Faith Fears God
Faith and grace are, of course, inseparable. Those who have believed to the saving of the soul need constantly to ask for the grace “whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear” (Heb. 12:28). We note that perhaps the foremost indication of the fraud in much of today’s so-called faith is its irreverence and utter boldness with God, based not on Christ but on self. We must each ask ourselves whether, indeed, we think we ought to show that we fear God. It is good to fear Him if we mean to serve Him acceptably. The individuals listed in Hebrews 11 feared God; the testimony the apostles left us shows that they too feared God; and our Lord Himself feared God, His fear and obedience being one (5:7-9).

Having believed, we are to bear a worthy testimony in faith. We need to grow in faith; and our faith is to be seen in active obedience to God.

Justified By Faith
It is through Christ that we are justified by faith (see Rom. 1:16-17; Gal. 3:11). Justification is because of Him, but we receive it by faith – not by good works or the deeds of the law. Christians are reminded that it is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ that made the vital difference in their lives (Heb. 10:38). It has made a difference of eternal consequence: therefore don’t look back. In being declared just through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall live. “We are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul” (v.39). Once again, the foundation to the instruction to live by faith is Christ – live by faith in Him and for Him.

An Essential Proof
Living by faith in Christ is an essential proof that we have been saved through faith in Him. Unworthy as we are, we have been counted and sealed among those who are being preserved until the day that the fullness of redemption will be revealed (Eph. 4:30). In this body, in this world that is so contrary to God and faith, in this fading sphere where the Devil roams free for now – we may have cause to ache and groan (Rom. 8:22). Yet it remains true: the just shall live by faith. There is no other solution. But thank God, in the testimony of Hebrews 11 we discover that in times past it was a sufficient solution. This abiding sufficiency is for us too.

Doesn’t our Master who is now in heaven keep reminding us by His Spirit of what He had said before? “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (Jn. 16:33). Only living by faith can lead us to experience the victory offered us here!

By David Omojola (adapted from “Living By Faith”)