Faith in God's Word
“And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.”
Faith is the foundation upon which our salvation is built. According to Hebrews 11, one cannot please God if he does not have faith: “And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him” (11:6). Why is it impossible to please God without faith?
One of God’s characteristics is that He is truth. More than simply saying things that are true, God’s Word is Truth itself. We see this illustrated in Moses’ account of creation as it was revealed to him by Jehovah: “And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light” (Genesis 1:3). God spoke, and the things that He spoke of came into existence. In Romans 4, when writing of Abraham’s great faith, Paul seems to have Genesis 1 in mind when he writes that God “calls into existence the things that do not exist” (4:17).
John opens his gospel with a direct reference to the Genesis creation account, revealing Jesus as the Word of God and the agent of creation: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made” (John 1:1-3).
Later in John, the Word of God explicitly states that He is the truth: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). In John’s gospel, both he and the Lord make the profound claim that Jesus is both the Word of God and Truth.
When we consider truth as a foundational characteristic of God, it helps us understand why it is impossible to please Him without faith. As humans, we live in the physical world and we are tempted to believe that the things that we see or touch define reality. However, God tells us that the things that actually define reality are spiritual in nature. And if spiritual, then the things that are real are things that cannot be seen: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).
God is looking for people who believe what He says, even if it is at odds with what they perceive. This is exactly the situation recorded in Genesis 3. Whether God had directly communicated to Eve the command to abstain from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, or Adam had told her, we know that she was aware of the prohibition because she repeated (with an addition) God’s command when the serpent tempted her. Eve had to choose whether to believe what God had said—eating the fruit would have consequences—or to trust what she could see with her eyes: “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate” (3:6). Rather than believing the word of God, she believed the word of the serpent.
Faith in God and His word is the key to overcoming temptation and sin. If Eve had had a stronger faith in God, she would have believed Him and rejected the words of the serpent. If she had believed God, she would have overcome the desires that the fruit created in her and taken fruit from a different tree. We can say that with confidence because John tells us that faith is the key to overcoming sin.
“Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” (1 John 5:1-5)
The way to salvation is a deep, life changing belief that Jesus is the King. If we believe that, then we believe that He is reigning at God’s right hand and that He is going to return. With that return in mind, Peter asks, “what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God” (2 Peter 3:11-12)? If we have faith that He is returning, then we will live a faithful life.
Some day, our faith is going to become sight. All will see and acknowledge the truth of God’s word, and sadly, most will regret their unbelief while they had the chance to restore their relationship with Him. If Eve, before eating the forbidden fruit, could have foreseen the consequences of her unbelief—shame, sorrow, regret, loss—she surely would have made a different choice. God warned her, but she didn’t listen.
Are you listening to God through His word? Or are you struggling with temptations that too often give birth to sin? A deeper belief that Jesus is the Son of God will help you to be more faithful. A stronger faith in God’s Word will help you overcome the world. Focusing on what will endure will help you look past that which will not.
“So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:16-18).
