III. WHAT FAITH IS Faith is that work of God in man by which and out of which one is brought to trust in God through Jesus Christ the Lord and Saviour. It is the necessary consequence of regeneration. Regeneration creates in man that life which must look believingly to Jesus Christ from whom shines the radiance of the glory of God. Truly, the life is the light of men. Such a quickening work raises from interior death, and liberates from the bondage of unbelief, bringing the issues of new and everlasting life to saving faith. FAITH IS THE FIRSTFRUITS OF REGENERATION. IT IS NOT CAUSATIVE, BUT IT IS THE EFFECT, THE CONSEQUENCE OF REGENERATION. The quickening of regeneration issues in a life that necessarily believes. Given regeneration, the soul lives, and lives by faith. Faith is the effect of quickening, the reflex of regeneration. THE REGENERATE CANNOT BUT BELIEVE. The quickened have faith of necessity, BECAUSE THE FATHER REVEALS THE SON, AND THE SPIRIT OPENS THE EYES OF THE BLIND. This interior revelation results in the regenerate believing and EMBRACING CHRIST AND CHRIST ALONE FOR TIME AND ETERNITY, life and death, justification and sanctification, remission and salvation, for adoption and redemption, for church and worship. IN SUCH A LIGHT, CHRIST IS ALL AND IN ALL. And, in response, CHRIST WHISPERS WITHIN, Blessed art thou, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. CHRIST IMMEDIATELY ravishes the soul, he is the first and the last, the beginning and the ending, the Alpha and the Omega, the one in whom a helpless, childlike, yielding trust is reposed world without end. Faith perceives the love that God hath for us, not only in putting our debts to the charge of the Surety, and the full discharge by the Surety of all that was reckoned against us, but also, beholding the face of Jesus Christ, faith sees mirrored all the love of the Father from endless ages of eternity. FAITH beholds what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, seeing that we have been given a standing in Christ, that we are identified with the Son, accepted in the beloved, and are of that body, which is the fulness of him that filleth all in all. Identified with Christ! So that what he is, raised from the dead, having borne away our sins, having met Gods righteous judgment in death, now ascended and seated upon the throne in the glory of the Father, I say, what he is, THE ELECT ARE RECKONED TO BE IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD. What Christ is in glory, in the estimation of the righteousness of God, faith reckons to be accounted to all that believe. This is called, faith being counted for righteousness. FAITH believes, FAITH knows, FAITH perceives that the saints are accounted the righteousness of God in Christ. That where he is in righteousness, in light unapproachable, at the right hand of the Majesty on high, THERE IS SEEN THE BELIEVING PEOPLE.The measure of the victory and of the triumph of that death which he died as the Substitute of his own, APPEARS in the place where he now SITS IN THE HEAVENLY GLORY ON THEIR BEHALF. THE SONS PLACE IS THE SAINTS PLACE. This, they openly confess by faith on earth. With the mouth confession is made unto salvation. This is not hidden but clearly set forth, so that THE HEAVENLINESS AND REST OF THIS PLACE BECOMES THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF THE LIFE OF FAITH.The heart of his own embraces this completely, and, embracing it, enters into the rest that remains for the people of God. HERE IS THE TRUE SABBATH DAY. It is the Lords day, and the saints language is We will rejoice and be glad in it. The sabbath of rest, this day when the Son is high in the heavens, is one of light streaming from above, of heavenly love forming the most intimate of all unions, that of the Father and the Son, in the interior of the people of God. This inward unity stands in light, life and love from the Father and the Son, issuing in the witness of faith that, `Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Hence faith is seen to be the answer of the quickened heart to Gods interior revelation of the Son. NOT the exterior revelation of written scripture, which, albeit revealed and inspired, is of itself the dead letter. But the revelation, immediate and inward, of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of the Father, illuminating the Son. When it pleased God ... to reveal his Son in me. This response of the quickened heart, to that revelation by the Holy Ghost, is called, The faith of Gods elect. This is not without the word, God forbid. It is by the word of the truth of the gospel, that such a revelation comes with power. But it is not in word only, it is in power also. It is a revelation on the things described in that word, wrought by God, the living God, directly upon the soul. The things described to the blind and dead from the revealed scriptures are black and lifeless, and must be, so long as men remain without revelation and quickening. The scripture, the gospel itself, may INFORM THE JUDGMENT, BUT IT CANNOT GIVE LIGHT TO THE HEART... TO BE CONTINUED.... By John Metcalfe.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Aug 2014 23:28:01 +0000
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