Faith Which Can Move Mountains
Alan Yerkey
Table of Contents
Faith Which Can Move Mountains
The prayerful desire of this paper is to hopefully help in understanding what genuine faith is as defined in God’s Word.
Genuine faith has both an active and a passive quality to it, which can be seen in the lives of those who possess it. In the active sense, it is the physical expression of the loyalty we have to a person or the fidelity to an obligation or trust and the exercise of our duty relating to it (as to a promise or trust that someone holds towards them and the fulfillment on their part in being responsible to it). In the passive aspect, it is confidence which rests with certainty in the word or assurances of another. For a believer, it is finding and having their all in Christ.
In studying the Bible, we are taught what genuine faith is in the examples given of those who committed their lives to God, trusting in His faithfulness and care toward them. It is found in those who stand in awe of Him, recognizing Him as the Creator and Sustainer of all things and the Judge of the whole universe. This is not to suggest the people involved were perfect and without any form of doubt, but that even in error or under trial, they looked to the Lord for deliverance through it all. These examples are in every book of the Bible, Old and New Testaments alike. Those declared as righteous (or that, by their “faith” something was accomplished) all have the same thing in common: believing God’s word and trusting solely on His grace towards them (Heb. 11:3-38). Simply put, faith is that which owns the Person of God as being true and faithful in His Word. I use “own,” not in any disrespect to God’s sovereignty in the idea that He would be subservient to man. It is meant as possession as their own in taking all that He has said and promised as fact, already accomplished by His word and testimony alone.
As Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Job, Moses, Rahab, David; of the prophets; as of Peter, Thomas and Paul; as for us — it is of the heart given to God in utter confidence in His faithfulness and the loving obedience to do His will (faithfully knowing that, even if we should fail from time to time, God is gracious and just, His correction true, and He is to be relied upon for all things and to set all things to the right, according to His own purpose; 2 Tim. 2:11-13). Of course, faith’s fulfillment is in the Person and work of Christ.
The Product of Faith
While some may think of Hebrews 11:1 as the definition of faith, it is actually more appropriately understood to be the product of what true faith is. The simple Scriptural definition of faith, however, is found in John 3:33: “He that hath received His testimony hath set to his seal that God is true.” It is this verse which so beautifully illustrates what is meant as possession of His word and testimony as already accomplished in the believer’s life.
What is meant by “his seal,” in context, is meant as what is known as a signet: it is the stamp of ownership impressed as a mark of the genuiness of the contents, or of the privacy of access (as to its possession), on which it appears. In this, the subject of setting “his seal” becomes of the believer taking God’s ‘stamp’ — Christ’s testimony — for a signet (stamp) of their own. It is not meant as the one believing qualifying (“making”) what’s being stated as true, but of ascribing that truth itself comes only from God, and possessing such in lieu of one’s own (in place of one’s own).
God’s Testimony
To “receive” the Son’s testimony then (aorist: to have in possession, taken hold of), is to believe on the Son by holding that all which God had foretold is fulfilled in Him (Matt. 5:17, that Christ is the embodiment and completion of God’s revealed mind). This is shown by the believer’s obedience to His Person and Authority as both Christ Savior and Lord. While this does include being obedient to His commands, it is not of the simple idea of obedience to show oneself accepted (or that they have ‘earned’ such by doing so). It is obedience produced and manifested by love in those who own that they are already accepted and complete in Him (Rom. 1:17; 3:21-26).
This is in contrast to one who refuses not simply to believe in Christ as the object of faith, but also, one who willfully and perversely rejects being subject unto Him in His Person and Authority (the refusal to submit to Him as Lord in attempted defiance of His sovereignty). The result of such is that “the wrath of God abideth on them” (John 3:36b). Someone may say they believe that Christ is God’s Son, even that He is the Messiah, but it is meaningless unless they receive Him as such and submit themselves to Him in the fullness of His Person and Authority as well (see also Matt. 7:13-27). This is the obedience and submission which only the possession of God as being true creates.
In the Old Testament, to receive God’s testimony, is the idea of those who not only “call upon” the name of Jehovah, but those “calling themselves by the name of Jehovah (Gen. 4:26; 12:8; 13:4; 21:33; and so on — though most translations may only offer the alternate rendering in its first occurrence [4:26], its compound meaning, however, flows in thought throughout the text). Abraham was an example of its meaning in practice: he believed God at His word and acted in it being an accomplished fact in his life. He was not only considered righteous because of such, but he was called “the friend of God.” ‘Friend,’ in this meaning, is taken from the Hebrew, ‘Ahab (157), meaning “of love relationship.” He was a man of Jehovah, ‘adopted’ as such by Jehovah Himself, and known by his contemporaries as belonging to Him — a follower of God.
To “Call Upon” The Lord
To continue back into the New Testament then, it is not as the seven sons of Sceva sought to do (Acts 19:13-16); it is not simply as implied in certain translations, to “call over” the name of the Lord (or even to “speak forth” His name, as some say), but it is to have the ownership of being called by His name. It is of a personal love relationship to Him. And this is true even for those wanting to argue to the simplicity of passages found throughout the New Testament: what is meant to “call upon” the name of the Lord is ownership of all Christ is, and, in turn, our being owned of Him in such a confession being true. It is not simply for one to say His name in prayer, nor of the blasphemous idea of having command over it to speak forth whatever your heart desires (as in the sons of Sceva, where no relationship existed, and they solely sought their own personal gain). A love relationship must exist in both owning Him in all that He is, and being owned of Him as His own.
The comparison in Scripture between the ‘signet’ itself and the use of it in its application, is a blessing to enjoy. Sphragis (4973), the actual stamp impressed as a mark of privacy (ownership) or genuiness (Rom. 4:11; 1 Cor. 9:2; 2 Tim. 2:19; Rev. 7:2; also consider the use in Gen. 38:6-26 [v. 18, Heb. 2368], between Judah and Tamar as a pledge that he would fulfill his debt to her. Judah had previously broken his word by not giving her to Shelah his son. By giving her his signet itself, her possession of it gives her claim to any transactions made by Judah with others if he fails to fulfill his word towards her. She could have “taken him to the cleaners”; in this she truly was more righteous than he had been); sphragizo (4972), to stamp with signet/private mark (or, in fuller meaning, a personal mark of possession) for security or preservation or authentication (John 3:33; 6:[27]-29; 2 Cor. 1:21, [22]; Eph. 1:[13],14; 4:30; Rev. 5:1; 7:3). In each of the passages given, a fuller understanding of the terms becomes apparent by the significance in their use. All this leads back to the truth behind being called by His name. This is the ‘signet’ we receive as being owned by Him, in being sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of our full Redemption (Rom. 8:14-23; Eph. 1:5-14; 4:30).
David’s Life Example
While owning God’s seal is shown quite beautifully throughout the Bible, I find it of particular comfort to myself by example of those not quite walking as they were fully meant to. It is in times when the person’s act of disobedience and sin led to the Lord’s correction of them, and they turned to Him in faith that He would pardon and forgive.
David’s life is a perfect example of this. He was chosen of God, declared a person after God’s own heart, yet had committed sin under the law truly worthy of immediate death in the acts of adultery and murder. In faith, and not just in this incidence, he turned to God for pardon and deliverance (2 Sam. 12:13; Ps. 51). This was his repeated testimony of reliance on God (2 Sam. 24:10-14, 15-25).
However much a person of the world may look to find fault in David, seeing nothing by example except his sin, those of faith hear God’s own testimony of him. God Himself declared David as righteous, a man after His own heart. It is not David’s sin for which he is remembered, but of his faith, and of whom the promised Redeemer and Christ should come (Matt. 12:18-23; 22:41-45; Acts 2:25-36).
David owned God’s testimony as true; he owned it as a fact already accomplished. For one of faith, God’s word, whether of prophecy or history, of promise or of learning, is seen in the perfect as already having been accomplished to the full. It is complete, with nothing we can add to it or take away from it: the counsel (word and decree) of the Lord stands (Ps. 33:11; Rev. 22:16-21).