“But ye did not so learn Christ; if so be that ye heard him, and were taught in him, even as truth is in Jesus: that ye put away, as concerning your former manner of life, the old man, which waxeth corrupt after the lusts of deceit
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Well do I know it is faith that saves us—but not faith in any work of God—faith in God himself. If I did not believe God as good as the tenderest, purest, most unselfish human heart could imagine him, yea, an infinitude better, higher than we as the heavens are higher than the earth—if I did not feel every fiber of heart and brain and body safe with him because he is the Father who made me that I am—I would not be saved, for this faith is salvation; it is God and the man one. God and man together, the vital energy flowing unchecked from the creator into his creature—that is the salvation of the creature. But the poorest faith in the living God, the God revealed in Christ Jesus, if it be true, that is obedient, is the beginning of the way to know him, and to know him is eternal life. If you mean by faith anything of a different kind, that faith will not save you. Any other kind of faith will not save you. A faith, for instance, that God does not forgive me because he loves me, but because he loves Jesus Christ, cannot save me, because it is a falsehood against God: such a gospel would be the preaching of a God that was not love, therefore in whom was no salvation. Such a faith would damn, not save a man; for it would bind him to a God who was anything but perfect. Such assertions are nothing but the poor remnants of paganism, and it is only with that part of our nature not yet Christian that we are able to believe them.
Commentary
by Dale Darling
God and the man being one, is God's doing, and happens when God makes the man of I AM. I am of the I AM.
The meaningful definition of faith: faith is man's response to God's initiative: this is at the heart of everything MacDonald teaches, this is the foundation. By faith, Abel, Noah, Abraham, Moses, honored God and did His bidding in obedience, one step at a time. The Ark was not built in the moment it took Noah to say, "Yes Lord," but in the gathering of gopher wood, and in very detail that followed in the time and space Noah possessed, by faith. Abraham took one step at a time. Did he ever wonder, "What in the world am I doing out here?" It is difficult to imagine otherwise, yet he continued in obedience by faith.
The vital energy that flows unchecked from the Creator into his creature - the one we see in the mirror when we brush our teeth, if we have any - flows a moment at a time, and continues to flow as I say, "Yes Lord." Even though I have big ideas, have experienced immediate inspiration for huge projects, it is being available for the next five minutes that has put notes on staff paper to make an opera or other composition, or words on paper to make a book, one note, by faith, one word, by faith, at a time, in obedience to God initiating the inspiration.
MacDonald knew to live by faith for the next five minutes, to be faithful today, and available tomorrow. How shall we live? By faith in God, every fiber safe in Him.