Confused Faith: You place great emphasis on the new spiritual affections of people who are born again. In fact, as far as I know, he considers them essential to salvation, not peripherals. Doesn’t that make the experience of Christian security more difficult?
Christian Hedonist: Harder than what?
- Confused faith: Well.
- I always thought that faith in Jesus.
- Rather than new spiritual affections.
- Would be the way we would become Christians.
- Wouldn’t that make the warranty less difficult?.
Christian Hedonist: No, I don’t think so
Confused faith: Why not? It seems to me that treating spiritual affections as essential to being a true Christian creates instability, because these ailments have ups and downs, sometimes it seems that they do not even exist.
Christian Hedonist: That’s right. They have their ups and downs. Sometimes our gratitude to God, our pleasure to know Jesus and the intensity of our appreciation are low, but here is the problem: sometimes our faith is also weak.
Confused faith: I don’t think of faith that way, do I think it’s a constant thing, either you have it or you don’t have it.
Christian Hedonist: Well, whether you want to have it all the time or not, it’s true. True believers do not become disbelievers and become believers again. You’re not saved and you’re not saved many times. The saving faith is never definitively destroyed. . Romans 8. 30 is very clear about it, but do you think faith has no ups and downs?
Faith Confused: I’m not sure. I guess I think saving faith is something you have or don’t have, and variations like something else.
Christian Hedonist: Hmm, anything else?
Faith Confused: I guess. I don’t know. I didn’t think much about the ups and downs of faith, aren’t there different types of faith?
Hedonistic Christian: Well, there is the spiritual gift of faith mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12. 9 with the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, healing, and miracles. This kind of faith is something not all Christians have all the time. purpose and may not happen for a while.
Confused faith: That’s right. But I didn’t think about it. That’s not what I’d care if I thought of faith with ups and downs.
Christian Hedonist: That’s right. Me neither
Confused faith: I just wanted to say that I believe that the saving faith is fixed and unchanging, and then there is this other experience of faith: how to trust in specific promises. This can be the kind of faith that can be high or weak, weak, or strong.
Hedonistic Christian: I don’t think you’ll find that distinction in the New Testament: saving faith against faith that trusts in God’s promises.
Confused faith: Really? So do you think the saving faith has ups and downs, is it sometimes strong and sometimes weak?
Christian Hedonist: Yes
Confused Faith: Where would you go in the New Testament to support this?
Hedonistic Christian: In fact, my first answer is that I believe that the burden of proof lies with the one who says that believing in God’s promises and believing in Jesus for salvation are two different types of faith. be tested. I find it obvious that trusting in Jesus means trusting what He says, and if you don’t trust what He says, you don’t trust him.
Confused faith: I would always like to see that in the Bible
Christian Hedonist: That’s right. Me too. Then I would go to the texts that indicate variations in faith, and I would see what they are talking about.
Confused faith: How?
Christian Hedonist: It seems to me that the New Testament emphasizes the variability of faith in at least four ways.
Confused faith: And you say it’s about saving faith?
Hedonistic Christian: Yes, when Paul celebrates the faith of the Thessalonians by saying, “Your faith grows a lot,” does it not create a special category of faith so that there are two categories?One static and one that grows. And when Paul says that Abraham was strengthened by his faith, he goes on to say that he was “fully convinced that he was powerful in fulfilling what he had promised. “And ‘Why was he also charged with justice?(Romans 4: 21 -22). Then this justifies faith! Saving Faith And Paul suggests that he may be weaker or stronger.
Faith Confused: Okay, but would that be encouraging?
Christian Hedonist: Well, that’s what it is. We do not decide the meaning of a text considering whether it is encouraging or not; we look at what He means, and then, because we know that God is good, we try to understand how to use His word to become stronger Christians.
Confused faith: Does that include stronger certainty?
Christian Hedonist: Absolutely. Heavenly Father does not expect to keep his children unstable, wondering whether or not they are part of the family. He wants us to be safe. But on your terms, not the ones we invented.
Confused faith: So how do the ups and downs of the saving faith fit together with security?
Hedonistic Christian: The main thing to keep in mind is that our justification has no ups and downs, our union with Christ does not change at all, there is a qualitative and infinite difference between the new life in Christ and the non-life in Christ. Life. You’re no longer alive or almost dead, or you’re absolutely alive or absolutely dead. The same goes for union with Christ, justification, adoption, and perseverance. This is the point of Romans 8. 30: “And to those who predestined, he also called them; and those he called, he also justified; and those they justified. , those so glorified ?.
Confused faith: So your point is, I believe, that I am no less united with Christ, less justified and less adopted if my faith is weak and small than if my faith is strong and powerful?
Hedonistic Christian: Exactly,The same is true when I say that spiritual affections are essential marks of those who are united to Christ, justified and adopted.
Confused Faith: So, are we back where we started?
Christian Hedonist: Yes, the question we have tried to answer is whether making spiritual affections an essential aspect of salvation (not optional) destabilizes our security. His main objection, I think, was that these ailments are variable, sometimes strong and sometimes weak. Then that would bring up and down our guarantee of salvation.
Confused faith: That’s right. And I thought we could avoid this variation by saying that faith is the key to certainty, not affection, and you have shown that it does not avoid the problem, since our experience of faith is variable, as is our experience of affections.
Christian Hedonist: Yes, and one of the reasons why the variability of faith is not equal to the variation of salvation is that union with Christ, justification and adoption are not a matter of degrees: we are totally inside or totally out. The degree of true faith in Christ makes a difference, including that of a mustard seed.
Confused faith: Then you say that if the saving faith has ups and downs as spiritual affections, the battle for certainty is no more threatened by our changing affections for Jesus than by our changing faith.
Christian Hedonist: it’s true. In fact, I think it’s the same battle.
Confused faith: Really? So you think spiritual affections are essential to salvation like faith, why are saving faith and spiritual affections the same?
Christian Hedonist: No, I didn’t say it was the same, but I think spiritual affections are essential to what the saving faith is.
Faith Confused: I don’t know what you mean
Hedonistic Christian: I believe that for trust in Jesus to be an authentic trust, it must involve a spiritual affection for Jesus, for example, I believe that trust must be a confidence of gratitude, a confidence of admiration, a precious trust and a confidence of pleasure In other words, if you say that you trust in Jesus, but you do not feel him as the most desirable person , admirable, beautiful and pleasant in your life, you must ask yourself if you have a true saving faith.
Confused faith: I don’t know if I’ve heard anyone say that.
Christian Hedonist: What about Jesus? I do not believe that Jesus taught anything but justification by faith when He said, “He who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; He who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me”; (Matthew 10:37) And keep in mind that this love for Jesus that we must have is how you feel about the most precious members of your family.
Confused faith: So you say that love is part of faith?
Christian Hedonist: Be careful. I am not saying that love for people is part of faith, it is a fruit of faith. Paul says: “The purpose of this warning is the love [for the people] that comes?Faith without hypocrisy” (1 Timothy 1. 5). But yes, I say that love for Jesus is part of what faith is.
Confused faith: Does anyone else say that?
Christian Hedonist: Yes, for example, Jonathan Edwards said: “Love is the main thing to save the faith, life and power of it, for which it produces its great effects?(Written on the Trinity, grace, and faith, p. 448). ).
Faith Confused: I should have known it was Edwards
Hedonistic Christian: In fact, it is part of a glorious tradition of pastors and teachers who transmit the words of scripture to the complex reality of the human experience created by the Spirit behind them.
Confused Faith: I’m going to have to think about it more, but let me see if I can repeat what I hear, you say that certainty has ups and downs with stronger, weaker faith, as well as stronger, weaker affections. And the reason is that spiritual affections are part of what saves faith, and so when the scriptures tell us to seek full security, they call us to fight for a growing faith in God and for growing affection for God, because it is the same difficult thing.
Christian Hedonist: I’m happy
Confused faith: If I want to know more about it, do you have any suggestions?
Christian Hedonist: I would suggest delving into Edwards’ assertion that the essence of saving faith is love, and an article titled “The Dying Problem of the Guarantee of Salvation. “Maybe we can talk again.