Faith: The One Link

Faith then is the link, the one link, between the sinner and the Sin-bearer. It is not faith, as a work or exercise of our minds, which must be properly performed in order to qualify or fit us for pardon. It is not faith, as a religious duty, which must be gone through according to certain rules, in order to induce Christ to give us the benefits of his work. It is faith, simply as a receiver of the divine record concerning the Son of God. It is not faith considered as the source of holiness, as containing in itself the seed of all spiritual excellence and good works; it is faith alone, recognizing simply the completeness of the great sacrifice for sin, and the trueness of the Father’s testimony to that completeness; as Paul writes to the Thessalonians, “our testimony among you was believed.” It is not faith as a piece of money or a thing of merit; but faith taking God at his word, and giving him credit for speaking the honest truth, when he declares that “Christ died for the ungodly,” and that the life which that death contains for sinners, is to be had without money, and without price.”

God's Way of Peace, Chapter VIII Believe and Be Saved, Horatius Bonar

Photo attribution: Kristian Pikner / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)