Comments on: persevering faith

By: Jerry Bouey

Jerry Bouey — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 00:24:40 +0000

Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.

I believe that God gives every person the ability to believe (so He is the source of true faith in that sense) – but it is up to man to believe the Word of God. Responding to the Word of God is what gives us true faith (see Romans 10:17) – though of course, man can generate his own false faith based on anything other than the Word of God (or even based on a wrong or incomplete understanding of the Word of God).

By: Joshua Allen

Joshua Allen — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 09:00:51 +0000

Really good post, and something that I think about a lot. You articulated the counter arguments perfectly. True God-given faith will persevere, but it’s not up to us to judge whether perseverance happened (even the suicide could repent at the last tenth-second of life, and be saved). And belief which stubbornly perseveres is not necessarily God-given. I’m reminded of the Tibetan “saints” who traversed the mountainous paths to Lhasa entirely on their bloodies knees and endured the greatest self-torture for “faith”. If we regard such self-destruction as “faith”, Adam and Eve represent the most faithful servants of all.

By: ox

ox — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 04:29:39 +0000

In reply to Keith.

I agree with you in general. I suppose I didn’t do a good job paraphrasing! My friend used the word “only” as I recall, saying it something like this: “Only God-given faith can persevere to the end.”

However, I am not certain that someone who may verbally recant under extreme duress is absolutely without saving faith. I am glad I don’t have to decide the question and I am sure the Lord knows his own.

Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3

By: Keith

Keith — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 23:03:06 +0000

The paraphrase of your friend says nothing about true faith being the only kind of persistent belief. All it says is that true faith always perseveres. If it doesn’t persevere it wasn’t God-given.

No logic is violated in saying, “True, God-given faith always perseveres,” and also saying “Some folks may (and have) also held onto other types of beliefs or ‘faiths'”.

The fact that a belief is maintained does not prove it is true, but loss of a belief does prove that it isn’t saving faith.