Trust
The verb form of "faith" really means "trust."
When we understand this, then we can consider the grammatical variant "faith of Jesus" (versus "faith in Jesus") in Romans 3:22, 25, 26; Galatians 2:16,20; 3:22; Ephesians 3:12; Philippians 3:9. We can consider that Jesus' statement on the cross "into your hands I commit my Spirit" near the time He said "why have you forsaken me?" demonstrates His trust (the "faith of Jesus") which is the kind of "faith" that "saves" us.
If you are yawning and wondering why I would care about this . . . . here are the implications of this realization:
turns kingdom reality from future to present;
turns life from religion to relationship;
turns focus from me to God;
turns issues from head to heart.
And when I try to get God to give me guidance on the "big decisions" of life, He always seems to shrug in indifference and lead me back to this.
2 Comments:
thank you for your wise and yet simple words.
See Richard Hays' The Faith of Jesus Christ. This book, a new 20 yr edition is out, is just a book form of his dissertation, but it treats the topic in a very helpful way (including discussion of the narrative structure of Gal 3) and is, in many ways, the book that launched both discussions of this issue (faith of Jesus, rather than Faith in) as well as narrative interpretation. Greg, since I know you have plenty of extra reading time now that you're in law school, I'm sure you'll be on it right away.
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