Featured Predestinated to Faith in Christ !

About Faith !



Contrary to what false teachers , faith that has to do with Salvation Eph 2:8 is properly speaking a authoritative conscious conviction worked in by the Spirit of God, concerning Christ and Spiritual things given to us for His sake ! The greek word for faith comes from the ideal of persuading or persuasion. It is the greek word pistis which comes from the word peithō which means:


persuade

a) to persuade, i.e. to induce one by words to believe


to be persuaded, to suffer one's self to be persuaded; to be induced to believe: to have faith: in a thing

1) to believe

2) to be persuaded of a thing concerning a person

b) to listen to, obey, yield to, comply with


Remember Paul's words Rom 14:14

I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean.

2 Tim 1:12

For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.

The word persuaded here is both times in the passive voice, meaning Paul was persuaded by someone outside of himself !

Also look at Abraham Rom 4:20-21

20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;

21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.

Again, the persuasion is passive, so that means the Faith was given, it was not his own !

In 2 Cor 4:6

6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

This is persuasive Knowledge given !

Lk 1:77

To give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins,

This word knowledge means more precisely, the apprehension of Truths !

So God given Faith in Salvation is not of man, its the Spirit of God supernaturally persuading one to believe the realties of God revealed unto them !

 

Faith to believe on Christ !



2 Pet 1:1

Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:

Peter in this scripture does inform us where precious Faith comes from ! Its certainly not of ourselves Eph 2:8.

It comes in or with the Righteousness of God and Our Saviour, this Righteousness is the free gift that Christ purchased and bestows upon all for whom He died Rom 5:17

For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ)

This Righteousness as well as that referred to in 2 Pet 1:1 is the imparted Righteousness of Christ we receive at New Birth. It is through this imparted or communicated Righteousness at New Birth we receive of, that with it we are given precious Faith.

Peter goes on to say 2 Pet 1:3-4

3 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

4 Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Faith or precious Faith is of the many things Given to us by New Birth which gives us to live a life of godliness !

So 2 Pet 1:1 is but another scripture that proves biblically that Faith is the product of New Birth, partaking experimentally of the Divine Nature !

 

Always Sons or Children of God, even before Faith !



Jn 1:12,13

12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.


When a person of the Elect comes to Faith as a result of Receiving the Spirit of Adoption in Time, that experience is not what made them Sons or Children of God, but it is what made them evidentially the Children of God Gal 4:6

6 And because[since] ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.

This sending the Spirit of His Son into our heart is New Birth, its a Covenant Blessing Ezk 36:27

And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

And what it does is make known our sonship we had even before New Birth ! It makes known also that God was our Father even before sending His Spirit into our Hearts !

Now case in point, the Prodigal Son, the alienated Son was always the Fathers Son, he just became alienated Lk 15:11-13

11 And he said, A certain man had two sons:

12 And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living.

13 And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.

The journey into a far country denotes the Elects fall in Adam and becoming Alienated from the Life of God Eph 4:18

Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:

Col 1:21

And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled

Enemies in our minds by wicked works or as the prodigal 'riotous living !

However, the son was his Father's son even when he did not live like it and even as he was out in the strange country [of sin] alienated, estranged from his Father !

But, something happened, the son came to his senses Lk 15:17

17 And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!

The word came here as in came to himself is the greek word erchomai and means:

to come

a) of persons

1) to come from one place to another, and used both of persons arriving and of those returning

2) to appear, make one's appearance, come before the public

2) metaph.

a) to come into being, arise, come forth, show itself, find place or influence

b) be established, become known, to come (fall) into or unto

3) to go, to follow one

It was the time of his beginning to return, which was the effect of the blessings of the Covenant or the Work of Christ for all sons, for it causes a return 1 Pet 2:24-25

24 Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.

25 For ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.

And this is actually in the original being returned, for the word returned is the greek word Epistrepho and its an second aorist passive indicative, it means:

transitively
to turn to
to the worship of the true God
to cause to return, to bring back
to the love and obedience of God
to the love for the children
to love wisdom and righteousness

That is the coming to himself was the Father by the Work of Christ causing His Sons return to Him, it was the son being granted Repentance, it was his New Birth, it was his receiving the Spirit of Adoption into his heart and made to cry abba Father ! Lk 15:18-19

18 I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee,

19 And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.

When the Elect are out in the far country ,alienated from God, they are not worthy to be known as children of God, and the spirit convicts them of that Jn 16:8-9

But, not that he was not a son, but because of his sinfulness, he was not worthy to be recognized as a Child of God ! Also notice what the Father states Lk 15:24

24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.

The Father acknowledges that the sinful son was indeed His Son when he was dead and when he was lost !

The Sons of God are really sons when we are dead in sin Eph 2:5

5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved )

Even while we were lost Lk 19:10

10 For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.

Now we know what it was Christ came to seek and to save, that which was Lost !

That which was Lost He came to save were all the sons of God Lk 15:24

24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.

The sons of God even while being enemies Rom 5:10

10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

Even as being enemies in our minds by wicked works Col 1:21

21 And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled

God the Father still calls them Son, My Son [huios]

However, the prodigals repentance and return to the Father by receiving the Spirit of Adoption, did not make him a son, but gave him the right to be called a Son as Per Jn 1:12-13

12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

Faith in Christ makes evident that we are the Children of God Gal 3:26

26 For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.

conclusion, those who teach that the Elect are not children of God prior to their Faith in Christ, they do lie and are ignorant to the Truth of scripture !