1. THERE are a few words in the English language which are associated chiefly with God and the things of God. One of these words is “faith.” But unlike such words as, say, “grace” and “salvation,” “faith” has also a purely human meaning and use. And this serves to remind us that, when they entered the New Testament, all such terms were terms of common life. The early Christian writers did not use theological language. To have done so would have entirely defeated their object. They used language which became theological, Tartly because they used it, partly because it so well expressed the ideas they had to convey.
The reading of most of the Epistles in the New Testament is a difficult task for young students. The subjects with which they deal are to a great extent abstract—things of the mind. Words such as justification, grace, glory, and even faith, convey no very clear idea to a beginner. A proper name or a bit of narrative is welcomed as a relief.
This is very natural. The real value of the Epistles can only emerge when more of life has been experienced; and yet it ought to be interesting at any period of life to know what were the thoughts of such men as Peter, Paul, and John about the meaning of the facts which they spent their lives in telling to men all over their world. We shall be more apt to realize the living interest of the Epistles if we recollect that the men who wrote them were not trained from an early age to use a certain kind of language, but were for the most part making for themselves the vocabulary which they used.
The abstract words of which I spoke—grace, justification, and the rest—were not, as now, smooth stones from the brook, worn down by constant attrition, but were rather blocks freshly hewn from the quarry. By their first readers these letters were most anxiously looked for; every word was of importance; and they would determine the line of action and mould the daily life of a whole community. Moreover, on these documents, next to the reports of our Lord’s own life and teaching, the foundation of the whole enormous structure of Christian theology has been raised. They have ruled the lines along which millions of Christian lives have moved. The Gospels are the most important books in the world, and the Epistles are only less important than the Gospels. “Une esperance immense a traverse la terre.” The Epistles are among the first books written to show what effect this hope ought to have upon the lives of ordinary men and women.
A beginner may perhaps have some notion of this: but I am sure that it will be good for him to remind himself of it, and to insist upon attaching some definite meaning to the words he reads. It is not to be expected that he will get as much out of them at an early stage of his career as will come in after years; but at least, in setting out upon the study of these writings, he should start with the conviction that the writer whose work he is to read had a very clear idea of what he meant; that his words were addressed to simple people; that the meaning of them can be attained in a measure by the simple as well as by the clever of our own days; and that it is well worth attaining. [Note: M. R. James, Second Peter and Jude (Cambridge Greek Testament), p. ix.]
2. Not only has faith a human meaning and use. “Almost every forward step in the progress of life could be formulated as an act of faith—an act not warranted by knowledge—on the part of the pioneer who first made it. There was little, for example, in all that the wisest fish could know, to justify the belief that there was more scope for existence on the earth than in the water, or to show that persistent endeavours to live on land would issue in the transformation of his swim-bladder into lungs. And before a bird had cleaved the air there was surely little, in all that the most daring of saurian speculators could see or surmise concerning that untrodden element, to warrant him in risking his neck in order to satisfy his longing to soar; although, when he did try, his fore-limbs were transformed to wings at length, and his dim prevision of a bird became incarnate in himself. So put, these instances will seem largely fanciful, I am well aware—too Lamarckian even for Lamarck. Still they serve to bring out the one fact, namely, that when we regard the development of living forms as a continuous whole, we are forced to recognize, as immanent and operative throughout it, a sort of unscientific trustfulness, that from the very first seems to have been engrained in all living things. This trustfulness—might I say?—is comparable to the faith of Abraham, who, ‘when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.’ No doubt with perfect knowledge all this would be otherwise; but the point is that with limited knowledge such as ours there is always ‘room for faith,’ and always need for it: here the maxim holds, ‘Nothing venture nothing have.’ We trust and try first, not understanding till afterwards: our attitude in short is not unlike that of Anselm’s famous Credo ut intelligam.”[Note:James. Ward, The Realm of Ends, 415]
“It is in unconscious obedience to law not bound by physical dimensions that all life works. This obedience is not of understanding, but of faith. How else do the daisy’s petals close at night, or when the shadow of the rain-cloud threatens? How have the long white florets of its aureole learned their gift of service, whereby, in renouncing their privilege to carry anthers and pollen for the perfecting of their seeds, they have gained power of service to become manifest in increase of beauty? How has the daisy’s cousin, the blue cornflower, learned an even greater serviceableness and beauty in her blue outer florets? These are quite sterile, but give the conspicuous beauty to the flower, rather than the lilac-hued central florets which are creationally perfect. The large blue trumpets proclaim the inherent dignity of service; and the surrender of personal privilege to make such service possible shines forth in beauty. The pot of very precious ointment is quite ordinary property to the lilies of the field, which, especially in so far as they do not toil and spin, eclipse in beauty the laboured self-conscious art of us Solomons. They also serve who only stand and wait, and they know not how the light within shines from their blind faces. The faith of the daisy and the cornflower and the wild guelder-rose is the faith of the Woman with the precious ointment. Such faith and its beauty are alike unselfconscious; but they are the very means of surviving the disaster which comes to a morality built upon utility and commerce and prudence.
“Or how does the lark know with the first breath of spring that he need no longer fear, but may rise into the empyrean and scatter his praise over the sleepy earth? What profits it him, beyond his new understanding of the faith which kept him alive through his tragic migrations? Now he can lavish the wealth of song, now he can sacrifice his physical strength fearlessly before his Maker! For has he not found love again and the service of his mate, and the sharing with her of hope? It is all faith; and a faith that must be glorified in prodigal song, despite the cost and the disappointments of wintry spring. What is it inspires the missel-thrush, as he swings on the leafless apple-tree, thrusting his open beak into the teeth of the sleet-laden north-east wind, and carols of the coming spring with all his mirth?
‘Love again, song again, nest again, young again,’
Never a prophet so crazy
And hardly a daisy as yet, little friend,
See, there is hardly a daisy.”
3. To return to faith in human life. We use freely and constantly such expressions as faith in a principle, faith in an enterprise, faith in a remedy, faith in a person—in a teacher, perhaps, or leader, or doctor, or lawyer, or friend. With equal naturalness we use the word “faith” with reference to a guide of our bodies up a difficult mountain, or through a dangerous illness, and to a guide of our minds through their problems on the way to a satisfying answer. To the word “faith” so used one dominant notion always attaches, namely, confidence, reliance, trust.
Men could have no business dealings with one another without an element of mutual trust and confidence. Before we approach our fellow-man at all we must trust him in some measure. You believe that the man with whom you are about to open an account is, in the first place, a real man; even if you have never seen him, you believe that he exists, indeed you must believe that he exists, or you would not trouble to write to him. And, in the second place, you believe that he is, or at least may be, ready to open business relations with you; on the mere chance of this you are prepared to go to considerable trouble and expense beforehand if you thought there was no such chance, you would never dream of incurring trouble in vain. It is still more so in offering your friendship to any one. Every such relation is built on a firm, deep foundation of mutual trust and confidence.
It is the glory of friendship and of love that they make large drafts on the bank of faith, which are drawn willingly and gladly, and which are as gladly honoured and returned. We feel, indeed, that the chief benefit of human friendship is the fact that it gives faith in one another so large and perpetual an exercise. It is my joy that my friend trusts me implicitly, ventures his credit on my faithfulness, my devotion, my willingness to help him in any possible way, that I do the same by him. Nay, even more than this: we value friendship chiefly because it is so stimulative of a further faith that enriches the soul, and quickens its noblest qualities into life and vigour.
Who can fail to see the value even of natural faith if, as Professor Herzog says, “All personal relations in human life rest on faith. I can respect no one unless I believe him possessed of some excellencies of nature and character. I can love no one unless I believe him possessed of some affinity to me, naturally in the blood, or spiritually in the mind. In human life faith is the connecting link between man and man. Thereby it becomes the latent source from which all individual development springs, mental and spiritual. Man was made for faith, and it is faith that makes the man. He who has lost his power of faith, his faculty of belief, is dead. But in no respect is this more true than in man’s relation to God.” [Note: H. W. Webb-Peploe, in Church Congress Report, 1890, p. 214.]
