About Jesus - Steve (Stephen) Sweetman

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I'm A Man Of Faith 

Some people call me "a man of faith", but do they know what they are talking about?  They say that "my faith is central to my life", but how do they define faith?  In our non-Christian, Biblically illiterate western world, that includes our Christian world, there is much talk about religious faith these days, but is all this faith talk Biblical?  Might it even be hypocritical?   

Much of our culture defines faith to be a belief system, a world view, a set of religious values to which one chooses to adhere.  Is this how you as a Christian define your faith?  Is your Christian faith a mere collection of values, a chosen Biblical ideology? 

To be Biblically precise, which we should be but most aren't, we must define words as the Bible defines them, not as our twenty-first century western world defines them.  So, our English word "faith" that is translated from the first-century Greek word "pistis" in the New Testament simply means "trust".  Pistis or faith is a confident trust one has in something or someone. 

When you sit on your couch and watch TV, you trust something.  You trust your couch that it won't collapse to the floor.  In Biblical terms, pistis or faith as it applies to Jesus is a personal, trusting relational reality one has with Jesus, with the emphasis on relationship.  That is far more than trusting in a set of values, even if they are Biblical values.      

Let this be known to all who call me a "man of faith".  I am more than a man who has adopted a Biblical belief system.  I am a man who trusts my very material, spiritual and eternal existence with Jesus, who by His Spirit lives within me.  Yes, I hold to a Biblical belief system, but more basic is my trusting relationship with Jesus.  Traditionally speaking, this is what Evangelical Christianity was founded upon, but in my opinion, has sadly replaced it with a mere belief system.

Let us be Biblically accurate.  Just because someone claims to be a person of faith, having adopted some form of Biblical belief, does not mean that person is a Christian.  A mere Biblical belief, like what the New Testament calls "works", makes no one Christian.  A Christian has a heart-felt conviction, an ongoing trusting relationship with Jesus, whose Spirit lives within him or her.  Romans 8:9 makes that clear when it says that "he who does not have the Spirit of God does not belong to God".  It is that simple.  In our day, all kinds of people claim Christian faith for all sorts of personal, political and ambitious reasons that benefit themselves.  Let's not be fooled with all of this faith talk that in so many cases is more hypocritical than Biblical.         

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