Galatians 5:6 For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision avails any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which works by love. Faith is the foundation of the whole spiritual building, whereby we are built on Christ Jesus. It is the root of the whole spiritual life of grace, the ground whereon the soul rests securely, the beginning of our spiritual existence. The cross is not far off, not over the seas, in the Holy Land, nor removed by length of time. Faith sees it close at hand, and clasps it and loves it, and is crucified on it with Him, dying to itself with its Lord, nailed to it, motionless to its own desires, dead to the world, and living to Him. Nor is heaven far off to faith. For where its Lord is, there is heaven. Faith is with Him, present with Him in spirit, though absent in the body; a penitent amid those who, around the Throne, sing "Holy, Holy, Holy." Faith, in one sense, goes before love, because, unless we believed, we should have none to love. Faith is Divine knowledge. As in human love we cannot love unless we have seen, heard, or in some way known, so, without faith, we cannot know aught of God, or know that there is a God whom to love. Yet in act, faith cannot be without love. "The just,' says Scripture, 'shall live by his faith,' but by a faith which lives. A dead faith cannot give life." Faith without love is the devils' faith. For they believe, and tremble. Hearing must come before faith, for "faith cometh by hearing." But faith cannot for an instant be separated from love. Who is the object of faith? God the Father, who created us, and gave His Son to die for us; God the Son, who became one of us, and by dying, redeemed us; God the Holy Ghost, who sanctifieth us, and "pours forth love," which He is, "abroad in our hearts." We were as stocks and stones without faith; but He died, even "of these stones to raise up children to Abraham." Are we stocks or stones now, that, having faith, we can believe without loving? Which of His acts of boundless love should we believe without loving? Were it not enough to bear us out of ourselves for love, to transport us, to make us give up our lives for love, to carry us away out of ourselves and of all that we are, to think that for us, earth-worms and defiled, Jesus died? Does not the very name of Jesus make the heart beat, and tremble, and thrill with love? Could a criminal really believe that he had received a full pardon from his injured king, or that the king's son had suffered to obtain his pardon, and was come to tell it him and forgive him, and not love? Well might he doubt such love. But he could not believe it and not love. Faith and love would enter his soul together. Love is in all true faith, as light and warmth are in the ray of the sun. Light and warmth are in the sun's ray, and the sun's ray brings with it light and warmth; not, light and warmth; the sun's ray: yet, where the sun's ray is, there are light and warmth, nor can that ray be anywhere without giving light and warmth. Even so, faith it is which brings love, not love, faith; yet faith cannot come into the heart, without bringing with it the glow of love, yea, and the light wherewith we see things Divine. So soon as faith is kindled in the heart, there is the glow of love; and both come from the same Sun of Righteousness, pouring in faith and love together into the heart, and "there is nothing hid from the heat thereof." In winter, fewer rays come upon any spot of this land from the sun; whence there is then less brightness of light and less glow of heat than in summer; and so the surface of the earth is chilled; and though for a time the frost be melted by that fainter sun, this warmth, coming upon it only for a short time, soon passes away. Even so, there are degrees of faith and love. Yet they may be real faith and love, even when the power of both is lessened, in that the soul does not keep itself or live in the full presence of God. Or, as through a closed window, more light comes than heat, so in some hearts, there may be more of knowledge than of love. And again, as on a cold misty day, when the sun is hidden from our eyes, we are so oppressed by the clamminess of the chill damp upon the surface of our bodies, and by the heavy gloom around, that we scarcely feel the presence of the light and heat; and yet the light and heat are there, else we should be in utter darkness, and our bodies would die; even so, many hearts, at many times, when some mist hides from them the presence of their Lord, feel nothing but their own coldness and numbness, and all seems dark around them, and yet in their very inmost selves they believe and love, else their souls would be dead, and they would be "past feeling," and they would not pine for more light and love. A dead body is in darkness, and seeth not the light of this world, and has an awful coldness to the touch; yet itself feels not its own coldness, nor knows its own darkness. Even so, the dead soul, being without the life of God, feels not its own death, craves not to love more. For He who is love hath left it, and it hath no power wherewith to desire to love, unless or until the voice of Christ raises it from the dead and awakens it and it hears His voice, and lives. Or think on the great instances of faith in Holy Scripture. Think you not that Abraham loved, as well as believed, when God first spake to him, and called him to give up his country, and his kindred, and his father's house, and instead of all, God said, "I will bless thee," and he took God for his all, and "went out, not knowing whither he went," save that he was following God? And of that great penitent, St. Mary Magdalene, our Lord bears witness that in her there were together love and faith; and for both together, a loving faith, or a "faith working by love," our Lord tells her, "Thy sins are forgiven." Or was there not love in the faith of the penitent thief, when he discerned his Saviour by his side, in that marred form, which "had no beauty or comeliness," "His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men," and he said, "Lord, remember me in Thy kingdom." There was humility, which owned that it deserved to be forgotten, and wondrous faith which owned in Him, "the rejected of men," his Lord and King and God. But there was love too. For love only craves to be remembered. Or think you not that, when God "opened the heart of Lydia, to attend unto the things spoken by Paul," He poured into her heart which He had opened, love with faith? Faith which loves not, is not faith; it is dead. And what is dead, hath ceased to be. A "dead faith" is a "faith without love." A dead body is, for the time, until it wholly decays in outward form, like a living body or a body asleep; a dead faith has an outward likeness to a living faith. But as a dead body has no warmth nor power of motion, nor feeling, nor can use any of the powers it once had, nor has them any longer, it can neither taste, nor see, nor hear; so a dead faith is that which has no love, no power to do good works. It perceives not, hears not, tastes not, feels not, the things of God. As love is the life of faith, so with the increase of love, faith increaseth. Even from man towards man, faith and love grow together. The more we love, the more we understand and the more we trust one another. We trust, because we love, and by loving, know God, We can only know God, by loving Him. St. Paul says, "I know in whom I have believed." Want of love is the cause of all want of faith. Did we fully love God, who could for a moment doubt of Him? But love liveth by good works. Love cannot live torpid. Even in human love, love which never did deeds of love would grow chill and die. We love those most, to whom we do most good. Love is perhaps increased more by doing than by receiving good; at least, by doing good out of the love of God. Acts of love do not prove only that we have a living faith they increase it. But it has been thought, "if faith, on which God holds us righteous, or justifying faith, have love in it, are we not accounted righteous for something m ourselves?" We are justified, or accounted righteous before God, neither for faith nor love, but for the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ alone. And faith and love alike, although in us, are not of us; both are alike the gift of God. But this gift, whether of faith or love, is so given, that it is with us to receive it. We come to God by faith and love. But "no man cometh unto Me," saith our Lord, "except the Father, which hath sent Me, draw him." "Believe, and thou comest; love and thou art drawn." The drawing of grace changes nature, and strengthens nature, reforms nature, subdues nature, but only if we be willing to be changed, reformed, subdued, strengthened. How then may we know if we have this faith? How may it grow and be strengthened in us? How do we know that our bodies live? "As," says a holy man, "we discern the life of this body by its motion, so also the life of faith by good works. The life of the body is the soul, whereby it is moved and feels; the life of faith is love; because by it, it worketh, as thou readest in the apostle, "faith which worketh by love: Whence also when charity waxeth cold, faith dies; as the body, when the soul departeth." (E. B. Pusey, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love. |
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