Does a verse in First John really say we make God a liar if we don’t believe in Him? This daily devotional looks at faith, belief, sanctification, and God’s truth.
Nuggets
- Faith and belief are connected but not synonymous.
- If we do not believe in God, we are saying that there is some aspect of God’s Word we think is a lie.
- We must be introduced to God’s truths through witnesses.
- Each of us has to decide whether we are going to believe God’s truths or not.
- Once we accept the Plan of Salvation, we have to grow in faith by navigating the Sanctification Road.
Okay, God highjacked my devotion. I was going to keep going on the Finding Our Center series.
God had different plans. There must be something in this devotion that I needed to see or someone else needed to read.
That is fine by me.
I started by looking at God doesn’t sin. The only thing I could really find was God doesn’t lie. The verse I pulled up only had one sermon, but it sent me to another verse.
That is where I found pay dirt — well, for a different topic.
What Is Faith and Belief?
The one who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony God has given about his Son” (I Jn. 5: 10 CSB)
Faith and belief are connected but not synonymous.
That seems really deep. Let’s see if we can decipher that.
Believing in God brings us to faith in God. What is the difference between faith and belief?
The Holman Bible Dictionary wrote, “‘Belief’ came to be distinguished from faith as an intellectual process having to do with the acceptance of a proposition.” Faith is the conviction that the doctrines revealed in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them, a belief which impacts our lives.
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Spurgeon made an interesting statement. He wrote, “God now biddeth us live by believing in Him.”
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If belief is the process and faith is the goal, that is another argument that perfection is being rather than doing. God wants us to be like Him. He wants us to live the process getting there.
So, if we believe, what we are saying is that God is not a liar. We believe that He sent His Son to die to pay the penalty for our sins.
What If We Don’t Believe?
If we do not believe in God, we are saying that there is some aspect of God’s Word we think is a lie.
God gives us free will to decide whether or not we are going to believe His truths. Free will is the ability within us to make decisions, which determine actions that produce character.
The lies we believe when we do not believe God include that
- Jesus was not God’s Son.
- Jesus’ blood could not pay the penalty for our sins.
- There is no reason for a Savior.
How Do We Believe?
We must be introduced to God’s truths through witnesses.
We are introduced to God and His Plan of Salvation through His Word and His people. These bear witness to His truths.
The Gospels are mainly written by eye witnesses. Matthew and John were apostles. They spent three years with Jesus. We need to believe what they said they saw and experienced.
Traditionally, it is believed that John Mark, a companion of the Apostle Peter, wrote the Gospel of Mark. Luke, a companion of Paul, wrote the Gospel of Luke. Both were evangelists. They were experts in their field. We need to believe what they knew.
Disciples ourselves are witnesses. That is what I John 5: 10 is saying. We believe that
- Jesus’ blood made the atonement — repayment — for our sins.
- We are made new creations.
- One of the rewards of faith is eternal life.
Glossary
So, in other words, we start out by believing the testimony of others. But then we must internalize it and establish our own testimony.
Okay, Barrows said it better. He wrote, “Our faith in him began with testimony, but now it has become independent of it.”
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But what does that really look like? We have to hear or read God’s Word. Then we have to decide if we accept what we hear and read is the truth.
This is what we call searching for God.
Searching for and Seeking God
Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).
Making the Decision for Salvation
Each of us has to decide whether we are going to believe God’s truths or not.
Salvation is deliverance from evil and the consequences of sins to replace them with good and eternal life. The consequences of sin are spiritual death and separation from God. Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God. Eternal life is the promise of living eternally – even if we have died in this life – because we have admitted our sins, believed Jesus as Savior and Redeemer, and confessed God as Sovereign Lord. This deliverance is necessitated by the original sin committed by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, which made everyone sinners.
Repentance is acknowledging our separation from God and expressing sorrow for breaking God’s laws and commandments by making the commitment to changing ourselves through obedience so that we no longer do the wrong things. We need to repent of the sins we’ve committed by doing something that is wrong or not don’t something that is right. Sins our actions by humans that disobey God and break one of his reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose he has for us, or follows Satan‘s promptings.
God designed a Plan of Salvation so that we could be delivered from the consequences of sin. This was accomplished through His grace. Grace is a free and unmerited gift from the Heavenly Father given through His Son, Jesus Christ that enables salvation and spiritual healing to believers by the work of the Holy Spirit. Because of God’s infinite grace, Jesus our Redeemer in order to forgive us of our sins.
Redemption is where something is used in exchange for something else to gain or regain something. Jesus is our Redeemer because He was born of a virgin, making Him 100% God and 100% man; gave His life on the cross for us so that His blood could pay the price for our sins; and because of God’s great might and power, rose from the grave, conquering death and paying the price for our sins.
We access this grace through faith. Because we have faith and believe, we gain the forgiveness of our sins. Forgiveness is, when we ask, God pardons us because we have broken His laws and commandments.
We accept the pardon by letting go of the guilt and remorse that we feel because we have done something wrong. It is a conscious decision to accept His forgiveness. We also commit to changing ourselves so that we no longer do the wrong things.
How do we know we are saved? We are saved if we admit that mankind was separated from God after the original sin, making us sinners; believe Jesus paid the penalty for those sins to become our Savior and Redeemer; confess God as Sovereign God; and demonstrate that commitment by submitting our lives to living our lives following His laws and commandments.
That makes us saints. Saint means holy one who has been set apart. I think some are uncomfortable with that title. That is why believer is the nickname we use.
Growing in Faith
Once we accept the Plan of Salvation, we have to grow in faith by navigating the Sanctification Road.
Ooo. I have to think about this. Spurgeon wrote, “You know how faith arises in the heart from the human point of view.”
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What is tripping me is that “human point of view.” But isn’t that the way it goes?
Let’s say we have not grown up in church. Maybe we meet somebody new, who invites us to be a guest at a service.
So, we have no building blocks on which to hook the new information. We’ve got to evaluate biblical truths based on human knowledge.
Fortunately, we will have the Holy Spirit guiding us to correct any human knowledge that does not mesh with God’s truth.
Okay, but do those who have grown up in the church also grow their faith from a human point of view? I think we almost have to.
We have to start from where we are. That means we have to determine what sins we have committed. Sins are committed by our human nature. That colors ours human point of view.
That makes the Sanctification Road even more needed. We have to go from our human point of view to God’s point of view. That is what sanctification means.
- Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is the change in us that God brings about when we go from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
- The perfected state indicates the combination of the graces which, when all are present, form spiritual wholeness or completeness.
Glossary
I think Spurgeon also said this because he felt “faith is to a large extent a matter of consciousness.” If faith is a matter of awareness, we have to experience God’s Word.
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Experiencing it is more than just reading and hearing it. The Holy Spirit has to show us what God’s provision means. We are introduced to His love.
It is more, however, than just a passive experience. Morgan said we have to exercise our faith. We have to put forth the effort to understand Who God is.
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We don’t know God is real until He is real to us. Our faith has to grow. That only happens through experience.
Making the Connections
I kind of have trouble with John’s wording. “The one who does not believe God has made him a liar …” (I Jn. 5: 10 CSB). No, in my opinion, a worldview person has not made God a liar.
God’s Word is still true, even if they don’t believe in Him. Jesus is still His Son and came to die to pay the penalty for our sins. We do need a Savior because we are separated from Him unless we accept His gift of Salvation.
Barrows said that God’s Word quiets the conscience. Our conscience is the part of our nature that impacts our moral decisions as it points us to what is right and gives us pain or pleasure depending on the choice.
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Our consciences are quieted when we gain salvation. It Is further quieted because we have peace when we believe in God and are doing His Will.
When we gain salvation, we gain victory over the power of sin. We gain the power when we communicate with God.
How Do We Apply This?
We need to ABCD. We do that through searching for Him. We continue to seek Him after conversion.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Barrows advised us that
- We have to realize God’s Word is true. He will reveal the extent of that truth only after we ABCD.
- We don’t want to be so mired in the worldview that we cannot see His truths. We want to sincerely believe in Him.
- We will only have the assurance of the truth as we grow in faith.
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If you haven’t made the decision yet to put your faith and trust in God, do so today. Don’t let any more time elapse until you do.
Father God. Before You even created us, You designed a plan to restore us to You after we disobeyed You. Call us today to Your salvation. Lord, we admit we are sinners. We believe that Jesus is our Savior and Redeemer. We confess You as our Sovereign God. We want to demonstrate that commitment daily to You as we submit our lives to You. Amen.
What do you think?
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