© 2014 by Tom Boynton (editing by Kathy Boynton)

Are you saved? Then you have faith in God! How did that faith get there? Jesus put it there! Scripture teaches us that Jesus is both the “author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2). When we have repentant faith in Christ, this pleases God. “Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth” (Luke 15:10). In fact, without this faith, it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6).

But the unsaved can’t please God. This means they have no ability to have faith which pleases God. “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God” (Romans 8:6-9). This Scripture teaches that unsaved people are spiritually dead and cannot please God.

The plight of the unsaved person is truly desperate! The only way that person can be saved is to have faith in Christ and, yet, the unsaved person is dead with no capacity for anything pleasing to God – including faith! Jesus, Himself, said, “No man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father” (John 6:65).

Some say the unsaved person is saved by exercising faith. How? You can’t exercise it if you don’t have it! Can an amputee exercise a missing leg?

How, then, can an unsaved person become saved? Only God’s sovereign power can reach into that dead heart and breathe life and faith into it. This happened to Lydia of old. “And a certain woman named Lydia … heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul” (Acts 16:14). Who opened Lydia’s heart? God did! She had no ability to open it herself!

If you are trusting in the shed blood of God the Son, Jesus Christ, don’t credit your salvation to your own sovereign act of exercising faith. That was beyond your capability! No! Humbly worship and adore your sovereign Savior who died for you and gave you life and faith to trust Him!

If unsaved, read the Bible! “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17).

 

 

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