In his multi-volume commentary on Romans the prominent Welsh Protestant scholar Martyn Lloyd-Jones bemoaned the fact that Christianity had lost the hope of the resurrection and that “the saints will rule the world” (using 1Cor 6:1-3).
“This explains why,” he wrote, Christianity “spends most of its time in trying to improve life in this world [by] preaching politics.”
One of the ways you can try to get Christianity back on track is by explaining what the Bible means by “the faith of Jesus.”
In Romans 10 Paul defines faith as hearing and believing the Gospel preached by Jesus.
So for Paul to talk about the “faith of Jesus” is the same as talking about “the gospel of Christ.”
As a matter of fact, note the alternate reading of the KJV to the famous Rom 1.16:
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.” Cp. Rom 15.19; 1Thess 3.2; Phil 1.27; Gal 1.7; 2Cor 9.13.
Simply put, we can’t believe what we don’t understand.
In Acts 8 Phillip finds a man who was “reading out loud from the book of the prophet Isaiah.”
Even though he was a learned man, the chief treasurer of a queen no less, Phillip asked him:
“Do you understand what you’re reading?”
He replied:
“How can I understand unless someone guides me?”
Immediately Phillip preached “the gospel of Jesus” and with equal immediacy the man asked Phillip to baptize him!
This is all beautifully in keeping with the Great commission commandment Jesus gives in Matthew 28:19.
This definition of Biblical faith of via hearing and understanding is not unique to the NT.
Paul himself alludes to an OT Proverb in Romans 10 that warns against “zeal without knowledge.”
1 Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is for their salvation. 2 For I testify about them that they are zealous for God, but not on the basis of knowledge.
That’s why Paul later classifies his own Jewish people as “enemies of the Gospel” itself in Rom 11:28!
To the Corinthians Paul explains how this Gospel about the KOG has been hidden from the view of some people by “the god of this age [Satan, who] has blinded the understanding of those who do not believe.”
By the way this speaks to the importance of a personal Devil!
But I digress.
It’s very important for God that you not only hear but understand that the Gospel is about the Kingdom of God. That is, a world government that will be different from all the others because it will be unshakable and peace will never end.
This will only happen when the Son of the Most High God finally receives “the throne of his father David.”
Once the Kingdom comes Christians will rule alongside Christ “to order it and establish it with judgment and justice forever.”
“For it is your Father’s good pleasure,” Jesus says in Luke 12.32, to gift you the Kingdom!
So like Paul, let us join in prayer for “the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God,” to shine on the minds of everyone.
Pray the eyes of their understanding be enlightened in order that they may know the hope to which you, Christian, have been called for!
Tell them that in “His infinite goodness towards those He has chosen to share in His glory,” “having overlooked the times of ignorance, God now commands them to: Repent and believe this Gospel about the KOG!
Remind them that God’s desire is for everyone to be saved by coming to a full knowledge of the truth.
