Faith Matches Divine Gift's Purpose

2 Peter 1:2-4 “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord,  (3)  as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue,  (4)  by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

In a previous section we mentioned that when every saint is given the gift of faith they are each given the same measure of faith. We also mentioned that the measure of faith given is more than enough for every saint to be able to fulfil God’s requirement that the just live by faith. In other words, every saint has more than sufficient faith available to them to appropriate for themselves every promise of God that is recorded in scripture. In the above quoted passage of scripture the apostle Peter teaches us that the saints become partakers of God’s divine nature through the promises of God. So how does God do that? Peter answers that question for us in this same passage when he tells us that God’s divine power gives us all things that pertain to life and godliness. We have already established in a previous section that we access God’s power through the exercising of our faith. And so very clearly the scriptures teach us that every saint is able to partake of God’s divine nature because every saint has the faith necessary to release God’s power and thus appropriate every promise of God for their lives.

Romans 12:3-7 “For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.  (4)  For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, (5) so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another.  (6)  Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; (7) or ministry, let us use it in our ministering; he who teaches, in teaching.”

Although every saint receives the same measure of faith when they come into the kingdom of God, there is one aspect of our faith that differs from one saint to the next. The aspect that differs is the faith we receive to operate in our functional gift in the body of Christ. In the passage of scripture quoted above the apostle Paul teaches us that each of us has received a measure of faith and in the context of this passage Paul clearly implies that some saints have received a greater measure of faith than others. So why would God give one saint more faith than another if, as we have already seen in scripture, He shows personal favouritism to no man? Paul answers that question for us by explaining that each saint has a different function in the body of Christ, and it is for that reason that each one requires differing measures of faith. For example one who has received the functional gift of an apostle would require more faith to operate in that office than one who has received the simple gift of prophecy, for as Paul explains, the signs of an apostle require the demonstration of God’s power through various signs and wonders (2 Corinthians 12:12), whereas less faith is required for one to simply prophesy edification, exhortation and comfort to men (1 Corinthians 14:3). In fact in explaining the concept of differing levels of faith given for the different gifts, Paul implies that even in the gift of prophecy that there are differing levels of faith, for he instructs the saints to prophecy according the proportion of faith that they have received for their gift. Each gift received by the saint requires a certain amount of grace for them to be able to operate in their gift, for this passage declares that our gifts differ according to the grace that is given to us. Grace in this context is God’s ability that is made available to the saint to be able to operate in the various gifts they have been given (1 Peter 4:10-11). However, we can only access God’s grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8), which is why, in explaining the concept of differing measures of faith, Paul links our faith to the grace we have received; for he says that God has given each one the appropriate measure of faith for the differing levels of grace that is given to each one. Therefore the conclusion is that the differing levels of grace given require differing levels of faith to access God’s grace. This is why the apostle Paul admonishes us not to think more highly than we ought to think but rather to think in line with the level of faith each of us have received. In other words we are not to try operating in a gift that we have not received, because the grace needed to operate in that gift has not been made available to us and we also do not have the faith required to access that grace. And so saints that try to operate outside of the gift they have been given will find themselves operating in presumption, and we have already discussed the disaster that that course of action brings about.

Michael E.B. Maher

Faith Toward God

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