February 19 – LD 8, Day 1: God is the Object of Our Faith

1 Peter 1:21, “Who by him do believe in God that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God.”

You notice that this quotation makes it plain that our faith is focused upon God.

This means two things.

First, it indicates that when we confess our faith to others, we speak about our God. God is the subject of this conversation. The crisis of all world religions is “who is God”? The distinguishing thing about the Christian religion is that we openly and without reservation make known the name of our God. He is the one and only true God of heaven and earth. When we teach our children concerning faith, we speak to them about our God. We tell them the history of His revelation given in the Bible, we help them focus upon the salvation which God alone has provided for us. When we encourage one another with the comfort so necessary in this life, we share with them the comfort which comes from our God.

Second, when we make this confession about God to others, we do this in the presence of, and before the face of this God. We are aware of God’s divine involvement in all the affairs of men, most of all in our own affairs. We want God to hear our confession. We want God to pay attention to activities as we relate to other human beings because in this way we praise Him and bring glory to Him. By faith we give recognition that He is our God.

In one word, God is the object of our faith.

There is a reason for this. That reason is that when God bestows upon us true and living faith, we enter into a covenant relationship with Him. By faith we realize that we are what we are and we become what we become because of God’s wonderful work of salvation in us. It is amazing to us that Almighty God, Creator God, Sovereign God loves us and takes us into His friendship. As quoted above, He raised Jesus from the dead and now He also raises us from spiritual death.

Faith reaches up to Him and confesses to Him and speaks about Him concerning the joy of that fellowship.

Our faith and hope is in God alone.