(upbeat music) - Pastor John, you are not afraid to define saving faith as seeing and savoring Jesus Christ as supremely glorious. You have written sentences like these, quote, "Receiving Christ as your supreme treasure "is what faith is," end quote. Or, quote, "An essential element of saving faith "is treasuring Christ above all things," end quote.

Or, quote, "Faith includes the embrace of Jesus "as our all-satisfying treasure," end quote. And today we have a rather critical email from a listener named Colin who writes in to say this, "Pastor John, forgive me, but I think you've gone off "the deep end in your definition of faith.

"Faith is trust, period. "Abraham believed God and it was counted to him "as righteousness," Romans 4:3. Definitely loving Jesus more than anything is a necessary fruit of faith, but not the means of salvation. Why, Pastor John, have you complicated saving faith? - Well, I share the concern of this question that neither I nor anyone else should make faith so complicated that a little child can't believe and be saved.

I think God has provided in the Bible, to paraphrase John Owen, a stream in which toddlers can wade and an ocean in which elephants can swim, or if you can't imagine elephants in the ocean, try blue whales, which means that in the Bible, the most important realities are presented in ways that are simple and straightforward, and they are presented in ways that reveal layers and layers of meaning and reality, which are not always immediately obvious at first glance.

I think it is right and good and wise, especially with children, to treat saving faith as essentially trust, that is, trust in Jesus to be who he said he would be and to do what he said he would do. That's what trust is, right? Be who you say you'll be, do what you say you'll do, and most essentially, save me from my sin and from death and hell through your death and resurrection.

I think that is good and right and wise and biblical to stress. Trust does that. But as you read more and more of the Bible and as you ask more and more questions about the very words you're using, you realize there are dimensions of the act of trusting which have to be spelled out in order for a full understanding of what's involved, and this is owing not just to the fact that John Piper might have an overly inquisitive brain, but to the fact that there are biblical passages which call for this kind of reflection.

For me, the issue was pressed by the Gospel of John, which in one sense is the simplest of Gospels, and in another sense, the most layered of the Gospels in depths of meaning. So here's what I mean about believing in the Gospel of John. So John 1:12, it says, "He came to his own, "Jesus came to his own, "and his own people did not receive him, "but to all who did receive him, comma, "who believed in his name, comma, "he gave the right to become the children of God." So who received him, who believed in him, those are at least overlapping realities, if not identical, but that immediately raises the question, receive him as what?

Trust him as what? Messiah, king, savior, friend, Lord, God, counselor, financial advisor? That's not a joke. I think if you don't believe in Jesus as your financial advisor, you're not saved. That is, if you reject his counsel about how to use your money and say, "You're stupid, I'm smart," that's unbelief.

Is it not wise to say saving faith receives Jesus for all that he is in as far as we can understand what he is? Some little child can receive him savingly with genuine faith, genuine saving faith for what he is according to what that child truly understands and then if he's truly born again, then he will go on receiving him as he reveals more and more of who he is as life goes by.

Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven "is like a treasure hidden in a field, "which a man found and covered up, "and then in his joy, he goes and sells all that he has "and buys that field," Matthew 13, 44. So one of the things that we receive Jesus as when we're converted is as our treasure.

He's treasure hidden in a field and conversion is having our eyes open to how valuable Jesus is. So we trust, yes, trust, trust, trust him to be all that he says he is for us, namely the supreme treasure of the universe. Trusting Jesus includes that. This helps us understand, I think, in the Gospel of John, that there's a kind of believing that's not truly saving believing.

Listen to John 2, 23. Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing, but Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he knew what was in man.

In other words, that believing, something's wrong with that, something's wrong. That's not authentic. And we can see the problem if you go to John 7, 2-5, where Jesus' brothers see those signs, they believe in those signs, and they're called unbelievers. Listen to this. This is John 7, 3. His brothers said to him, "Leave here.

Go to Judea that your disciples may see the works that you're doing. For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world." And then John adds, "For not even his brothers believed in him." Whoa. Well, of course they believed in him in some sense.

You're doing all these wonderful works. You're surely the messianic miracle worker we've been expecting, but they didn't know him for who he really was. They didn't submit to his new way of bringing the messianic hope into the world. They didn't know that he was gonna die for their sins and they would have to renounce all their boasting and take up their cross and follow him.

They were totally missing the true reality of Jesus. And so all of their belief in him as the messianic miracle worker is called unbelief. Those are the kinds of things that gave me pause as I was studying this and sent me on a quest to find what in this gospel really is saving faith.

And I found this verse so helpful. This is John 6, 35. Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger and whoever believes in me shall never thirst." It seems to me this gets right at the essence of what faith is.

Yes, trust. It is trust in Jesus. It is trust in him as a kind of bread. It's trust in him as a kind of living water. A trust that is of such a eating and such a drinking that the soul is satisfied. You will never thirst again if you eat this bread.

And I think that's what Paul was getting at when he said in the case of unbelievers that Satan had blinded their minds to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God in 2 Corinthians 4, 4. In other words, to come to a true saving faith, whether a little child or an adult, you have to experience the miracle of spiritual sight of the supremely valuable glory of Christ, the image of God.

In other words, Christ must be perceived as supremely glorious. And a six-year-old experiences that. He would never use those words probably unless he's been incredibly well taught. He wouldn't need to use the words. He needs the miracle though of seeing Jesus Christ as trusted as the best of all, the most glorious and valuable of all.

So I'm sorry. I'm sorry if this seems excessively complicated to people. Here's what I hope. I hope I don't put any stumbling block in anyone's way in trusting Christ. Instead, here's what I hope. I hope that people will find Jesus as easy to believe for the spiritual mind as a billion-dollar inheritance is easy to receive for the natural mind.

- Boom, this is so distinctive. I mean, this is one of the distinguishing marks of your entire ministry. Thank you, Pastor John, for addressing it here. Well, we are going to take a break for the weekend. As we do, I wanna remind you that you can subscribe to our audio feeds and search our episode archive and even reach us by email with a question of your own.

You can do all of that through our online home at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn. Well, there is little question that the sins of greed and pride wreak havoc in our culture. There's no doubt about it. So why are Christians so often talking about the devastation of homosexual practice? It seems like a sin, if we call it a sin, with much less influence than greed and pride, which are more widespread and destructive to the fabric of society.

So why are Christians so distinctly known as anti-homosexual? It's a great question, and we will begin next week with it. I'm your host, Tony Renke. We will see you on Monday. Have a great weekend. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)