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Salient: An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria University of Wellington. Vol. 24, No. 5. 1961

Four Steps of Faith

Four Steps of Faith

"So often faith seems unreal in our day-to-day experience as Christians," said the Rev. Taylor in a lunchtime address to the Evangelical Union.

So often we tried to live a Christian life on our own strength, instead of drawing on Christ, by faith, for life.

How? the Rev. Taylor asked, and based his answer on the parable of the nobleman's son. The nobleman had come to Jesus asking that his son be healed of a mortal illness, and had returned to his home in faith when Christ told him that his son was already healed. This illustrated the four basic steps of faith—(1) He heard; (2) he went; (3) he begged; (4) he believed.

We are in the same initial position as the nobleman when we believe intellectually. He had lost faith in everything else. It was out of the bankruptcy of his own resources that faith was born. On our side, we never really put our faith in Christ until we have lost faith in everything else.

However, the first step of hearing about the truth was not enough. There was no promise from God that we would find without seeking, and this was the second step. In the case of the nobleman, faith-hearing became faith-seeking, and faith-seeking faith-pleading, but a fourth step was necessary, active believing.

Luther once said that faith was of two kinds: believing about God, and believing in God. This second kind of faith, which involved putting all one's trust in Christ alone made man a Christian. The speaker illustrated his point with a story about a private who had once saved Napoleon from a dangerous fall from his horse. Napoleon had said, "Thank you, Captain." The soldier demonstrated his faith in Napoleon's word by immediately walking over to Napoleon's Guards battalion and taking his place there as a captain. So it was with the Christian trusting in Christ's word.

—D.P.