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has evidently perplexed you, is passed over without reference. Perhaps you will read the
passage.
A.--(Reads).--
"How then shall they call on Him in Whom they have not believed? and how shall
they believe in Him of Whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a
preacher? and how shall they preach except they be sent? . . . . . So then faith cometh by
hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (Rom. 10: 14-17).
B.--You observe that there is no "still small voice" that is to be heard, but the word of
God, as preached by one sent, and that the inference is that without the word to hear,
there will be no faith.
A.--I must admit, so far as this passage goes, that it is so, yet I feel a little disappointed
over the discovery.
B.--Are you not a little Naaman the Syrian who would gladly have done some great or
spectacular thing, but despised the simple process ordained by God for his cleansing.
Turn to I John 5: 9-11 and see how the apostle speaks of faith. You might, when you
read, observe that "witness", "record" and "testify" are one and the same.
A.--(Reads).--
"If the testimony of men we receive, the testimony of God is greater. For this is the
testimony of God that He has testified concerning His Son. (He that believes on the Son
of God has the testimony in himself; he that does not believe God has made Him a liar;
because he has not believed in the testimony which God has testified concerning His
Son). And this is the testimony, that God has given to us aionian life, and this life is in
His Son."
B.--The continual iteration of testimony and testify undoubtedly is not such good
English as the variation introduced by the A.V., but its insistence is striking and beyond
dispute. Faith, here, is belief in a testimony, that testimony being given by God and
concerning His Son. To believe that testimony is equivalent to believing "God"
(verse 10), the One Who gives the testimony, and believing on the Son, the One
concerning Whom God has testified (verses 9 and 10).
Moreover, the inspired apostle has no scruple in comparing the testimony given by
God with that of man, simply urging that if we give credence to sinful men upon slight
evidence, the demand upon us for giving equal credence to the testimony of God is
"greater". And further unbelief makes God a liar, which is the practical reverse to saying
Amen to all that God has said.
A.--I see very clearly that my view of faith would never have allowed the argument from
men that is used in verse 9, and that the emphasis upon believing a testimony is very
strong indeed. I confess that the subject is clearer and simpler and makes faith and belief