The God-given faith is allotted to all believers as a common precious portion (2 Pet. 1:1). The faith given to us by God is the portion of our inheritance allotted to us by God. As long as we have this gift, we have the lot of God’s inheritance, for living faith equals the lot of God’s inheritance. This is a common portion to all believers.
Second Peter 1:1 speaks of “those who have been allotted like precious faith.” As the children of Israel were allotted a piece of the good land (Josh. 14:1-5), we have been allotted like precious faith. This implies that all the things which relate to life and godliness (2 Pet. 1:3), including the divine nature (v. 4) partaken of by the believers through the like precious faith according to the precious and exceedingly great promises, are the real inheritance given to the believers by God in the New Testament.
The good land, the portion of the children of Israel in Old Testament times, typifies the all-inclusive Christ. According to Colossians 1:12, Christ is our portion. As the good land was the portion of the Old Testament saints, so Christ is the portion of the New Testament believers. Furthermore, in the Old Testament the good land was allotted to the twelve tribes, and in the New Testament precious faith is allotted to us. But how can faith be our allotted portion? According to the Bible, Christ is our portion. This means that it is Christ who has been allotted to us. But 2 Peter 1:1 says that we have been allotted like precious faith. To speak of Christ being our portion may be somewhat doctrinal. It is more experiential to say that faith is our portion. If Christ were merely Christ to us and not also faith, we would not be able to participate in Him or share in Him. In order for us to partake of Christ, He must become our faith. Such a faith has been allotted by God to all believers in Christ as their portion.
Faith is not merely a means; it is also a portion. A means is an instrument through which we obtain something, but the portion is the very thing we obtain. In 2 Peter 1:1 faith is not a means; rather, it is the very thing, the object, we receive. Therefore, in this verse faith equals the inheritance. Faith is an allotted portion of the New Testament inheritance. Yes, according to the New Testament, faith in a certain sense is a means. In particular, faith is the means by which we receive salvation and eternal life. But in 1:1 Peter considers faith not a means but an allotment, a portion of the New Testament inheritance allotted to us by God.
We need to be deeply impressed with the fact that faith in 2 Peter 1:1 is equal to the New Testament inheritance. Our portion is Christ, the embodiment of the Triune God. This Christ is revealed in the New Testament and conveyed to us through the New Testament. The New Testament is a container of the Christ who embodies the Triune God. This container conveys Christ to us mainly by the way of the preaching and teaching of the Word. Faith, then, comes from hearing, and hearing comes from the Word.
The all-inclusive Christ is not only the Word but also the life-giving Spirit. While Christ is preached to us through the Word and conveyed by the Word, He simultaneously works within us as the Spirit to produce faith in us. The issue of the faith produced within us is that whatever Christ is according to the word of the New Testament is imparted to us. As a result, we have the reality of Christ.
Faith and Christ are one. The faith which is the response to the content of the Word is actually Christ. This means that the response is one with that to which it is responding. In other words, faith (our response) and Christ are one. When in our experience our response and the Christ conveyed to us through the preaching of the Word become one, faith is produced within us. Therefore, our faith and Christ who is the object of our faith are actually one. This is the portion of the New Testament inheritance God has allotted to us.
Faith is not initiated by us, and it is not something that is out of us. On the contrary, faith is out of God, it is initiated by God, and it is allotted to us by God. In what way is faith allotted to us? Faith comes to us by the word in God’s revelation. When this word is preached to us, it conveys the reality of the New Testament inheritance. Furthermore, as this word is preached to us, simultaneously the Spirit works with it. Actually, according to the Bible, the word and the Spirit are one. In John 6:63 the Lord Jesus said, “The words which I have spoken unto you are spirit and are life.” The word is the Spirit, and the Spirit is the word (Eph. 6:17). Therefore, through the spoken word and by the working, the inspiring, of the Spirit, faith is produced within us. This is the way God allots to us the like precious faith. Through the spoken word and by the inspiring Spirit, God infuses faith into our being. Once this faith has been imparted into us, we have our portion of the New Testament inheritance.
In 1:1 Peter speaks of the allotment of “like” precious faith. The Greek word rendered “like” literally means of equal value or honor; hence, equally precious. It does not mean equal in measure but equal in value and honor to all the receivers. All the portions of the precious faith are equal not in measure, quantity, but in quality. For example, the portion of the good land allotted to each of the twelve tribes differed in size, but although the allotments were different in size, they were equal in quality. For this reason, each allotment was equally precious. The principle is the same with the like precious faith.
Faith is the substantiation of the substance of the truth (Heb. 11:1), which is the reality of the contents of God’s New Testament economy. The contents of God’s New Testament economy are composed of all the things which relate to life and godliness, that is, the Triune God dispensing Himself into us as life within and godliness without. The like precious faith, allotted to us by God through the word of His New Testament economy and the Spirit, responds to the reality of such contents and ushers us into the reality, making its substance the very element of our Christian life and experience. Such a faith is allotted to all the believers in Christ as their portion, which is equally precious to all who have received it. As such a portion from God, this faith is objective to us in the divine truth. But it brings all the contents of its substantiation into us, thus making them all with itself (faith) subjective to us in our experience. It can be compared to the scenery (truth) and the seeing (faith) that are objective to the camera (us). But when the light (the Spirit) brings the scenery to the film (our spirit) within the camera, both the seeing and scenery become subjective to it.