Message Nine

Taking the Unique Way of Faith
to Carry Out God’s New Testament Economy

Scripture Reading: Heb. 11:3—12:1; 10:39

1. Faith is the unique way to enjoy Christ in His heavenly ministry and to experience all the bequests in the new testament—Heb. 11:1; 4:2; 6:1; 4:3; 6:12; 10:22.
2. Abraham, Moses, and the martyrs are part of the history of faith and witnesses to the unique way of faith—Heb. 11:8-19, 23-27, 32-38:
   1. By faith Abraham, the forefather of all believers, obeyed God’s calling—Heb. 11:8; Rom. 4:1, 12; Gal. 3:7:
      1. When Abraham was called by God, he went out by faith, not knowing where he was going—Heb. 11:8:
         1. God appeared to Abraham to call him out of his fallen condition and to bring him back to Himself as the tree of life—Acts 7:2.
         2. Abraham’s faith did not originate with himself; his believing in God was a reaction to the transfusion of God’s element into his being.
      2. Abraham was justified by faith—Gen. 15:6; Rom. 4:2-3:
         1. Abraham’s believing was the springing up within him of the element that God had transfused into him—Rom. 4:3.
         2. God’s reaction to Abraham’s believing was to justify him, that is, to account him righteous—Gen. 15:6.
      3. Abraham experienced God as the One who calls things not being as being and as the One who gives life to the dead—Rom. 4:17:
         1. By the birth of Isaac, Abraham experienced God as the One who calls things not being as being—Rom. 4:18-21; Heb. 11:12.
         2. When Abraham received Isaac back after offering him to God on the altar, he experienced God as the One who raises the dead—Heb. 11:17-19.
      4. Abraham lived by faith, living the life of the altar and the tent—Heb. 11:9; Gen. 12:7-8:
         1. In order to live by faith, we must first build an altar, signifying that our life on earth is for God, and then pitch a tent, indicating that we do not belong to the world.
         2. By living the life of the altar and the tent, Abraham testified that he was sojourning by faith, as in a foreign land, longing after a better country and eagerly waiting for the city whose Architect and Builder is God—Heb. 11:9-10, 16.
   2. By faith Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter and chose to be ill treated with the people of God, looking away to the reward and persevering as one seeing the unseen One—Heb. 11:24-27.
   3. By faith the martyrs experienced God’s peaceful silence, exercising faith in God even when He did nothing to deliver them—Heb. 11:32-38; Matt. 11:6.
3. Faith is the unique way to carry out God’s New Testament economy—1 Tim. 1:4:
   1. The believers in Christ are justified by faith, and have life and live by faith—Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11; Heb. 10:38:
      1. By faith, which is the moving and working God in Christ who puts us into Christ as our righteousness (1 Cor. 1:30), we have the divine life according to God’s righteousness judicially.
      2. “The righteous shall have life and live by faith” (Rom. 1:17); “This word should be the banner of God’s eternal economy, which is altogether a matter in faith (1 Tim. 1:4)!” (The Crystallization of the Epistle to the Romans, pp. 123-124).
   2. Through faith in Jesus Christ, we are brought into an organic union with Christ—Gal. 2:16:
      1. Faith in Jesus Christ denotes an organic union with Christ through believing:
         1. This is related to our experience of Christ as the most precious One, who is infused into us and who becomes in us the faith by which we believe into Him.
         2. Faith creates an organic union, a life union, in which we and Christ are one—1 Cor. 6:17.
      2. In this organic union we experience Christ and live Christ—Eph. 3:17; John 14:17; Gal. 2:20; 2 Cor. 5:7:
         1. The real experience of Christ is invisible; it is altogether a matter of faith—Heb. 11:1; Eph. 3:17.
         2. We should not put our trust in anything extraordinary or spectacular; instead, we should take the way of faith, which is to read the Word and believe it—Rom. 10:8, 17.
   3. In the Body “God has apportioned to each a measure of faith”—Rom. 12:3:
      1. God first allotted faith to us in quality (2 Pet. 1:1), and then He apportioned it in quantity.
      2. How much faith we have depends upon God’s apportioning.
      3. We should esteem ourselves according to the faith that God has apportioned to us, that is, according to the measure of God’s element that has been infused into us.
   4. Faith is the divine requirement for the overcomers to meet Christ in His triumphant return and to receive the reward of the kingdom—Luke 18:8; Heb. 10:35, 39:
      1. The believers who live an overcoming life by faith will be found by Christ at His return as the treasures ready to receive the salvation of their souls as the end (result) of their faith—1 Pet. 1:7-9; Heb. 10:39.
      2. The overcomers will be rewarded by Christ with the co-kingship and the top enjoyment of divine life with Him in the millennium— Rev. 20:4, 6.
      3. To the overcomers the Lord will say, “Well done, good and faithful slave....Enter into the joy of your master”—Matt. 25:21, 23.