2. Why is faith selected as the channel of salvation ?
(1) Faith has been selected as the channel of grace because tlure is a natural adaptation in faith to he used as the receiver. Suppose that I am about to give a poor man an alms ; I put it into his hand — why ? Well, it would hardly be fitting to put it into his ear, or to lay it upon his foot ; the hand seems made on purpose to receive. So faith in the mental frame is created on purpose to be a receiver ; it is the hand of the man, and there is a fitness in bestowing grace by its means. Faith which receives Christ is as simple an act as when your child receives an apple from you, because you hold it out, and promise to give him the apple if he comes for it. The belief and the receiving relate only to an apple ; but they make up precisely the same act as the faith which deals with eternal salvation ; and what the child's hand is to the apple, that your faith is to the perfect salvation of Christ. The child's hand does not make the apple, or alter the apple, it only takes it; and faith is chosen by God to be the receiver of salvation, because it does not pretend to make salvation or to help in it, but it receives it.
(2) It gives all the glory to God. — The hand which receives charity does not say, " I am to be thanked for accepting the gift " ; that would be absurd. When the hand conveys bread to the mouth, it does not say to the body, " Thank me, for I feed you." It is a very simple thing that the hand does, though a very necessary thing ; and it never arrogates glory to itself for what it does. So God has selected faith to receive the unspeakable gift of His grace, because it cannot take to itself any credit, but must adore the gracious God who is the giver of all good.
(3) It unites man to God. — When man confides in God, there is a point of union between them, and that union guarantees blessing. Faith saves us because it makes us cling to God, and so brings us into connexion with Him. Years ago, above certain great falls, a boat was upset, and two men were being carried down the current, when persons on the shore managed to float a
^ H. N. Pym, Caroline Fox, Her Journals and Letters, i. 305.
EPHESIANS II. 8 29
rope out to them, which rope was seized by them both. One of them held fast to it, and was safely drawn to the bank ; but the other, seeing a great log come floating by, unwisely let go the rope, and clung to the log, for it was the bigger thing of the two, and apparently better to cling to. Alas ! the log, with the man on it, went right over the vast abyss, because there was no union between the log and the shore. The size of the log was no benefit to him who grasped it ; it needed a connexion with the shore to produce safety. So, when a man trusts to his works, or to sacraments, or to anything of that sort, he will not be saved, because there is no junction between him and Christ ; but faith, though it may seem to be like a slender cord, is in the hand of the great God on the shore side; infinite power pulls in the connecting line, and thus draws the man from destruction.
(4) Faith touches the springs of action. — If I walk across a room, it is because I believe my legs will carry me. A man eats because he believes in the necessity of food. Columbus discovered America because he believed that there was another continent beyond the ocean. Many another grand deed has also been born of faith, for faith works wonders, v Commoner things are done on the same principle ; faith in its natural fofm is an all-prevailing force. God gives salvation to our faith, because He has thus touched the secret spring of all our emotions and actions. He has, so to speak, taken possession of the battery, and now He can send the sacred current to every part of our nature. When we believe in Christ, and the heart has come into the possession of God, then are we saved from sin, and are moved towards repent- ance, holiness, zeal, prayer, consecration, and every other gracious thing.
^ The next day I again went to Farringford. I found Tennyson walking up and down the ballroom. I walked up and down with him for three-quarters of an hour. After talking of various matters, he came back to the subject of immortality. " It is hard," he said, " to believe in God, but it is harder not to believe in Him. I don't believe in His goodness from what I see in nature. In nature I see the mechanism. I believe in His good- ness from what I find in my own breast." . . . Then he said, " I wonder what the earliest Christians thought of it all." I said that I thought that they were content with seeing in Christ a revelation of God and an assurance of God's love ; later came the