It is not true, as is being frequently asserted of late, that in the gospel preached by Jesus there is no place for His own Person, it being merely a gospel about God. Though not frequently in so many words, yet in acts we find our Lord seek- ing to cultivate a relationship of faith between the disciple and Himself and, in Himself, with God. If only once in the Synop- tics we read explicitly of faith in Jesus (Mt &-'^), and that in a passage where the authenticity of the words tU e/ui is doubtful, this is counterbalanced by the fact that not more than once God Himself is specified as the object of faith (Mk 11^'-). Jesus, conscious of being the Messiah, the Judge at the Last Day, who would finally dispose of the destiny of all mankind, could not help ascribing a central soteriological position to Himself. Such a figure as He was in His own view, could not be kept outside of the saving transaction, which in a certain sense forestalls the Last Judgment. The absence of more direct affinr.ations of this principle is simply the result of Jesus' method of not directly proclaiming at first His Messianic dignity, but rather allowing it to be gradually inferred from the impi-ession made by His Person and the witness of His works. On the basis of our present Gospels, apart from critical reconstructions of the teaching of Jesus, no other view is possible than that our Lord represented salvation as in some way bound to and wrapped up in His Person. He did not represent salvation as something uncondi- tioned, flowing simply from the love of God, which would over- leap every necessity of mediation. The parable of the Prodigal Son, so often quoted to the contrary, furnishes, when rightly read, the clearest demonstration of this, for it was spoken to describe not God's attitude towards sinners in the abstract, but the historic approach of God to lost men in the apjtearance of His Son Jesus. It was the attitude of Jetnoi towards publicans and sinners that drew forth the parable, and therefore it describes God's attitude towards them as bound to that assumed bv Jesus (cf. Krnst Cremer, ' Die Gleichnisse Lukas l.'i und das kreuz' in Beitr. z. Forder. Christl. Thenl. 1904, Heft 4). The gospel is not a mere announcement of the love of God unpre- ceded and unattended by any action on His part ; it is the glad message of the love of God in action, of what God does in Jesus to give His love effect in actual, substantial salvation. The un- folding of what the Person of Jesus as the bearer and worker of salvation contains could not be fully given by our Lord before His saving work had actually transpired, but had to be left to Apostolic teaching.
3. Humanly considered, .mlvriflnn is dependent on faith. This is not merely exj)licitly announced
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(Mk 16^ Lk 8^^ Jn S^s- "), it is likewise pre- supijosed or expressed in connexion with the heal- ing acts of Jesus. It is a striking fact that in the Synoptics nearly the whole of our Lord's teaching on faith attaches itself to the performance of miracles. This is because miracles embody that saving aspect of the Kingdom to which faith is the subjective counterpart. The miracles, almost with- out exception, have two features in common. Firstly, they are transactions in which the result depends absolutely on the forth-putting of the Divine supernatural powers, where no human effort could possibly contribute anything towards its accomplishment. And, secondly, the miracles are healing miracles, in which the gracious love of God approaches man for his salvation. Faith is the spiritual attitude called for by this twofold element in God's saving work. It is the recogni- tion of the Divine power and grace, — not, of course, in a purely intellectual way, but practically so as to carry with it the movement of the whole inner life. How faith stands related to the saving power of God is most clearly illustrated in the narrative of Mk Q^'^"-^. When the disciples could not heal the child with the dumb spirit, Jesus ex- claimed, ' O unbelieving generation ! ' The father says, after describing the severity of the case : ' But if thou canst do anything, have compassion on us and help us.' To this Jesus replies : ' What, if thou canst ! all things are possible to him that believeth.' Faith is omnipotent. To speak, with reference to it, of an ' if thou canst ' is an ab- surdity. Thus to faith is ascribed what can be affirmed of God alone. And elsewhere also this same principle is emphasized by our Lord (Mt 2121.22^ Mk 1122- 23^ Lk 17"). The explanation lies in this, that faith is nothing else than that act whereby man lays hold of, appropriates, the end- less power of God. This line of reasoning, how- ever, is not applicable to the miracles only. The miracles, as has been shown, illustrate the saving work of God in general. All salvation partakes, humanly speaking, of the nature of the impossible : it can be accomplished by God alone (Mt 19^^- -", Mk 1026- 27^ Lk 1826- 27). All genuine saving faith is as profoundly conscious of its utter dependence on God for deliverance from sin and death as the recipients of our Lord's miraculous cures were convinced that God alone could heal their bodies from disease. Faith, however, is more than belief, more than a conviction regarding the necessity and sufficiency of the Divine power. It also involves trust, the reliance upon God's wdllingness and readiness to save. Jesus never encouraged the exercise of faith as a mere theoretical belief in supernatural power. The performance of a sign from heaven, such as men might have witnessed without trust in God or Himself, He persistently refused. He who truly believes, realizes that God is loving, merciful, forgiving, glad to receive sinners. Faith transfers to God in the matter of salvation what human parents experience in themselves with reference to their own children, the desire to help and supply (Mt 7''""). This re- liance of faith is not confined to the critical moments of life ; it is to be the abiding, character- istic disposition of the disciple witli reference to his salvation as a whole. Faith, in those on whom the wonderful cures were wrought, may have manifested itself at first as a momentary act, but, as shown above, Jesus frequently called the atten- tion of such people to what faith had done for them, thus suggesting that it was permanently available as an instrument of salvation.