Faith, Hope, Love, all three

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

One idea one gets from some notable Reformed theologians is that only faith justifies because only faith is passive and outward looking (or worse, “extraspective“). Hope and Love are active, would imply works and merit, while faith is not and does not.

But it seems to me that all three could easily be understood as outward oriented. “Hope” can be used as virtually a synonym for trust or faith.

Now Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.

And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.

She who is truly a widow, left all alone, has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day, but she who is self-indulgent is dead even while she lives. Command these things as well, so that they may be without reproach.

As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.

And likewise, Paul does not portray loving God as some kind of moral heroism but as nothing more than caring and hoping in one’s own well-being with the recognition that it is bound up in the other:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

There is no great credit in loving your wife because you are insane and self-hating not to love her. How much more is there no credit or merit in loving Jesus and God when one recognizes that they are the key to one’s own purpose and provision!

So when taking “love” and “hope” in the abstract, I don’t think that it would be difficult to produce credible descriptions from the Biblical data that are just as passive and outward looking.

It seems to me that the reason that faith is singled out as the means by which we are counted righteous before God needs to be sought elsewhere. Sociologically, I think the point is that all those who confess the true God (confess their faith or belief) belong to Jesus whether or not the are circumcised. All are righteous before God, belong to his covenant people, without any other condition.

On a more personal level, I suspect the key issue is the promissory nature of salvation. While one could easily also put hope in this place, the more fundamental reality is one has hope because one trusts God to keep His promises. So faith is the human response to God’s faithfulness that He has kept and keeps His promises:

By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

This last I take as a word play that is stating from God’s faithfulness to our faith. That, I believe, matches the appeal to Habakkuk which is all about God’s faithfulness in adversity and how those who trust Him, count him faithful, are righteous in His sight.

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