The words the English language is missing for the verb form of Faith or what was needed for the tranalators to translate "pisteuo" are , faithe, faither, and faithing.
I've shared some good back ground with you, now lets get down to the nuts and bolts of what true faithand faithing is.
I read a post a couple of days ago here, and it stated that "faith is not in mans nature." My blood boiled, because thats basically all we are.
With the definition of Faithing (pisteuo) being, "An action , based upon a belief, sustained by confidence." How many times in a day do we do that? We probably perform a 100 acts of faith before we get in our car to drive to work. Everything we do is an act of faithing or pisteuo. When we get out of bed in the morning, do we check to make sure our legs work, or that the floor will hold us up when we stand on it? Do we check our blood pressure to make sure it won't give out before we make it the the bathroom? These are all acts of faith, the verb.
Now, theres a difference between the thousands of acts of faithing we perform all day long and what "NT Faithing is".
NT faithing or "pisteuo" in the Greek is a specific act. This act had to be available before Gods Word right, Gods Word wasn't being written for public consumption until the 1500's. And for us who do have Gods Word, Faithing has to be something that has nothing to do with Gods Word. That may hit you wrong but hear me out.
Rom. 8:9 defines a foundational state of being that we are all bound to, and reads. "And if anyone has not the Spirit of Christ, He is none of his."
Now, we all start out in the beginning in this state. We do not have the Spirit of Christ, so Christ is not ours. I will take it one step further and say, if Christs Spirit is not ours, and if Christ is not ours, then His Word can't be ours either. So "believing in Gods Word to receive His Spirit is impossible because Gods Word is not ours in the binning of our walk yet. That is why i said Nt faithing has to be something that God accepts, that is not tied to His Word.
The answer, is in the Greek dictionary. Pisteuo, "A personal surrender to Him, and a conduct inspired by such surrender."
Nt faith and faithiong is a continual surrendering of our lives to Him, and a life inspired by that surrender. This means, that when we make our first surrender to Him, He watches us to see if we back up that surrender with evidence that we really mean what we have done. Every little decision we make during every day tells God that we really have surrendered our life to Him. And that daily continual surrender is the life of faith that has been lost to time. The trust that todays church world stands on, "trusting that God will do what He said He would do in His Word", is not saving faith and will result in nothing. Nt faithing is in a real person.
Christ is formed in our hearts by Faith, by a continual surrendering of our lives to Him, and a conduct inspired by that surrender. When Christ comes into our hearts, not by some kind of perfect daily surrendering, but by a genuine continual surrendering of our life and will to Him , His Spirit will be sealed in us. If we have the Spirit of Christ, we have the "mind of Christ", nobody has a clue what that means or feels like. Yet everyone has the spirit of christ because of a moment of "belief".
Thats just not true.
Was this the direction you thought i was going Pops? I look forward to your reply.