Having Faith as St. Paul or as Our Lord seems to use it here doesn’t mean that we have to believe a certain set of logical propositions to be saved. It’s also not about believing in one key idea that serves as a magic talisman to open the gate of heaven to our command. (For some reason, perhaps because of our educations, this seems to be a commonly held mistaken belief today.)

Faith is much more complicated and much more simple than believing a fact or reciting a creed.

When I was in seminary, my liturgics professor Paul Marshall (who later become my bishop in Bethlehem) pointed out something about the way the catechumenate functioned in the early church. The catechumenate was the time people who were planning to be baptized often were asked to spend up to three years in preparation before they were baptized in a dark and powerfully emotional service on Easter Eve.

I suppose that it was inevitable that folks who were in seminary also spending three years in preparation for a big service that would give us a new status in the Church would leap to the conclusion that the three years of baptismal training must have looked very similar to the three years of academic preparation that we were undergoing.

But Prof. Marshall said that wasn’t the case at all. The three years did have teaching and instruction associated with them, but more importantly, the three years of the baptismal preparation where meant to be a time of testing to see if the person planning on becoming a Christian was capable of living the life that Christians were expected to live.

Could they be honest? Could they be loving? Could they love their neighbor? Would they honor God by keeping the commandments? Could they live peaceably with the rest of the saints in their local congregation? Would they be able to remain faithful in times of trial?

All of these were considered much more important to being a Christian than that they believed the right beliefs or proclaimed the doctrines properly. Systematic theology and teaching were still developing and there was little point to insisting on one understanding versus another when the Church as it then existed held both and perhaps a third.

So if faith, as understood in the early Church wasn’t a matter of assenting to ideas, what was it? It seems to have a great deal more to do with enduring than it does with acting… Which may be why St. Paul says in another place we are not saved by our actions, we are saved by faith, by trust.

The sermon below has a number of concrete examples of what that sort of faith looks like. I’m afraid that as an older clergy person I have a lot of examples to share so… it’s pretty long. Get comfortable…

You can view the sermon direclty by following this link.