The Gift of Faith
Paper Ninth(TOC)
The Gift of Faith
"To another faith by the same Spirit"—1 Corinthians 12:9
The Bible treats of a phase of faith differing from both faith in its saving exercise and faith in its fullness; this it very properly designates the gift of faith. When Paul enumerates the gifts sovereignly bestowed upon believers in the twelfth chapter of I Corinthians, the gift of faith is prominent in the list. The gift of faith operates in spheres which are not available to saving faith or to the fullness of faith; it apprehends results which only the supernatural illuminations of the Holy Spirit reveal to the soul as possible to faith. Without such a supernatural revelation the existence and exercise of charismatic faith, or the gift of faith, is impossible.
There is a gift of faith; it has not been withdrawn from Gods people; it, like other manifestations of himself, the selfsame Spirit worketh in them who believe, as hitherto. Several features of the gift of faith may be profitably considered.