Wendelin's "Christian Theology": Doctrine of Justifying Faith, Part 2

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THESIS VII:  The Matter is in which and about which.

THESIS VIII:  The Matter in which, or the receiving subject, is man elected to eternal life, whose intellect and will is affected by faith.

EXPLANATION:  I.  Justifying and saving faith is proper to the elect:  which is proven:

(1.)  By express testimonies of Scripture.  Titus 1:1, where faith is said to be of God’s elect.  Acts 13:48, as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.  John 10:26, ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, that is, of the elect.

(2.)  The elect alone are justified and glorified:  Therefore, the elect alone are gifted with faith.  The rationale of the consequence:  Because, whoever is gifted with faith, those alone are justified; but whoever is justified, those also are glorified, Romans 8:30.

(3.)  The elect alone are made members of Christ:  Therefore, the elect alone are gifted with justifying faith.  The rationale of the consequence:  because whoever are furnished with true faith are the members of Christ, for by faith we are ingrafted into Christ.  The antecedent is proven:  Because God predestinated the elect alone, whom He would adopt unto Himself as children by Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of His will.[1]

(4.)  If true and saving faith with its requisites were common to the elect with reprobates, there would be no certain criteria of election and eternal salvation:  But the consequent is absurd:  Therefore also the antecedent.

The rationale of the hypothetical:  because all certainty of election and salvation is had à posteriori, namely, from the proper effects of election:  which sort of effect, if there is no faith with its requisites, will not be.

II.  That saving faith is given, not only to the elect, but also to reprobates, the Lutherans and Papists contend and thus prove:

(1.)  Some reprobates receive the word with joy, and believe for a time, and in the midst of temptations fall away from the faith.

Therefore, saving faith is also given to some reprobates.

The antecedent is proven out of Matthew 13:20.

Response:  I deny the consequence.  The rationale for the negation:  because faith, wherewith there is belief only for a time, and from which there is a falling away in temptations, is not saving and justifying, but hypocritical and merely temporary:  which is different from saving faith, as we have shown a little before.

(2.)  Some reprobates are renewed and implanted in Christ.

Therefore, some reprobates are also gifted with saving faith.

The rationale of the consequence:  because no one is renewed and implanted in Christ except by saving faith.

The antecedent is proven, Romans 11:20, where they are said to have been broken off of the tree of life through unbelief:  whence it is evident that they were previously ingrafted in that tree by faith.

Response:  I deny the antecedent.  To the proof I respond:  If those that are said to have been broken off of the tree of life through unbelief were reprobates, I deny that they were truly and by saving faith ingrafted in Christ, but only by external profession, through which they appeared to have been ingrafted in Christ.  Whence they are said to have been broken off, when because of their unbelief and hypocrisy they are rejected from the society of the Church:  as it happened of old to the Jews, concerning whom the Apostle speaks in the passage alleged.

Note:  Wherever in Scripture faith is attributed to those that are damned, and so are reprobates, there saving faith is not understood:  but either a mere external and hypocritical profession of faith:  or a historical and temporary faith.  As faith is true and apparent:  so also is ingrafting true and apparent:  κατὰ ἀλήθειαν ἢ κατὰ δόξαν, in accordance with truth or in accordance with appearance.  In this controversy the more recent Lutherans are contradicted by Luther and the old Lutherans:  who teach that justifying faith is a good proper to the elect.  See our Exercitation 118, § 11.

III.  That faith does not only cleave to the intellect, but also extends to the will, against some Papists (for not all dissent from us on this point) we prove:

(1.)  Because it is a law:  But all law pertains to the will, Romans 3:27.

(2.)  Because it is trust:  as we shall prove shortly.

(3.)  Because it does not only understand the good/benefit in a general way, but also applies it to itself.

(4.)  Because it is only then praised, if it be ἀνυπόκριτος/anupokritos/ unfeigned, that is, without hypocrisy, 1 Timothy 1:5.  But as hypocrisy pertains to the will, so does sincerity.

(5.)  Because faith is also love.  But love is an act of the will.  Augustine on Psalm 130, This is what it means to believe upon Christ, namely, to love Him.  The same Augustine in de prædestionatione Sanctorum, chapter 5, expressly says that faith is in the will.

IV.  Against the contrary opinion Bellarmine takes exception.

A single virtue is able to be only in a single subject.

Therefore, faith is not able to be in two faculties, as subjects, namely, in the intellect and will at the same time.

Response:  The antecedent is granted only of one simple virtue, not having distinct parts.  But faith is not a simple virtue of this sort:  but consists of diverse parts, knowledge, assent, and trust:  which do not pertain to the same faculty.  Thus Bellarmine locates hope in the intellect and will, de Justificatione, book 3, chapter 11.

V.  It is asked:  Whether infants also are gifted with justifying faith.

Response:  The opinions of the Theologians vary.

Some simply deny all faith to infants, and contend that it is proper to adults.  Others attribute habitual faith to them, but not actual faith:  yet others, the seed or root of faith:  still others, in the place of faith, new motions:  others, faith consisting in knowledge, assent, and trust:  and others, faith indeed, but diverse from the faith of adults, in such a way that an account of it is not able to be set forth by us.  Those that deny all faith to infants, acknowledge none but that which is conspicuous in adults:  and, since unto infants destitute of the use of reason no knowledge, no assent, no trust appears to be able to fall, they think that faith is rightly denied to them.  But these are pressed with difficulties by no means slight.  For, if infants are altogether without all faith, either none are saved; or, if some are saved without faith, the manner of obtaining salvation will be twofold, one for adults, another for infants:  which, whether it be agreeable to Scripture, many doubt.  Also in this manner, those universal pronouncements of Scripture are not to be referred promiscuously to all, but to adults only, and so are to be restricted:  Without faith it is impossible to please God, Hebrews 11:6.  He that believeth not is condemned already, John 3:18.  Without holiness no man shall see God, Hebrews 12:14.  Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God, John 3:5.  At this point assent is with good reason withheld.

Therefore, all faith does not appear to be withheld from infants; even if what sort it be is by no means able to be explained:  for the knowledge, assent, and trust, of the sort that belongs to adults, the imperfection of infants does not allow to be attributed to them.  It is added, that also by this rationale the word would not be the ordinary instrument of faith in the Church of Christ, if before the hearing of the word, in tender infants, there were already knowledge, assent, and trust, of the sort found in adults.

But that faith, which we attribute to infants, should one wish to call it either habitual, and in that respect potency, or the seed and root, with respect to the faith of adults, we do not morosely contradict, for all acknowledge this difficulty to be obscure.  See Calvin, Institutes, book 4, chapter 16, § 17-19.  Some here allege the passage, Matthew 18:6, whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him, etc.  But how aptly, let them look to it:  For Christ speaks of little ones that are able to be offended.  But infants, crying in the cradle, destitute of the use of reason, are able to be discouraged by no stumbling-block.  Concerning the faith of infants, see Exercitations 76, 68, 9, 11, 19.

* VI.  Finally, it is asked:  Whether there was faith in the soul of Christ?

Response:  A distinction is to be made between so-called faith in general, and faith in particular, which latter we call justifying:  the object of which is special mercy, and the act of which is the apprehension and application of the merit of Christ.  Was the latter faith in the soul of Christ?  For Christ had no need of a Redeemer, because He was not a sinner, but the Redeemer of sinners.  Yet He had so-called faith in general, consisting in the knowledge and assent that is had to the word of God:  seeing that the interpreter of the divine will prescribed faith to men:  which He certainly would not have done, if He Himself had not had faith in the teaching as altogether true.  Thus Christ was also certain of His hearing in all things that He would ask, John 11:41, 42.

The judgment is also the same in the case of the faith of Angels, who know and believe that God is perfectly trustworthy in all His promises.

Neither is all faith wanting to the saints in heaven, even if it is not that whereby what things are hoped subsists, and which demonstrates what things are not seen, Hebrews 11:1.  To this faith has succeeded vision, in which they now actually have what wayfarers hope for.

[1] Ephesians 1:5.