What About Faith Being a Gift of God?

Dr. Couch, thank you for some clarification about faith being a gift of God. It seems as if the best of theologians agree, right? 

 

    That is correct. And especially those who know Greek. 

    What I teach from the Greek text is that faith is merely the instrument by which we are saved, but it is clearly the gift of God. A. A. Hodge writes: “Faith is the gift of God—Eph. 2:8; Phil. 1:29.” Thiessen writes:

From the divine side: The writer of Hebrews speaks of Jesus as being “the author and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2). Clearly, faith is a gift of God (Rom. 12:3; 2 Pet. 1:1), sovereignly given by the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 12:9; cf. Gal. 5:22). Paul speaks of the whole aspect of salvation as being a gift of God (Eph. 2:8), and surely that includes faith.

    The former president of Wheaton College (where I attended and Walvoord also), James Buswell, said in his Systematic Theology: “Saving faith is a Gift of God. In Eph. 2:8 touto is neuter, showing that it is not merely grace, and not merely faith, but the entire concept of grace accepted by faith, which must be regarded as a gift of God.”

    Shedd in his Systematic Theology writes:

Election does not rest upon faith …, any more than upon a foreseen outward work. Faith is a gift of God to man (Eph. 1:8); therefore it cannot first be a gift of man to God, as the ground and reason of his electing act. If election depends upon foreseen faith, God does not first choose man, but man first chooses God, which is contrary to John 15:16. The Bible represents God as the author alone of election, regeneration, faith, and repentance (Rom. 9:16; 8:7; John 1:12-13; 3:5; 6:44, 65).

    Thanks for asking.

    Dr. Mal Couch