The Apostle Paul also
taught that a believer’s continuing faith played a role in his sanctification,
both as an instrument to enable specific ministry and as a conduit for receipt
of Divine grace and transformation in general.  As in the Old Testament king David, despite trial and
affliction (Psalm 116:1-9), spoke for the Lord because he believed (Psalm
116:10), so Paul and other preachers speak and preach the truth and endure
persecution (2 Corinthians 4:8-12) because of their continuing faith in Christ
(2 Corinthians 4:13) arising out of their conversion.  That is, Christian ministry, specifically bold preaching of
the gospel in the face of tremendous hostility and opposition, arises out of
the continuing faith and confidence of the believer in the risen Christ, his
Redeemer (2 Corinthians 4:14). 
Paul also taught that God fills believers with all joy and peace as they
believe and by means of their faith (Romans 15:13); faith is the human response
through which God makes the believer holy, filling him with the holy attributes
of hope, peace, and joy.  The
Apostle Paul taught that faith was the necessary foundation for boldness and
perseverance in gospel ministry and the means through which God transforms
believers into His image.  Thus, as
the verb believe illuminates the
believer’s greater entrustment of himself to Christ in progressive
sanctification, so the noun faith
illuminates the role of faith in the spiritual life of the regenerate.[i]  Faith prompts the believer to perform
specific spiritual ministries, such as speaking for Christ (2 Corinthians
4:13), for power from the Holy Spirit arises out of the “hearing of faith.”[ii]  Faith prompts generous sharing of
physical goods with other believers (Philemon 5-7).  Saving faith will always result in good works (James 2).[iii]  Furthermore, faith is indeed essential
for spiritual life and growth, because whatever does not proceed out of,
whatever is not sourced in faith is sin (Romans 14:23).[iv]  A strong faith will trust in God and
His promises despite human impossibilities, while a weak faith will stagger in
such situations (Romans 4:19-20).[v]  The degree of weakness or strength of
faith leads the believer to its respective degree of proneness to wander and
susceptability to fall or to stedfastness and faithfulness (Romans 14).  Patience is produced by faith that is
successfully tried and tested.[vi]  It is not surprising, then, that by “taking[vii]
the shield of faith” and the “breastplate of faith and love,” the Christian can
“quench all the fiery darts of the wicked,” “stand,”[viii]
and “resist . . . the devil . . . steadfast in the faith”[ix]—faith
is key to resisting sin and Satan. 
Indeed, God continually keeps, preserves, and guards His people through
faith, and so brings them to ultimate salvation.[x]  Those with faith are the regenerate,
and all such people definitively overcame the world at the moment of their
conversion, are overcoming now, and will ultimately and finally overcome the
world and enter the eternal kingdom.[xi]
 Faith in both its initial bestowal
and its increase in sanctification is not an autonomous product of man, but is
initially created and subsequently strengthened by the supernatural efficacy of
the Holy Spirit,[xii] although
not the Spirit alone, but also the Father and the Son, and therefore, the
entire Trinity, give believers both initial faith (2 Peter 1:1) and ever
greater measures of faith, love, and other spiritual graces (Ephesians
6:23).  Through the efficacious
working of God, the believer’s faith is established, strengthened, and
confirmed, with the result that it abounds[xiii]
and “groweth exceedingly.”[xiv]  God produces this increase of faith
through the Scripture, for faith, while ultimately resting on God, proximately
rests upon His revelation of Himself in the Word.  While God produces faith, believers are responsible to “add
to their faith” virtue, knowledge, and other holy graces, which develop out of
the root of faith;  believers are
to diligently and industriously pursue the means to obtain what they desire God
to bestow upon them,[xv]
and in this manner their faith, knowledge, godliness, charity, and other holy
graces will be in them all the more, increasing and abounding, with the result
that they bear spiritual fruit.[xvi]  Sanctification takes place as one is
“nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine,” inspired words that
both produce faith and sound doctrine and which describe and delimit what such
faith and doctrine are.[xvii]  Believers are to “stand fast in the
faith” (1 Corinthians 16:13), for Paul writes, “by faith ye stand” (2
Corinthians 1:24).  Indeed,
believers “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7),[xviii]
so the spiritual life of the Christian is a walk of faith, specifically, faith
in the Son of God (Galatians 2:20),[xix]
through whom believers are strengthened by the Spirit to employ their free,
gracious, and confident access by faith to the Father.[xx]  Rather than Jewish ceremonial, faith
that works by and is being energized by love is what matters (Galatians 5:6).[xxi]  The believer’s faith can grow in
quantity, resulting in his proper exercise of his spiritual giftedness and in
holy living (Romans 12:3-21), for the more faith the believer has, the more
spiritual joy and other holy graces he has, and the greater progress he makes
in holiness (Philippians 1:25).[xxii]  An increase of faith will result in an
increase in good works, in the “work of faith.”[xxiii]  Indeed, while all believers already
have Christ in them,[xxiv]
the Father grants that believers, as they are spiritually strengthened, have
Christ dwelling[xxv] in their
hearts by faith in an ever greater way, and as His special presence in them
increases, they are rooted and grounded in love for their brethren,
experientially know the love of Christ, and are filled with ever greater degrees
of the fulness of God.[xxvi]

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