Here’s a challenge for you… go to any Bible study, Sunday School class, or online Bible forum, and ask the question, “What is faith?”

You will get a variety of answers. One common answer is, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, thge evidence of things not seen.” That answer is a quotation of Hebrews 11:1. Your next step is to ask, “What does that mean?”

The tragedy of modern Western Christianity is that salvation comes by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8-9), but most don’t even know what faith is.

So, what is faith?

If we don’t know what faith is, how can we be saved? If we don’t understand faith, can we truly experience redemption and reconciliation?

In John 3, Jesus is approached by Nicodemus, who recognizes that Jesus was sent by God, but the Lord’s radical teaching of repentance and faith did not always line up with the religious traditions that Nicodemus followed.

Nicodemus, unlike his fellow Pharisees, wanted the truth. Recognizing that Jesus came from God, and that what Nicodemus believed didn’t line up with what Jesus taught, Nicodemus came to Jesus to reconcile his personal belief system with what God actually wanted.

Jesus knew this, which is why Jesus said that a man “must be born again” in order to be saved.

The rest of the conversation in John 3 is about how to be born again, that is, how to be saved, or how to be redeemed and reconciled to God. John 3 is one of the most important passages of scripture, because it is here that Jesus, the only Begotten Son of God who went to the cross to pay for our sins, tells us how to be saved.

These instructions on how to be saved are as valid and true to us today as they were to Nicodemus. Nothing has been added or changed since, for if it were, this passage would not have been recorded in scripture.

In John 3, telling us how to be born again, Jesus tells us that “whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” And just in case we confuse ourselves on what it means to believe, Jesus tells us (and Nicodemus) and Old Testament Bible story.

In John 3:14, Jesus said, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

In this verse, Jesus references an incident from the book of Numbers, where Israel complained and rebelled against God. Because of the severity of their rebellion, the LORD sent what the King James Version refers to as “fiery serpents” into the camp. Fiery serpents were more than likely poisonous snakes, as the scripture described how they bit the people, and the people began dying.

As they died, they cried out to Moses for help. Moses prayed to God, and God told Moses to make a bronze serpent, place it on a pole, and set it up in the middle of camp. If anyone is bitten, they can look at that bronze serpent and live.

Being saved from the snake bites in Numbers was as simple as looking to that serpent on the pole. No sacrifices, no offerings, no religious works. Just a simple look.

In John 3, Jesus said in the same way, He was to be lifted up on the cross. And in the same way, if people look to Him on the cross, they will be saved. Looking to Jesus on the cross constitutes belief, because that is what you are depending on for your forgiveness and salvation. Because Jesus went to the cross, you know you have been redeemed and reconciled to God.

Belief in Jesus is as simple as looking to Jesus and remembering that He redeemed you through His death on the cross. And that belief is the ONLY condition that must be met in order to be saved.

Faith and belief are used interchangeably in the New Testament. They are both translated from the same Greek word. So, with that in mind, we conclude that faith simply means a belief, a trust in the Lord. We have faith because we believe that Jesus will receive us into Heaven, because He paid for our sins on the cross. That’s faith. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Faith is not a religious system. Faith is not an expression of religious works (on the contrary, your works reveal whether or not you have faith.) Faith is belief.

Do you believe in Jesus? Do you believe that He died on the cross for your sins? Can you look to Him on that cross and know that because of His death and resurrection, you are going to Heaven? If you can, and if you have done that, you have been saved, and you have become a Christian.

While that faith will change the way you live and think, please know and be assured that it is the faith that has saved you.

May God bless you.