Day 222: John 20:24–31

These are written so that you may believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and by believing you may have life in His name (v. 31).

In his book Encountering John, Andreas J. KÖstenberger wrote:

Apart from “Jesus” and “Father” there is no theologically significant word that occurs more frequently in John’s Gospel than the word “believe” (pisteuo; 98 times). . . . Another interesting observation is that while John uses the verb “to believe” almost a hundred times, he does not once use the corresponding noun (pistis, “faith”). It appears therefore that John’s primary purpose is to engender in his readers the act of believing, of placing their trust in Jesus Christ.48

Glory to God! John’s Gospel doesn’t just call us to belief, as if it were in the past tense and complete. In Christ we are called to be living verbs, Beloved! We are called to the ongoing act of believing! Yes, for many of us the belief that secures our salvation is past tense and complete. In other words, we have already trusted Christ for salvation, and we are now and forever secured. But tragically too many live in past-tense belief, believing God for little more from that time forward.

Believing in Christ and believing Christ can be two very different things. We begin with the former, but we certainly don’t want to end there! We want to keep believing what Jesus says about Himself, His Father, and us until we see Him face-to-face.

Think of the roll call of the faithful in Hebrews 11. As eternally vital as faith is, none of these were commended for the initial faith that enabled them to enter a relationship with God. Rather, they were commended for ongoing acts of believing at times when their physical eyes could not see what God told them they could believe.

It’s by no coincidence either that the same Gospel that speaks so often about the act of believing also includes the word “life” more than any other. Any of those in the great cloud of witnesses of Hebrews 11 would tell us that really living the Christian life is synonymous with really believing the God who created it.