What is it to believe in Jesus? First, the firm and cordial assent to scriptural Gospel truth. God sent His Son, born of a Jewish virgin woman, to die in the place of guilty men. God the Father laid on Jesus the iniquities of us all. He bore the punishment due to our sins, and was made a Curse for us. True faith is a sincere belief of scriptural truth. Heartily believe the Gospel: Isaiah 53:5-7. The grand doctrine of Substitution - II Corinthians 5:19-21. God ordained to save sinful men by a substitutional sinless, bloody Sacrifice. Sin was punished in the person of Jesus Christ, and now mercy is extend to the guilty. Give hearty assent to Jesus offering Himself up to suffer in our place. Agree with all your soul and mind to God's way of free salvation by simple faith in Jesus' atoning blood.
Second, Accept the Sin-Bearer for yourself. You have committed personal and actual sin against God. You are lost by the sin of first Adam, you must be saved by the Righteousness of Another, which must personally accept and appropriate for yourself. Jesus has offered a bloody Atonement, and that Atonement becomes yours when you accept it by putting your trust in Jesu alone now.
Third, there must a personable trust. First, comes assent to the truth, then acceptance of that truth for yourself, and then a simple trusting of yourself wholly to Christ Jesus, as your Substitute. The essence of faith is trust, reliance, dependence on the Blood and Righteousness of Jesus Christ. Cast away every other confidence of every sort, save confidence in Jesus' Precious Blood. Jesus satisfied God's divine justice by enduring the wrath of God on the Cross. Jesus took all the punishment that was due to our sin at the end of our days. Look alone to Jesus' finished work who God has set forth to be the Propitiation for human sin.
Faith in Jesus Christ's Blood alone brings immediate salvation. Receive Christ freely, trust yourself with Him now. Look to His dear wounds. What is it to believe on Jesus Christ? It is just this: it is to trust yourself with Jesus now. Faith in God is true wisdom - childlike confidence in the word of God. Constant trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Childlike confidence in Christ crucified. Stop living impulsively in the motions of sin. True faith is always praying faith.
Saving faith is the work of the Holy Ghost, not you. All your sinful life will laid bare at the Judgment. True saving faith concerns itself with the person and work the Lamb of God whom God raised from the dead. Childlike gratitude, adoring love, holy obedience, and trembling at God's words. Childlike trust in Jesus alone. Trust your soul with Him. The Holy Spirit's first work in any sinner is the withering of all human hope and righteousness. The awful withering of the Spirit of God dries up vain human glory. The merits of Christ is only gotten by faith in His Blood, so keep to that. Confide in Christ abundantly, constantly. Be done with self-saving. Confide alone in the Son of God - the bleeding Sin-Bearer for guilty man. Quit your self-righteous struggle against God's Son, and rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. Real faith trusts Jesus Christ when it cannot trace Him. You need to faith God, when you can't find Him.
