Faith credited as Righteousness

Ephesians 2:8 NASB
For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this salvation is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;

The Greek construction of "though faith" is "dia pisteos." The preposition "dia" has the instrumentality meanings of "by means of" and "by reason of" and "because of." Some claim the meaning of the phrase is "not through faith" or the opposite of what scripture teaches. But for those who believe scripture means what it says, then faith provides either the means by which we are saved or faith is part of the basis of why we were saved. In any event, God utilizes our faith. Since the means by which we are saved is the precious blood of Christ, it follows that our credited faith forms the basis of our election for salvation.

Romans 4:23-24 teaches God will credit the faith of those who believe - God raised Jesus from the dead - for the believer's benefit. Some deny that benefit is salvation, but it would be absurd to say God saves those whose faith He does not credit as righteousness.

Does our faith need to be spot on, containing all the right doctrine, and held in just the right ferment way? Nope
God either chooses to credit our worthless, filthy rag faith as righteous or not based on His knowledge of our heart. Lack of our deeply rooted commitment or lack of Christ being our overriding priority does not bode well for accreditation.

 

1) Obvious, you need to read Hebrews chapter 11, where Old Testament Saints obtained approval "by Faith." So for you to ask if any faith in God and His Promises existed before the birth, life, death and resurrection of Christ Jesus, is without merit.

2) 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 presents the basis of our faith in the gospel of Christ, our New Covenant faith.

3) Of course if Christ is not risen, our faith is in vain! Duh

4) What is credited as righteousness is OUR, OUR, REPEAT OUR faith, as flawed as it may be. God and God alone chooses to credit our faith as righteousness, He does not find our faith any better than a filthy rag. What would give you the idea a lost person could do some work of righteousness that would satisfy the requirements of God when you know all our works of righteousness as as filthy rags to God?