Christ's Doctrine of Faith: A Study of "Believing" in John's Gospel (John 12:46)

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A note I must make to fix a mistake I made in my previous post: in my previous post, I only said that John 12:44 contains the seventy-fourth occurrence of “believe” or one of its cognates. Actually though, it contains both the seventy-fourth and seventy-fifth such occurrences. Anyway, with that note made, let’s move on!

The seventy-sixth occurrence of the idea of faith is in John 12:46. Here, the Lord Jesus Christ tells us: “I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness” (KJV). So, as usual, we are left with the questions “What is the context?” and “What are some facts about faith here?”

First, what is the context? Right after Jesus cries out and says that the one who believes in Him does not believe in Him, but in the One who sent Him, He elaborates by saying that the one who sees Him sees the One who sent Him. Then, He declares that He has come as a Light into the world, so that whoever believes in Him would not abide in darkness. This is the context of John 12:46!

Second, what are some facts about faith we can extract from here? The primary fact about faith from this passage is this: trust in Christ leads to the believer being spiritually enlightened, so that he knows God in a personal and salvific way. This personal and salvific knowledge of God is the “light” in which the Christian lives to God out of love for Him. This is a fact about faith from John 12:46!