Jerry Shugart
Well-known member
Let's see if I can play this game. Were I a Neo-MAD adherent, I'd point up first the tense of the word "believe" is in the present, and that the Greek present tense implies something that is continuous, not a one-time past event that could possibly be drifted away from at a given point in the future. It might better be translated, according to some, as "whoever believes and goes on believing." Contrast this with Paul's words in 2 Timothy 2:13, "If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself." The believer in the present dispensation becomes a member of Christ's Body (as opposed to His Bride), and Christ cannot deny Himself even if we lose faith.
To answer you I will quote these words of the Lord Jesus spoken to the Jews who lived under the law:
"Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life" (Jn.5:24).
In this verse the Greek word translated "believes" and the Greek word translated "has" are both in the "present" tense.
In The Blue Letter Bible we read the following meaning of the present tense:
"The present tense represents a simple statement of fact or reality viewed as occurring in actual time. In most cases this corresponds directly with the English present tense."
Therefore, John 5:24 is saying that those who were believing at the time the Lord Jesus spoke those words received eternal life the second when they believed. That is what is meant as something being "viewed as occuring in actual time."
So once a Jew who lived under the law believed he received eternal life and given the assurance that he will not be judged.
I'd also say the word "believe" here is shorthand for the concept of a saving faith as later illustrated by James in his epistle to the circumcision, and implies those things that are concomitant with a saving faith, which is to say, works.
Please quote one Greek expert who says that the Greek word translated "believe" can mean that.
And let us look how James says here about how one is born of God:
"Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures" (Jas.1:18).