BIBSTUD:

Gods Loving Revelation and Mans Faithful Response:

Revelation comes from the verb to reveal which means to make known. Indeed when God speaks to man it is to make Himself known to man.

God has spoken to his final word in Jesus, the Word of God made man.

Therefore JESUS is called the fullness of revelation.

And this revelation is entrusted to the Church.Divine Revelation- is Gods ways of making Himself known to us for salvation.

How does God reveal Himself?

God reveals Himself in:

1. Creating us and everything we see, hear and touch-from the beginning till now. (natural signs)2. His words and deeds in Sacred Scriptures record of salvation history, completed and perfected in His Son made-man, Jesus Christ. (biblical signs) 3. His continuing presence by the Holy Spirit in His people, the Church. (ecclesial signs)

4. The prayer and sacramental worship, doctrine, and moral service of the Church. (liturgical signs)

5. His interior presence (Grace) in our conscience and in all the events of our daily lives, world events, recognized in the signs of the times. Our faith is our response to Gods revelation. It is our friendship with Christ and through Christ with the Father, in their Holy Spirit.

Our personal conviction and belief in God, our Father as revealed by Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit is known as FAITH As a living response to God, faith includes:

our mind ( believing in God)

our will (doing Gods will)

our heart (entrusting ourselves to God in prayer and worship)How important is faith? Faith is necessary to become our true selves and thus gain our salvation, that is, union with God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. To the three human classic questions Faith responds What can I know? God our Father and Christ our Lord. What should I do? Love others as Christ does. What may I hope for? Christs presence and life everlastingHow can we be sure of our faith?

Faith is something like the loving knowledge we have of our family and friends. We are sure of their love and we try to respond to them. Likewise, through Gods Revelation in Christ, we are absolutely sure of His love for us, and try to respond through the gift of faith. The faith of a Christian has three aspects. These are:

1. Doctrine or Truth of Faith

Tradition, the Holy Scripture and the Church Teachings are the sources of our doctrine. Doctrine is sometimes referred to as the Word.2. Morals or the actual day-to-day relationship with oneself, with others and with God.

The Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes guide us in our daily actions. By following the 10 commandments and the 8 beatitudes, we can make the right decisions. We are Witnesses to the Word of God when we live according to His Commandments. 3. Worship or the ability to reach out to God and the community

This is accomplished through personal prayers and participation in the celebration of the sacraments. To worship means to pray, to celebrate liturgy and to honor God. When we participate in the Mass and in other Sacraments or when we do a kind deed because we love God, we are worshipping Him.

Living the Faith:

Faith is a gift of God, it is not something which comes merely from our own doing. The Catechism for Filipino Catholics (CFC) affirms that faith depends upon God for two things:

First, Gods free gift of revealing Himself throughout salvation history;

Second, for the grace of the Holy Spirits interior illumination and inspiration which gives to all joy to the truth and believing in it. (CFC 149) This means that we have faith because God freely and lovingly called us to Himself through His Son Jesus Christ; yet we cannot respond to Gods call unless the Holy Spirit moves our heart and converts it to God.

Even if faith is a gift of God, it demands our free cooperation. For faith is a dynamic reality. It needs to grow. It is a life, and like all life, it can never remain static.(PCP II 68). The person who has accepted this gift of faith must strive to make it grow, bear fruits and mature into loving, life-giving faith We need , therefore ,to live the faith. To live the faith is to allow it to touch our minds (believing), our wills (doing) and our hearts (trusting). Believing, doing and trusting are the three essentials dimensions of faith. This means that faith is not faith if one of these three is absent . The Diagram of Catholic FAITH:

The triangle represents the whole Christian Faith with its three essential dimensions of Doctrine, Morals and Worship; in the center is a circle uniting the three sides of the triangle, and their grounding in orthodoxy and orthopraxis, based on the three principal sources of the Faith:); Scripture, Tradition and Human Experience ; the square bracketed terms-(Dogmatism), (Activism), (Ritualism) indicate deficient Faith when only one dimensions is exercised (Cf. CFC 221-222;240-42;209-11) at the three points of the triangle, two side (two dimensions) of the Faith connect, but the third (opposite side) is lacking; the bottom left corner doctrine and worship side connect in Pious Dogmatism,). but no Morals (No Praxis); the bottom right corner, Worship and Morals connect to produce Idealistic Activism, but lack the opposite side Doctrine (No doctrinal base); the top of the triangle, Doctrine and Morals intersect, but no Worship (No prayer).Orthodoxy

Orthopraxis

Scripture/

Tradition/

Human Experience