The Purpose of Faith

"We are so selfish that we tend not to look any further than our own concerns and interests.  So long as we are pardoned and saved we care little about Christ's interests and concerns.  But this attitude is not born in a true faith in and love for God.  The chief duty of faith and love is to lead us to prefer Christ above ourselves, and his concerns above our own." ~ John Owen

Too often the message of faith in Christ ends with pardon for sins and salvation.  What more is there? is the common question of response when pushed on the matter.  But I think this reveals much about both the gospel that we are preaching and the message people are "receiving."  We tend to think of Christianity as a get out of jail free card rather than a life transforming call.  We see Christianity as a flu shot that inoculates us from hell rather than radical change of heart that will unmistakably and permanently change a person's heart from a rebel set in opposition to God to a saint transformed by the grace of God.  The chief end of faith is not to save a person from hell, but rather to bring a person into the presence of God through Christ and being made into the likeness of Christ.  There is a profound difference.  The former has at its core ourselves.  I don't want to go to hell.  I want to go to heaven.  I want.... I want... I want....  The later has at its core Christ.  Christ changing the heart through faith.  Christ making us into his disciples.  Christ changing the desires of the heart from ourselves to Him.  Christ making much of Himself.  The purpose of faith is to get us off of ourselves and to make us into the likeness of Christ.  This is why throughout history one of Christ's primary tools for making us more like him has been persecution, sickness, and suffering.  For there is nothing like those three to get us to the end of our own rope and depending on Him quickly.