Alistair Begg defines it this way: “Saving faith is essentially the entrustment of our lives to Jesus as Lord and Savior. It is not the belief that we have been saved, nor it it even the belief that Christ died for us, but it is the commitment of ourselves to Christ as unsaved, lost, helpless, and undone in order that we may be saved.” Furthermore, dying to self is a necessary component of saving faith.

David Brainerd, an altogether selfless American missionary to 18th century American Indians, wrote this in his diary just a few months before his death at the tender, young age of 29: “Especially, I discoursed repeatedly on the nature and necessity of that humiliation, self-emptiness, or full conviction of a person’s being utterly undone in himself, which is necessary in order to a saving faith, and the extreme difficulty of being brought to this; and the great danger there is of persons taking up with some self-righteous appearances of it. The danger of this I especially dwelt upon, being persuaded that multitudes perish in this hidden way; and because so little is said from most pulpits to discover any danger here; so that persons being never effectually brought to die in themselves are never truly united to Christ, and so perish (copied from The Life and Diary of David Brainerd by Philip E. Howard, Jr.).

In Jesus’ own words, ” … Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall save it” (Mark 8:34-35). This not conjecture; this is absolute truth.