10/09/24

I saw a recent “smackdown” of comedian and news commentator, Bill Maher, by Canadian psychologist and author, Jordan Peterson, in which Maher said to Jordan (and I’m paraphrasing): “You see the answer to our nation’s woes as family and faith. I have no family and I have no faith,” to which Jordan answered, “Then you don’t have the answer.” 

I’m hoping by now you’re looking at faith a little differently. But you may be asking, “Why? Isn’t the way I’ve always thought about faith good enough?” 

Well . . . yes, and no. 

Faith is belief . . . and that’s an important place to start! But faith is also truly a case of “But wait! There’s more!” 

Faith is like a many-faceted diamond. Every time you turn it, you get a different, dazzling view.  Writing on a different, but related topic, New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright says: 

 “The Christian faith is kaleidoscopic, and  most of us are colorblind.  It is multidimensional, and most of us manage to hold at most two dimensions in our head at any one  time. It is symphonic, and we can just about whistle one of the tunes.”

Wright is referring to our ideas of what “gospel” means, but what he writes is certainly true of our ideas of “faith” as well. We have a tendency to simplify ideas or focus on one aspect of an issue and ignore the greater part of it. We’re content to admire a nice trickle of water and don’t realize that around the corner is a beautiful waterfall. It’s like the difference between giving a man a fish and teaching a man to fish: seeing faith as belief gets us into the door –saves us – but seeing “faith” in it’s multifaceted beauty leads us into a lifetime of fidelity, loyalty and faithfulness to God. 

But wait! There’s more! Let’s turn our diamond slightly and examine another facet. 

In Classical Greek, pistis (faith)  also meant confidence, assurance, persuasiveness and proof. But, in our modern world, faith is often reduced to believing something we can’t see. Richard Dawkins, the famous atheist, latched onto this, deriding faith as “the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of the lack of evidence.” 

To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, people who can’t understand ideas intended for adults shouldn’t try to discuss them.

This misunderstanding of faith comes from a mis-reading of Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” And people like Dawkins have jumped on the “conviction of things not seen” part and concluded that faith is believing something without any evidence. 

This makes people — including some good friends of mine — believe that faith is irrational. 

But that’s not the case. Think of the Greek idea of faith as “proof.” What we outwardly see points to the invisible certainty of God’s word and promises. 

What do we outwardly see? 

We look outward to see the created universe, which is evidence for God’s creative power. In Romans 1, Paul writes, “Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made.” What we see points us to the invisible Creator. In Hebrews 11:3, we read, “By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.” When we see it, our faith in God’s word is confirmed. 

Despite what talking heads may say when they try to paint faith as contrary to evidence, in accusing us of putting our brains in neutral, in Hebrews faith actually involves following evidence in order to confirm God’s powerful word. As the Hebrews writer says, “By faith we understand.” 

Biblical faith is not anti-evidence. 

Just as we look outward to see the evidence of God’s creative power in the universe, we can look inwardly to see God’s re-creative power in our changed lives. I’ve told the story of my brother who, when he was having a sharp conflict over something he built on his property, told the president of his HOA, “You should be glad I’m a Christian now because before I’d have put my fist through your face!” 

As we’ll see in our upcoming Bible study, the unity of God’s people is one of the greatest evidences of our faith. In the first century, the most powerful evidence for the truth of Christianity was when a Gentile ate with a Jew, or when a master washed the feet of a slave, or when a family adopted children who had been abandoned, or when someone cared for a diseased and dying stranger. 

That’s faith as proof.

So how do we tie all this together? Faith is a conviction that something is true. Why are you convinced? By the evidence you see of the invisible God in nature or the changed lives of people who follow Christ, and by the Spirit moving you toward that conviction. And your conviction of its truth has consequences; you reorder your life around your conviction, pledging complete fidelity to Christ and the Kingdom of God. And then your life of faithfulness and loyalty becomes evidence to another person, pointing them toward Christ, proving the gospel is true.

As members of Christ Church, I hope you’ll embrace faith in all its beautiful dimensions!  

Blessings,
Pastor Terry