Transcribed from the Words of Life Radio Program.
It is wonderful to be together again as we look into the Word of God. The title for the lesson is “Faith with Reason.” And our study text is taken from the New Testament the book of Hebrews chapter 11 versus 1 through 3 which will get to in the body of our lesson.
What follows in this lesson is a very practical, hopefully thought-provoking, and witnessing of our faith to others. Many people, in our increasingly secular society, have the impression that Christians live in two type worlds – the world of faith and the world of reason. That there is a dichotomy between the two, a separation between the two they believe about Christians. The world of faith, they believe, is the realm that Christians primarily live in and on Sundays, and when Christians are commenting on spiritual or moral issues. However, largely the unbeliever’s impression is that Christians contradictorily, inconsistently live in the realm of reason throughout the rest of any given week when dealing with practical everyday living. One word, nonsense!
If we as Christians have this impression, whether we discern it or not, we should realize that faith versus reason is a false dichotomy or division of our living. Christian faith is not antagonistic nor against reason. On the contrary, biblical faith and reason go very well together in our everyday lives and should in our minds, our mindset. Our Christian mindset should be faith and reason.
This impression lies in the fact that most have a misunderstanding of biblical faith. Our Christian faith is not a leap in the dark, is not a belief that is unreasonable nor is Christian faith just having belief for the sake of believing it. Instead, faith is having, biblical faith is having confidence in someone and something that we have not perceived with our senses. The basic biblical definition of faith is as revealed in Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 1 “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” Two words here describe faith which are: “sure, certain”! Surety and certainty. These two qualities need a confident and assured beginning and ending point.
The beginning point of biblical faith is believing in God and His character. That He is, who he reveals He is in scripture. The ending point could be said to be believing in God’s promises. That is that He will do what he promises in scripture. That’s biblical faith.
Therefore, when we believe in God and that He can and will fulfill His promises, even through we haven’t seen those promises to materialize as of yet, then we are demonstrating true biblical faith.
Whenever we have confidence in someone or something that we cannot see, that we cannot hear, taste, smell, or touch, we are acting upon a type of faith. In fact, all people have this type of faith, even if it is not biblical saving faith in the one true God of Scripture.
Genuine biblical saving faith is illustrated in Scripture as noted in Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 2 “This is what the ancients were commended for.” ‘Ancients’ here refers to all the believers, male and female who were under the Old Covenant of the Bible, a select few of whom are described in Hebrews chapter 11 verses 4 through 38 beginning with Abel. The writer summarizes in Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 39 which states “These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised.” That is during their lifetimes while on earth because they lived by their demonstrated faith. So, God bears witness on behalf of these believers that they, in fact, lived by faith, and so divine approval is given to them for their saving faithfulness.
All people live out their lives, including some type of faith. For example, people believe, have faith in the principals of logic – that which is logically true. Yet obviously the principles of logic themselves are not material. They are abstract and cannot be experienced by the senses. One can write down a principle of logic such as the principal or law of noncontradiction. Which is that it is impossible to have “A” and “not A” at the same time. And in the same relationship. As an example: a door cannot be both open and closed at the same time and in the same way. This is because this principle (or law of noncontradiction) states that something cannot be true and false simultaneously; whereby a statement and its opposite cannot both be true at the same time. This principle or law is abstract and cannot be observed by the senses only its physical representation can (here the door) but not the principle itself. So, what’s the point?
All people have laws of logic every day and have confidence, certainty and surety in something they cannot actually observe with the senses; this is a type of faith everybody has. When a person gets on an airliner to fly somewhere they logically have faith in the pilot and airliner that they are going to arrive at their destination safely or they would not have boarded the airliner. Here as a principle of logic, it is reasoned that airliners rarely crash. So, everybody lives by some type of faith. Therefore, the popular notion that only Christians live by “faith versus reason” is a false conclusion. The fact remains that everybody believes in something that goes beyond sensory experience.
For the consistent believer faith and reason go well together. Indeed, God encourages us to reason. Listen to Isaiah in the Old Testament which is just as much as the Word of God as the New Testament. Listen to Isaiah chapter 1 verse 18 “Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow…”
Surely a good reason to be believe in God is that He is a forgiving God. Everybody of sufficient age knows he or she does wrong, morally. Believing one’s sins are forgiven can bring peace of mind – more importantly peace with God in Christ Jesus today! This is a reasonable expectation. In the New Testament of the Bible the apostle Paul reasoned. Acts chapter 17 and verse 17 states about Paul “So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there.” This because Christianity is a reasonable faith. Christian faith is not a so-called “blind faith.” It is a faith that is rationally defensible; it is reasonable, and incorporating God it is logical. Christianity can make sense of what we experience in this world. Having a Christian faith, a Christian mindset, and lifestyle, is reasonably practical as it has been lived out now by millions for almost 2000 years.
Moreover, Christians have a moral mandate to think rationally. Scripture largely affirms this. For example: Proverbs chapter 4 and verse 7 “wisdom is supreme; therefore, get wisdom. Though it cost you all you have, get understanding.”
Proverbs chapter 2 and verse 6 “For the LORD gives wisdom, and from His mouth come knowledge and understanding.”
In the New Testament consider for example, Romans chapter 12 and verse 2 “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is his good pleasing and perfect will.” Also consider for example, First Corinthians chapter 14 and verse 20 “Brothers, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil be infants, but in your thinking be adults.”
Also consider what the apostle Peter wrote in, First Peter chapter 3 and verse 15 “But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.”
In his essay entitled “My Credo” Cornelius Van Til (1895-1987), Cornelius Van Til was a Dutch-American theologian and he wrote in his essay: “Christianity alone is reasonable for men to hold. It is wholly irrational to hold any other position than that of Christianity. Christianity alone does not slay reason on the altar of ‘chance.’” Meaning that ultimately unbelievers in an all-powerful, all-knowing God – as Creator of everything out of nothing – As creator of the universe claim to stake all that they perceive by our senses: that we must see, hear, smell, taste, touch as existing only by chance. That is irrational as to what is compared and is revealed in; Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 3, which states “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen is not made out of what was visible.”
I ask you, dear listener, what seems more reasonable, our universe created by an all-powerful, all-knowing supreme being or everything eventually created by pure chance? Most cosmologists today postulate the concept of “chance” as used to describe the unguided, natural progression of events from the ‘Big Bang’ theory that the universe began from a single, extremely hot and dense point about 13.8 billion years ago to the formation of the universe as we know it.
So, to be clear it comes down to “a single, according to most cosmologist, a single extremely hot and dense point” versus in Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 3 “formed at God’s command.”
Yes, the Christian worldview is reasonable, moreover, I dare say more reasonable, more rational, than any other competing worldview or for that matter universe-view.
Accepting a meaningless universe by chance leaves one in an illogical position. As the defender of the Christian faith the Apologist C. S. Lewis put it: “It takes less faith to believe in an intelligent designer than to believe that our ability to reason and think developed from a series of random, physical chemical reactions.” Our Christian witness remains reasonable: “But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.” Again (First Peter chapter 3 and verse 15). And why? Because its not “Faith versus Reason. In fact, it is “Faith with reason.”
David Johnson is minister of the Sellersburg Church of Christ in Sellersburg, IN.