We certainly are not going to take it easy on the topic though. I want to talk about the nature of faith. What is it?
This can be addressed from one or two angles. First one might come from outside the Church. Is faith incompatible with reason, i.e. a shot in the dark? What?
Second one might come from inside the Chruch and ask what the human side of salvation entails. It might go like this: When were you saved? What did you do right in that moment to be saved? Anything? How do you know that is the moment? Is there a moment? If not, what?
Even with the second angle we come back to the question: What is faith? Is it an emotional gravitation? A choice of the will? A covenant with a club? A line in the sand crossed with sincerity or with words? Is it just another word for worldview, or theory?
Central to Christianity is the verse: "By grace you have been saved through faith." So what is faith?
I'd love to hear it get personal, philosophical, biblical, theological, and/or more. Remember how close this hits to home and respect one another while we talk. But remember also how important this issue is and respect it enough to talk about it!
Again, welcome back! Let's give it another go!
Second one might come from inside the Chruch and ask what the human side of salvation entails. It might go like this: When were you saved? What did you do right in that moment to be saved? Anything? How do you know that is the moment? Is there a moment? If not, what?Even with the second angle we come back to the question: What is faith? Is it an emotional gravitation? A choice of the will? A covenant with a club? A line in the sand crossed with sincerity or with words? Is it just another word for worldview, or theory?
Central to Christianity is the verse: "By grace you have been saved through faith." So what is faith?
I'd love to hear it get personal, philosophical, biblical, theological, and/or more. Remember how close this hits to home and respect one another while we talk. But remember also how important this issue is and respect it enough to talk about it!
Again, welcome back! Let's give it another go!
8 comments:
my first angle on the topic is this:
we hear a lot IN church about how you need to have that moment where you say to God that you believe, confess, repent, accept, and so on. You can never be sure exactly how "good" your conversion moment has done but you can be pretty sure if you've said a certain set of words and meant it.
But how do I even know if I meant it well enough? How do I know I said the right words?
If I'm doing it to be saved from hell, am I not acting out of fearful self-preservation? If I'm doing it because of the high of the moment (as real as it may be) am I not acting out of my excitement? What when it fades? Doesn't matter as long as I did it?
So what is faith? The sincere belief of that moment or the right words or what?
And what words are the right words? I've come to see salvation as about way more than one time absolution of sin. I've come to see it as the creation of a new life, which is typified by self-sacrifice now and full victory later. What if that wasn't mentioned at all? Aren't those some pretty important words? Why is it okay for me to learn those ones later?
So how do I know if I was sincere enough or well-spoken enough?
I start to see the value of baptism as a salvific act. I start to see the value of letting the Church tell you if you are saved.
But all of it ends up coming back to the question of faith.
Is faith a decision made that God honours even when the zeal of that first decision is gone or faded? Is faith an acceptance of something that relies on nothing at all but that preliminary openness?
Is faith even a human action at all? Is faith a "work"?
I think faith is a human action that is typified totally by passivity. It has to be surrender. Therefore it is not a work whereby we earn anything. It is an acceptance that proceeds into new life and action. That ensuing action is all about continual surrender.
This surrender can and should by nature involve acts of confession, forgiveness, repentance, and so on, but at heart faith is neither done for us nor is it something we do. It is something we are given.
It is not unreasonable, even though it does not depend on reason alone. It can be the end of a long journey with reason or the very beginning. The first thought or the last. Neither way nullifies its importance.
Plenty of food for thought. Grab one and push back or take a new angle of your own. I'll be happy to hear it.
Faith is a worldview, but it's a little more than that I think. A worldview is too small a concept for what faith is. My belief that people should all treat other with respect, that's a worldview, one that is informed by my faith but not a faith on its own.
As for the salvation question, that's tough and likely unanswerable. Is believing enough? Clearly not as one can believe in God and/or Jesus and still not choose to serve God. Is understanding enough? Clearly not since many people without faith have significant understanding of the faiths that do not believe in. Is church enough. Not even close. For me it's some combination of belief, understanding, and action. Only God can judge the sincerity of any of it. There's certainly no way faith can be attained by a simple prayer, no matter how articulate. One might be able to make up their own mind through saying a prayer and that may be a turning point for them but the fourfold gospel and the sinners prayer are both over simplifications of a lifelong and complex process in my opinion.
Hello from my hibernation. Been busy this summer but Fear reminded me that this blog still exists so I'm going to try to participate a little better.
I think Tanti is close with his idea that it's a matter of belief, understanding, and action, and that each on their own does not constitute faith. But I think he's missing something in his excellent equation.
I would summarize faith as "relationship"... which I think contains Tanti's three important elements but something else that's not quite tangible.
When we commit to a relationship with Jesus, and actively pursue that relationship, we're adopting a lifestyle of belief, understanding, and action, even if these things aren't fully evident in our lives all the time. By having a relationship with Jesus, we're committing to a lifestyle that should be marked by the passionate pursuit of these three things.
When people commit to a relationship with Jesus (through whatever means: i.e., the sinner's prayer, or "asking Jesus into their heart", etc.), and then DON'T live their lives as if they were in a relationship with Jesus, I don't think any of us would say that those people are heaven-bound. In the same way, I could have gotten married and then completely ignored my wife: not talked to her, not done anything for her, even live as if she doesn't exist. Few people would say that I was acting as a married person.
I don't know if this makes our faith sound too simplistic or too abstract. For me it clarifies so much.
Hello fellows and sorry for my long absence, although not as sorry as Tuna is going to be by the time he finally chimes in.
Perhaps its too late and nobody is checking this thing anymore, but I will toss in some thoughts nonetheless.
I really like what Trembling said about faith being a relationship. This hits the nail on the head for me. I think too many people treat faith like a static quantity or state, as though they could just have faith by reaching out and taking it like a cookie from a cookie jar.
To me faith is something that's started during the salvation experience, through a variety of different ways, that may or may not include the fourfold gospel and the sinners prayer. It then grows from there, even with ups and downs, or dies from there. Its something that takes effort and time to nurture, all the while realising that it is a gift and not something we can work to attain.
Its a tough question. Obviously its God that judges the heart and so in some way we can't come to some categorical answer here. Maybe its just different for each person
Slightly unrelated but I stumbled upon Benny Hinn on tv today and it made me think of this blog. What is faith? Is the hype and emotion in a Benny Hinn service some sort of sincere faith? The whole thing makes me sick but the people there aren't faking it I don't think. Is Hinn faking it?
Here's the problem, I don't like it and I have a serious problem with it. Seeing crap like that makes me struggle with my faith more than anything because I don't want my faith to be anywhere near the category that Hinnians would put there's in. It's completely manipulative and dishonest and I can't imagine that God accepts Hinn's worship.
Any thoughts?
Every organization (and I'm including Christianity as an organization here) has that batch of embarrassing people we can't seem to shake: the weirdos, the hangers-on, etc... The "Michael Scotts", if you will. (a little "The Office" reference). Problem is, Christianity is already on the precipice of respectability by its very nature of faithfulness over pleasure-pursuits. And, by its rules of inclusion, it invites the losers in and excludes those who society has deemed as winners.
So, we're already a bunch of freaks with barely any respectability and suddenly a freakier freak comes by pretending to be part of our crowd.
It sucks. But it's no different than when it happens to a company or a social group or a college dorm... it's just that we belong to the associated group.
My two cents, anyway.
rule of inclusion...invitation to losers and exlusion of winners...bunch of freaks...
I thinnk that while there are clearly examples of these ideas in some churches, it's quite a stretch to say that these things are happening any more often than their opposites.
As for the freak in the dorm analogy, the only way that analogy works is if the freak in the dorm regularly carries out actions which both shame and discredit everyone else in the dorm but the freak stills commands the respect of a huge number of those who live in the dorm.
It's not the fact that Benny Hinn exists that bugs me, it's that millions follow his BS teaching.
In the Greek NT, "metanoia", the word translated as "repent" basically means to "change your mind". Faith, to me, is the changing of one's mind to acknowledge the reality and the presence of God. Acknowledging the reality and presence of God probably requires some type of contact with God -- this is, I believe, the thing that each believer's faith is built on, if it is a true faith. The issue of "what is faith" mainly comes up with those who believe or profess without any real experience of God or conviction that is based on experience with God. I find those who are most faith-filled know God, and faith becomes not something that is believed in a vacuum, but something that is known through experience. Of course, there are many who profess faith but lack contact and I keep wondering why.
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