Believing is being persuaded of something: convinced, certain. It is the substance – the concrete reality - of what we hope for, and the evidence of things we do not see. (Heb 11. 1) And we are all exercising faith, all the time. We don't see air, radio waves, time, music, or love. But they all touch our lives....
When the Bible talks about believing, it means specifically believing in God. It does matter what you believe! You remember the musical “Joseph”? One of the songs said “Any Dream will do” NO! Andy dream will not do! It isn't enough to believe in something. The statement “It doesn't matter what yo believe so long as you are sincere” is a load of rubbish. When I am driving my car, it doesn’t matter how sincerely I believe that the pedal on the far right is the brake. If a child runs out in front of my car and I put my foot down on that pedal, the car won't stop, it will hit the child even harder! At its centre, “Faith” is believing in God, in who he is and in the big truths of the Christian faith. It is being certain, convinced, about these truths: so convinced that you are prepared to build your life upon them.
Mark 1:15 "The right time has come," he said, "and the Kingdom of God is near! Turn away from your sins and believe the Good News!"
Rom 10. 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
Jn 20. 25-27 Jesus said to Thomas, “Do not disbelieve, but believe.”
Heb 11:3 It is by faith that we understand that the universe was created by God's word, so that what can be seen was made out of what cannot be seen.
Heb 11:6 No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God must have faith that God exists and rewards those who seek him.
That’s faith: a confident, persuaded certainty that God is there; that he is good; that he has revealed himself in Jesus, his Kingdom has come; that Jesus died for our sins and rose again.
Sometimes what we "Know" from life's experiences challenges our faith
But lots of people go through tough times: once a father brought a messed up sick boy to the disciples, looking for for Jesus, and hoping for healing. And the disciples tried to get him better, to get rid of the spirit that was damaging the boy's life... they thought “What did Jesus do last time? They prayed; they told the thing to go; they laid on hands... they believed... or tried to... and nothing happened. When Jesus himself came on the scene with Peter, James and John, the nine were in the middle of an angry looking crowd. Have you ever been there? Jesus sees unbelief everywhere: disciples, the crowd, the boy’s dad... : “Faithless generation,” he says (Mk 9. 19) and the dad has got to the stage of saying “If you can, please do something” (v. 22) Jesus responds that all things are possible for those who believe, and the man answers “I believe, help my unbelief”... A lot of us struggle with unbelief, a failure of that certainty, of that assurance of things hoped for... I believe, help my unbelief... That's all it takes....
I had a retreat day on Monday; in the Blairadam Forest. As I was driving out there, I listened to a CD and God got my attention through one track: the song “My redeemer lives” says “I know, he rescued my soul, I believe! ... my redeemer lives!” It felt like God had something to say to me about faith. So as I walked I asked God to show me what the hindrance was to my faith. And this is what came back: “You know too much! You rely on your own understanding.” Now if you know me well, you'll know that I am one of the last people to suggest that we all leave our brains at the door of the church, like gunfighters have to take off their gunbelts when they go into the saloon... “You can't bring that in here – it might go off an any minute!” We are called to “Love the Lord with all our heart, and soul and mind and strength.” (Dt 6. 5)
There is good knowledge, and bad knowledge; there is good understanding and bad understanding; there is good belief and bad belief. The good belief, trusts in the Lord. It factors in the God facts, and builds everything on the big truths – who God is, what God is like, what God has done.
There was a man who lost everything in human terms – family, health, fortune, and the respect of his friends. In the middle of his struggles, and the rubbish his friends heaped on him as they tried to counsel him (ever been there?) Job comes out with this amazing jewel: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God.”(Job 19. 25) That's astounding. That's faith. It's built on the big truths – and applies them to his own messed up little life. David echoes some of that in Ps 27. 13: “I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!”
We all need to filter out wrong beliefs - things that are rooted in...
- Bad growing up (or other) experiences. Some people learn from parents and teachers, “Authority figures – parents, teachers – can't be trusted. You never know when they are going to turn nasty and violent.” Poem people learn “I'm stupid; I can never be smart/good at football/like my brother”. Some people learn “the only way I can give and receive love is through sex.” If there's something in your head that tells you something like that it's a bad belief. It's become part of your own understanding and you need to trust in the Lord, to build your belief on the big truths of who God is, what God is like and what God has done.
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| William Carey. |
- Folk-wisdom. Paul calls it the wisdom of this world (1 Cor 3. 19) and James says it's marked by bitter jealousy and selfish ambition. (James 3. 14-15) You know the sort of wisdom I mean. It's about looking after number one, getting to the top, getting the best job, the best bargain, never being a doormat. It's cynical about authority, pessimistic about the future and tends to treat everything as a joke. Bad beliefs. False facts. And remember that sometimes worldly wisdom can dress itself us as theology: the “Prosperity Gospel” is one example; another is the extreme Calvinism (the belief that only those God chooses can become Christians) that made Nottinghamshire Baptists tell William Carey the father of modern world mission, in 1786, “Young man, sit down; when God pleases to convert the heathen, he will do it without your aid and mine”
- Pseudo-science and fake philosophy. I don't mean sound research-based science; I mean the trendy, rather sneering way that some in the scientific world like to suggest that science has totally disproved faith in God and people of any faith are a dwindling moron minority; and the way some books and films portray as unquestioned fact what are usually groundless and tired old theories about the origins of Christianity. These guys are what Philosopher David Bentley Hart calls the fashionable enemies of faith. Bad beliefs. False facts.
Bad belief leads to fear, frustration, despair, disappointment, frenetic activism of complacent, hopeless inaction. Good belief releases God's power into situations: It moves mountains (Mark 11) it enables us to live courageously and to face all sorts of odds for Jesus. (Heb 11)
It takes faith to allow oneself to be misunderstood and not feel one has to defend oneself. It takes faith, in fact, to take the servant approach to mission (ministry in the world) and to live generously in our society. It takes faith to be generous to people who are different, not to demand conformity; to speak the challenging prophetic word, without fear of offending, and to be silent without the fear of compromise. and to let the holy spirit do it his way way. And God calls us to walk by faith!
© Gilmour Lilly January 2012
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