The Journey of Faith starts with a question: What Do We Mean FAITH?

Hi my fellow blog readers...glad you're here and sorry for the time away.  I've had a couple of busy weeks that included a trip to St. Louis to teach at a Perspectives in World Missions course in two locations in the greater St. Louis area.  It was a great time and I had the opportunity to teach on a subject that often doesn't get time in the local church:  The Name and The Glory of God as a basis for Missions.  It was a great teaching time and sometime down the road I'll post these notes too.

This September I'm beginning a series of teachings at New Life Fellowship - which I serve as the pastor/teacher - on the overall theme of "The Journey of Faith".   Faith is an essential part of our relationship with God - and I would even say with each other.  SO, in this first teaching I had to ask the question, "What Do We Mean By Faith?"

This series is coming from two sections of scripture: 

Hebrews 11 and the book of Genesis.

Hebrews 11 is known as the faith chapter…and that’s because it begins with this BIG PICTURE statement about what Faith is…

Hebrews 11:1 (ESV)
¹  Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

A lot of people. Christians included, think that Faith is merely an intellectual thing, an exercise of religious belief. 

Can we trust that the bible is accurate?

• How Can you reconcile belief in God as creator with Evolution?
• If there is a God, 
• Why is there so much Evil?
• Don’t all religions lead to God?

Every person has some kind of faith.  It’s not a question of “do you have faith?”; but rather, “What do you have faith in?”

For some people, it’s difficult, because everyday life leaves them wondering at times “what’s wrong with my faith?”

They’re told, “You just got to believe”.  

For others, Faith is merely acting out our religious or traditional beliefs.

I’ve seen people evaluate bad things by saying, “If only they had more faith”, as if Faith is something like an IRA you’ve made deposits to.

There are probably more misunderstandings of faith as there is correct ones. 

Christianity requires people to have and exercise faith; but what do we mean by that?

Over the next few weeks, using Hebrews 11 and looking back in Genesis at those stories, I want to dive in and try to understand how to live our lives as a journey of Faith.

The Importance of Faith

Hebrews 11:1 (ESV)
¹  Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Perhaps you’ve had a conversation with a family member, or co-worker, or neighbor, who wasn’t a believer, and they were challenging the whole of idea of what it meant to have faith in God.

His argument is “How do you know there even is a God?”  and “You say we come to God by Faith, well, what is Faith anyway?”  “Is it just being religious, doing the right things, believing a set of assumptions based on what people in Christian circles say about belief?”

Faith – It is the most fundamental aspect of what we say in relation to who God is, and what we believe about our relationship to God.

Faith is NOT a set of religious beliefs, and I’ll add to it, Faith is NOT being religious.

Faith is multi-dimensional…many different aspects of it appear in scripture, and in Hebrews 11, the author of Hebrews presents Faith in its many varied forms.

BUT, to understand the need of FAITH in general I want us to start with the question,  

WHAT then is Faith and why is Faith so important?

Hebrews 11:3 (ESV)
³  By faith we understand ….

Faith begins with understanding, with reason, with a sense of Knowing…i.e., Christianity teaches that Faith is Knowledge…reasoned knowledge…

That knowledge doesn’t always lead to a conclusion, but it does allow us to think.

Did you realize that Faith is not just hoping that what we believe is correct? 

Faith creates knowledge, understanding, reason.

Faith begins NOT with assumptions that can’t be proved… but rather with the ability to THINK about big picture things.

AND,

Faith therefore – 1^st and foremost of all – makes us realize how we humans are people who can have knowledge, can have reason, can understand.

We are Not Accidents, and

Life is Not Random,

Life is Not Fatalism

Faith is Not Just Believe and Not Question… 

Our Faith is what gives us the ability to THINK, To REASON, To UNDERSTAND…

A lot of people think that to have Faith means we suspend our reason, our doubts, or questions, and we simply “Believe”…  We all know that doesn’t work.

NOW…Think about what our culture has done with what is called “Matters of Faith”.

Much of our culture – Politics, Social Policy, Universities, Governments, even organizations like Rotary or Kiwanis, have created a separate place for “people of faith” and separated knowledge into a different category.

Popular on university campuses is this concept that’s ok if you believe in some religion, or have “faith”…but that’s different from secular knowledge.

Western culture has created this concept of “secular knowledge” …but what is that? Is knowledge “secular”?  Is reality “secular”?  Knowledge is knowing something to be true.

We know "gravity" is true...just drop an egg and watch what happens.  I KNOW that, can trust in that to happen.  Is that secular knowledge?  NO, that's simple Knowledge and it is confirmed in science, but also is a principle of Faith - that we can trust in that to come true.

When we say we know something, we put our trust in the truth of that.  

Immanuel Kant wrote a classic philosophical book called “A Critique of Pure Reason”.  In it he said that there were 3 fundamental questions that every person seeks to have answered in order to live a purposeful life (Not just Christians, but every person…your relatives, neighbors, co-workers, believers and unbelievers)…

• 1.   How Can I Know what is real?
• 2.   How Do I Know what is right?
• 3.   What Can I Live For, Hope For?

How does our Culture, our World around us answer that? 

Some say,

·        “What’s important is your standard of living,

·        how much money do you make and have”,

·        My appearance: “how do I look?”,

·        And to others to live for self, take care of your own individual needs.

In other words, the Big Questions of WHAT IS REAL? HOW DO I KNOW WHAT IS RIGHT? AND WHAT DO I LIVE OR HOPE FOR? doesn’t make the cut…just these things that people think about in everyday life.

I REMEMBER TALKING TO A COLLEGE STUDENT ONCE…

• ·        “Why are you here at the university?”
• ·        “get a degree”
• ·        What do you want to do?
• ·        Get a job, make money
• ·        What do you want to do with your job and money?
• ·        Get married, have a house, go on vacations, enjoy my family….that’s ok
• ·        Then what?  That caught him by surprise.
• ·        “I don’t know…”
• ·        “I suppose retire…”
• ·        Then what?  Annoying him.
• He came to the point where he said, “Ultimately you die”.   I asked him, “Then What?”

You see?  What is real? What is Right? What Am I living for? Has to do with getting knowledge and reason that come from something much wiser and more able to see the Big Picture.  THAT’S IMPORTANT TO REALIZE!

I think that knowledge and wisdom is in scripture and specifically in God and his revelation of Jesus.

Now, when it comes to overall Knowledge, I Think/trust/have Faith that the smartest person that has ever existed is Jesus Christ?

NOW, Jesus is God, and so when he walked the earth, his words and actions demonstrated what is REAL, what is RIGHT, and WHAT I can LIVE FOR?

He displayed God’s wisdom in so many ways that caused people to stop what they were doing and just THINK…

In fact, Jesus often drove people crazy when he would question their ways of THINKING, and challenged them to THINK about something more than their immediate self.   When he would do that, he would often say the phrase, “O Ye of little Faith”…

He was pointing out that they were not getting the Big picture…they were not seeing what was happening, and not understanding what God was doing.

For example, at one point he said,

Matthew 6:25 (ESV)
²⁵ “… I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

What is he saying to them? -  “Is that what you’re going to make the focus of your life about?”

Do you remember what he said immediately after that?

Matthew 6:28 (ESV)
²⁸ …why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,

When he says “Consider”…Jesus is saying, “THINK”…  KNOWLEDGE IS GAINED FROM “CONSIDERING”, “THINKING”, “UNDERSTANDING”

In this case, He’s saying “you spend a lot of time and energy trying to have the right stuff around you…house, clothing, appearance, things…but just look around you at something like lilies in a field…don’t you see?”

And so we should ask, “Where does my Faith and the Knowledge that comes from that Faith intersect everyday life?”

Jesus says “If you want to have faith”,

·        Just THINK about what you want…

·        THINK about what and why that is real, and

·        THINK about whether that reflects faith in God or is temporary.

When we separate out Faith from Thinking, From Knowledge… we end up in a mental “cul-de-sac”.

We’ve lived in two cul-de-sacs…  In one sense they are nice because they have limited traffic…no one is driving through because there’s nowhere to go.

BUT that’s the drawback to…you can drive in, but you can’t go anywhere…  The only way out is the way in.

When any person - Christian or Non-Christian - suspends “Thinking”…or “Consider…”, you end in a place where your experiences carry you INTO, but all you can do is react…you can’t apply any kind of reason.

Christianity teaches that Faith is Knowledge…reasoned knowledge… Hebrews 11:3 (ESV)
³  By faith we understand...

Think about that…

I'll finish this tomorrow, Peace.