Faith

Faith is a New Testament word used twice in the KJV version of the Old Testament and scores of times in the New.  The word faithful is used much more generously in the Old Testament, but even then it appears in the majority of instances in the poetic books.  This does not take away the place of faith in the Old Testament, as noted through extensive repetition in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews in the New.  The pre-Christian generations utilized faith in a forward thrust that ultimately took a central focus in a messianic expectation.  In the advent of Christ as Messiah, the Christian perception added the expectation in the finished work of Jesus Christ.  This resulted, for Christians, in a vital shift from the evidence of faith (in following laws related to faith) to faith itself resting in the offering for sin in the sacrifice of Christ.  That faith no longer requires law and sacrifices as legal tender for the application of the mercies of God to human redemption.  The work is finished and offered in a faith experience for efficacy.  It is clear from human evidence and the declaration of Scripture that some persons will not exercise it. It is Christian duty to assist, to the degree possible, the place of faith in gaining spiritual resolution and a hope of a continuance of life.  Faith relates to the plan of God and it is not for mankind to argue with God about how he provides his gifts, mercies and redemptive means for imperfect human beings.  The provident gifts of God require our faith.

A basic problem, for the doubtful, appears in understanding faith.  We may find some of the problem in any context of life.  In a short essay by Alex Shakar, entitled Scientists Versus Mystics some of the same problem appears for the writer in literature as for the person in religion.  Shakar divides writers (novelists) into two camps – the scientists and the mystics.  He proceeds to characterize the two.  Each camp tends to view its way as the wiser one.  The scientist group insists on a plan, and bases everything on the working through of the plan.  He or she reviews the advantages of the approach as important to working through to the end.  Analysts then turn to the mystical approach, and note the doubts of the mystics that may deny even the title of Writers to the scientific authors.  They are simply reporters of a plan.  Shakar then carries forward the advantages of the mystic.  His beginning, as a scientific writer, must yield as he writes.  He finds too much that could not have appeared in the plan.  Sensory feelings break out, new understandings appear, and an unfolding occurs.  Shakar writes: Back and forth it goes from Mission Control to missionary until he becomes calibrated and balanced.  In this he perceives the scientist with a theory and experiment, but finding no volunteers for the plan, enters in to become the object of the event.  He ends by stating: . . . . there may not be the slightest difference between science and faith.  His point may be apt.

In my readings, college/university experience, and rubbing shoulders with scholars in various fields, I heard or found little of substance that could not be explained logically in either theistic or non-theistic terms.  The discussions turned on presuppositions, on unknowns as well as knowns, related to evidence or lack of it, and the tendency for persons to put their own spin on the material with which they function and extrapolate.  How then will we come to knowledge of the truth?  God, knowing our dilemma and the limitations or problems makes himself and his modus operandi available to all in a faith package that translates God and heaven to mankind and earth.  If I cannot engage God in faith, then he cannot be engaged for me personally.  In such an event I am left with more problems than I had in a faith context – and there are many in that one.  God is not the one in need of anything from a human relationship, except that he takes pleasure in his children.  The need for mankind is to meet God’s acceptance – utterly important in the end of our time period.  In any review of the natural world (with some evidence and verifiability), and the supernatural context (with its hope, illustrated in experience of natural life) the benefits appear to be favored to the personal advantage of those holding effective faith.