Faith Learning

Reading widely with an attitude of search for truth and meaning, one finds statements that reflect what the reader would like to say.  I found another one quoted from: Man:The Dwelling Place of God, but without noting the author (A. W. Tozer): In natural matters faith follows evidence and is impossible without it, but in the realm of the spirit faith precedes understanding; it does not follow it.  The natural man must know in order to believe; the spiritual man must believe in order to know.  The faith that saves is not a conclusion drawn from evidence; it is a moral thing, a thing of the spirit, a supernatural infusion of confidence in Jesus Christ, a very gift of God.

The statement though well cast, and gaining approval from persons who think as I do and whose lives have followed the implications of the statement, needs some explanation to gain large empathy with the author.  There is a gift of consciousness in both the natural and spiritual contexts of life.  The gift of faith, noted in the last words of the statement may imply that natural faith relating to replication of evidence leading to conclusions of truth may also be a gift.  That gift is explained in various terms such as the awakening of the prospective student to learning.  Living many years I have encountered persons who have not gained the consciousness of faith in verifiable natural evidence to appropriate conclusions that affect conduct.  No faith is fully applied that does not reach conclusions to beliefs that affect actions.  The tensions among those who deal with such issues ought to be understood so to clear the decks for discussion and discovery.  We know that there are persons with no spiritual faith who violate even natural faith in hypocrisies and deviations that sin (lies) against natural truth.  The Atlantic Magazine (December 2012) noted the failures of some researchers, who when their sins found them out, lost their jobs, avoided probes that would have led to repentance, if taken seriously, and in that process seek restoration by practicing even the faith of their disciplines.  There are rogues, backsliders, careless persons in both natural and spiritual contexts of learning.  They are an embarrassment to orthodox persons, searching for truth wherever it may be found.  The problems are further complicated when sincere persons, either in the one context or the other, disrespect the search for truth by holding out for only one system in which it may be discovered.

The arousal of faith in knowledge ought to begin with parents so that children are introduced to ideas and progress through discussion, the provision of effective literature in their lives, the best uses of time for human development – in short to instill to the emerging child a love of learning which discovers.  Some children never get it, even when they accidently use it.  The harried teacher in the school room is faced with a monumental task of teaching some robotic children who will not step over into the cerebral world, and take over their lives.  Many will defy the instruction when school is over.  The confusion factor carries over to spiritual faith contexts.  We are told that some persons pray even when they do not believe in God.  The gesture is taken as a means of personal psychological relief (meditation).  The prayer is not identified as genuine prayer, even if God regards the words favorably in response to his creation.  If God did not hear the words we utter as independent humanists, he would not hear us when we genuinely seek him – something he informs us that he does.  The repentance of a sinner is the prayer of a non-Christian.

There is an important point to be made here.  It has been asserted that many Christians have been lax in developing the mind and learning as knowledge, facilities and human needs have advanced.  Christian scholars have addressed this issue quite directly.  (Note the writing of Mark Noll and others.)  The main point to consider in the matter is that decline occurs across the board, extending to the secular world as well as the religious.  The decline, so extended, does not depreciate the Christian any more than it does secular constituency.  This is a serious matter, and may have something to do with the way either or both of the two contexts of interest here are carried through.  This general decline needs to be analyzed.  It may be that the stern division, offered by some in both contexts, creates the very problem each blames on the other.  In human education we prepare for earth life, in spiritual education we discover the additional directions for discovery of human/divine meaning.  We find confidence in faith’s context. Faith has roominess in it.