Just Follow the Signs
(Note: This piece is concerned with the issue of whether or not the Bible links public evidence with faith. I will mention several types of evidence, but not attempt to make an evidential case. I do more of that in other writings.)
Introduction
When my High School Sunday School class was studying evidences from science and philosophy for a theistic God, I began to be concerned that they might respond to the information in either one of two unhelpful ways. On the one hand, I did not want them to think that faith in God is nothing more than the sum total of facts and arguments such as those that they were learning. God is a person, and should be related to personally. On the other hand, I did not want them to reject the evidential and intellectual side of their faith for an entirely subjective, experiential approach to God. This could tend to create a disconnect between their faith and what they learn from science, history, and culture, which could make their faith seem irrelevant, narrow, or even bigoted.
As I prayerfully considered these alternatives, I wanted to share something with my class that would help them to avoid both hyper-intellectualism and hyper-subjectivism. An idea came to mind.
In our next Sunday morning session I presented the students with this scenario. I asked, "How many of you enjoy going to King's Island" (a popular area theme park)? All of the young people raised their hands. Then I asked, "When you come to a road sign for King's Island, would you pull your vehicle over to the side of the road and spend the rest of the day enjoying the sign?"
With bemused looks, they said "No!"
"Why not?" I replied.
"Because it is just a sign. It is not King's Island."
"Okay," I said. "What if you drove for an hour through the city and never saw a sign?"
They replied, "Then we are probably going the wrong way."
"Those are very good answers," I said. "So how does all this about road signs to King's Island relate to what we are learning in our class? Just like being at King's Island is the destination of our road trip, knowing God personally is the destination of our spiritual journey. And just as road signs tell us we are getting closer to King's Island, so also signs of evidence can tell us we are journeying toward a valid spiritual destination. In our class we have studied various evidences that point to the existence of a personal, intelligent, moral, powerful, creator, who we call God."
Confusing Choices
There are varied opinions and much confusion about the role of evidence, or signs, in Christian teaching. Many would say that we should “just believe” as if the personal experience of belief in God, apart from any evidence, is all there is to faith. According to this opinion, anything that has anything to do with reason, or with evidence, is contrary to proper Christian belief. These people do not reject all evidence, however. They believe in the inner, personal sense of the presence of God, spoken of in Romans 8: 16 “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.” No believer questions this evidence. Other believers acknowledge that there seems to be some role for evidence in the Christian experience, but they also feel pulled toward the “just believe” opinion, influenced by selected Bible verses and Christian slogans. I, myself, lived in this valley of indecision for many years. It is my goal with this writing to provide help to people in both groups.
The “Just Believe” Verses
There are two Scriptures which are perhaps the most popular in making the “just believe” case. The first is Hebrews, 11: 1, which reads “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” The phrases “things hoped for” and “things not seen” lead many to the conclusion that true faith is assenting to the statements of Scripture apart from public evidence. I use the term “public evidence” to mean evidence that anyone, believer or not, can recognize, regardless of the conclusions one draws from it. Public evidence can come from history, science, philosophy, and other sources. The second Scripture for the “just believe” case is John 20: 29, which reads “Jesus said to him (Thomas), “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Again, taken at face value, this verse can seem to support belief apart from evidence. Those Christians who feel tugged toward the “just believe” opinion tend to lean heavily on these two verses.
Context is King
Of the handful of principles used to interpret the Bible, one of the most important is reading in context. Some would even say that “context is king.” Much mischief can be done by taking a portion of Scripture and presenting it apart from its context. For example, the second part of Psalms 14: 1a, reads “There is no God.” How shocking that the Bible should say such a thing! However, when the first part of the verse is included, it reads “The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” The problem is solved by reading in context. There are two kinds of context that can be used to clarify Bible verses. The first is to read the Scripture surrounding the Bible verse(s). Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason ministry teaches that to understand what a verse means, one should read at least the paragraph it appears in, or more, to let the meaning of the overall passage shed light on the meaning of the verse in question. The second kind of reading in context is to read multiple verses or passages from the Bible which speak to the same topic as the verse in question, and let them bring clarity. It is best to use both forms of reading in context when possible. In the present discussion of the relationship between faith and evidence, I will first use the context of multiple passages, then the context of the surrounding passage to evaluate the "just believe" verses.
Context in Other Verses
Psalms 19: 1-2, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” So why would nature, outside of ourselves, declare the glory of God if we are supposed to “just believe,” from within ourselves?
Romans 1: 19-20, “ For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” God’s attributes are made known through what he has made? Really?
John 10: 38, where Jesus says “but if I do them (miracles), even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” Jesus apparently thought that His works can help people to believe.
Acts 1: 3, “He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.” Proofs? Shouldn’t they have “just believed?”
Acts 2: 22, “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know—.” This is the apostle Peter beginning his Pentecost sermon citing the public knowledge he expected his audience to know.
Acts 2: 32, “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses.” Peter, again, citing eye-witness testimony.
See also Acts 3: 15, 4: 20, 5: 32, and 10: 39-41 for similar statements.
Acts 26: 26, “For the king knows about these things, and to him I speak boldly. For I am persuaded that none of these things has escaped his notice, for this has not been done in a corner.” In this case, Paul the apostle is appealing to public evidence of appearances of the resurrected Jesus before the Roman ruler.
2 Peter 1: 16, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” One might think that a spiritual giant like Peter would appeal to mystical supports for faith, but here he is again, writing about being an eyewitness.
1 John 1: 1-3, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.” This one used to drive me nuts. John tends to be a very “spiritual” writer, but here he is, on the front end of his letter, writing about seeing, hearing, and touching Jesus. How does that fit with an approach of “just believe”?
From these verses, and many more like them, it seems that to King David, Jesus’ apostles, and Jesus Himself, the testimony of nature and eyewitness testimony of the person and works of Jesus are connected to Christian faith.
Context in the Surrounding Passage
The context of other Scriptures that relate to faith and evidence seem to endorse a confirming role for evidence. Let’s go back and look at the immediate context of the two verses used to support the “just believe” opinion.
In Hebrews 11: 1, we need to make a very important distinction. Faith is called the “assurance of things hoped for” and the “conviction of things not seen.” It is clear, therefore, that faith is confidence in spiritual realities that are not known through the physical senses. But does this verse state what the faith is founded upon? Can faith be founded upon public evidence as well as upon mystical experiences? It seems that we need to distinguish between faith itself and what faith is founded upon. The book of Hebrews, including the passages surrounding 11: 1, was written to encourage early, persecuted Christians. It reminds them of the spiritual reality of the sufficiency of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross for right relationship with God. The context of Hebrews 11: 1 does not seem to be concerned either way with the role of evidence with faith, but rather, with the content of faith.
Let’s look again at John 20: 29. It can seem that Jesus is saying that it is blessed to believe without evidence. But does the context really lead to that conclusion? Consider the Easter appearances of the risen Jesus to the women at the tomb, to ten of the disciples that evening, and to the disciples on the Emmaus Road. Were any of these disciples expecting to see Him resurrected? Absolutely not! They all started out skeptics, like Thomas. So why does Thomas seem to earn a rebuke? John 20: 26 records that Jesus appeared to all of the disciples, with Thomas present, eight days after he appeared to the all of the disciples, but with Thomas absent. Thomas surely had ample opportunity to question and consider the multiple appearances of Jesus to over a dozen of his friends. Would they be wrong about such a serious event, given the danger they could still be in as the close followers of someone crucified for blasphemy? From the context, it seems that a very reasonable reading of John 20: 29 is that Jesus is correcting Thomas for not believing reliable eyewitness testimony. Like all Christians since the New Testament time, Thomas had abundant evidence to believe. It would be improper for people who have received adequate evidence to demand special signs as a condition for their belief in Jesus' resurrection. Nevertheless, Jesus also graciously gave Thomas the evidence he demanded. Thomas shows us that some people, for whatever reasons, simply need more convincing evidence to believe than do others. Thomas demonstrated the sincerity of his stronger skepticism. After receiving the needed evidence, Thomas joined the apostles in risking his life for his testimony of Jesus' resurrection in Jerusalem. Later he went to India, where he established churches before being martyred for his belief and testimony.
Tying it Together
John 20: 30-31, which comes immediately after the verse we just considered, states “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Early in this piece I wrote about how my students would not park and spend the day at a road sign for a destination. They wanted to go to the destination, and expected to see signs that confirmed they were going the right direction. The verses just quoted indicate that Jesus’ signs, including miracle evidence, are for the purpose of enabling belief that Jesus is the Christ. An earlier verse, 1 John 1: 3, states that our goal is “fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ.” Belief, then, is beyond mental assent. It is active trust in God who we can fellowship with personally. Signs, including nature, history, fulfilled prophesy, philosophy, and miracles, tell us we are on the correct path to God.
What are some of the objective signs that might confirm belief that Jesus is the Christ? A brief, general listing of some of them breaks down into two groups. The first group of signs supports the existence of a theistic God, who made the universe and is not connected to it as part of His existence. These include the Cosmological Argument for the beginning of the universe, the Teleological Argument for Design in the universe and in life, and the Moral Argument for objective moral values. The other group of signs supports a distinctive Christian faith. These include the historical reliability of the New Testament, fulfilled prophesy, Jesus’ claim to be God, and His miraculous confirmation of that claim by His resurrection. I have written more about these evidences and listed other resources in my article “The Main Thing: Jesus the Christ, Crucified and Resurrected.” It can be found at: http://www.reasoningfaith.com/the-main-thing.html .
Thank you for taking time to read this writing. I hope it proves to be profitable for you.
Scripture quotes are from the English Standard Version of the Bible.
(Note: This piece is concerned with the issue of whether or not the Bible links public evidence with faith. I will mention several types of evidence, but not attempt to make an evidential case. I do more of that in other writings.)
Introduction
When my High School Sunday School class was studying evidences from science and philosophy for a theistic God, I began to be concerned that they might respond to the information in either one of two unhelpful ways. On the one hand, I did not want them to think that faith in God is nothing more than the sum total of facts and arguments such as those that they were learning. God is a person, and should be related to personally. On the other hand, I did not want them to reject the evidential and intellectual side of their faith for an entirely subjective, experiential approach to God. This could tend to create a disconnect between their faith and what they learn from science, history, and culture, which could make their faith seem irrelevant, narrow, or even bigoted.
As I prayerfully considered these alternatives, I wanted to share something with my class that would help them to avoid both hyper-intellectualism and hyper-subjectivism. An idea came to mind.
In our next Sunday morning session I presented the students with this scenario. I asked, "How many of you enjoy going to King's Island" (a popular area theme park)? All of the young people raised their hands. Then I asked, "When you come to a road sign for King's Island, would you pull your vehicle over to the side of the road and spend the rest of the day enjoying the sign?"
With bemused looks, they said "No!"
"Why not?" I replied.
"Because it is just a sign. It is not King's Island."
"Okay," I said. "What if you drove for an hour through the city and never saw a sign?"
They replied, "Then we are probably going the wrong way."
"Those are very good answers," I said. "So how does all this about road signs to King's Island relate to what we are learning in our class? Just like being at King's Island is the destination of our road trip, knowing God personally is the destination of our spiritual journey. And just as road signs tell us we are getting closer to King's Island, so also signs of evidence can tell us we are journeying toward a valid spiritual destination. In our class we have studied various evidences that point to the existence of a personal, intelligent, moral, powerful, creator, who we call God."
Confusing Choices
There are varied opinions and much confusion about the role of evidence, or signs, in Christian teaching. Many would say that we should “just believe” as if the personal experience of belief in God, apart from any evidence, is all there is to faith. According to this opinion, anything that has anything to do with reason, or with evidence, is contrary to proper Christian belief. These people do not reject all evidence, however. They believe in the inner, personal sense of the presence of God, spoken of in Romans 8: 16 “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.” No believer questions this evidence. Other believers acknowledge that there seems to be some role for evidence in the Christian experience, but they also feel pulled toward the “just believe” opinion, influenced by selected Bible verses and Christian slogans. I, myself, lived in this valley of indecision for many years. It is my goal with this writing to provide help to people in both groups.
The “Just Believe” Verses
There are two Scriptures which are perhaps the most popular in making the “just believe” case. The first is Hebrews, 11: 1, which reads “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” The phrases “things hoped for” and “things not seen” lead many to the conclusion that true faith is assenting to the statements of Scripture apart from public evidence. I use the term “public evidence” to mean evidence that anyone, believer or not, can recognize, regardless of the conclusions one draws from it. Public evidence can come from history, science, philosophy, and other sources. The second Scripture for the “just believe” case is John 20: 29, which reads “Jesus said to him (Thomas), “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Again, taken at face value, this verse can seem to support belief apart from evidence. Those Christians who feel tugged toward the “just believe” opinion tend to lean heavily on these two verses.
Context is King
Of the handful of principles used to interpret the Bible, one of the most important is reading in context. Some would even say that “context is king.” Much mischief can be done by taking a portion of Scripture and presenting it apart from its context. For example, the second part of Psalms 14: 1a, reads “There is no God.” How shocking that the Bible should say such a thing! However, when the first part of the verse is included, it reads “The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” The problem is solved by reading in context. There are two kinds of context that can be used to clarify Bible verses. The first is to read the Scripture surrounding the Bible verse(s). Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason ministry teaches that to understand what a verse means, one should read at least the paragraph it appears in, or more, to let the meaning of the overall passage shed light on the meaning of the verse in question. The second kind of reading in context is to read multiple verses or passages from the Bible which speak to the same topic as the verse in question, and let them bring clarity. It is best to use both forms of reading in context when possible. In the present discussion of the relationship between faith and evidence, I will first use the context of multiple passages, then the context of the surrounding passage to evaluate the "just believe" verses.
Context in Other Verses
Psalms 19: 1-2, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” So why would nature, outside of ourselves, declare the glory of God if we are supposed to “just believe,” from within ourselves?
Romans 1: 19-20, “ For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” God’s attributes are made known through what he has made? Really?
John 10: 38, where Jesus says “but if I do them (miracles), even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” Jesus apparently thought that His works can help people to believe.
Acts 1: 3, “He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.” Proofs? Shouldn’t they have “just believed?”
Acts 2: 22, “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know—.” This is the apostle Peter beginning his Pentecost sermon citing the public knowledge he expected his audience to know.
Acts 2: 32, “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses.” Peter, again, citing eye-witness testimony.
See also Acts 3: 15, 4: 20, 5: 32, and 10: 39-41 for similar statements.
Acts 26: 26, “For the king knows about these things, and to him I speak boldly. For I am persuaded that none of these things has escaped his notice, for this has not been done in a corner.” In this case, Paul the apostle is appealing to public evidence of appearances of the resurrected Jesus before the Roman ruler.
2 Peter 1: 16, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” One might think that a spiritual giant like Peter would appeal to mystical supports for faith, but here he is again, writing about being an eyewitness.
1 John 1: 1-3, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.” This one used to drive me nuts. John tends to be a very “spiritual” writer, but here he is, on the front end of his letter, writing about seeing, hearing, and touching Jesus. How does that fit with an approach of “just believe”?
From these verses, and many more like them, it seems that to King David, Jesus’ apostles, and Jesus Himself, the testimony of nature and eyewitness testimony of the person and works of Jesus are connected to Christian faith.
Context in the Surrounding Passage
The context of other Scriptures that relate to faith and evidence seem to endorse a confirming role for evidence. Let’s go back and look at the immediate context of the two verses used to support the “just believe” opinion.
In Hebrews 11: 1, we need to make a very important distinction. Faith is called the “assurance of things hoped for” and the “conviction of things not seen.” It is clear, therefore, that faith is confidence in spiritual realities that are not known through the physical senses. But does this verse state what the faith is founded upon? Can faith be founded upon public evidence as well as upon mystical experiences? It seems that we need to distinguish between faith itself and what faith is founded upon. The book of Hebrews, including the passages surrounding 11: 1, was written to encourage early, persecuted Christians. It reminds them of the spiritual reality of the sufficiency of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross for right relationship with God. The context of Hebrews 11: 1 does not seem to be concerned either way with the role of evidence with faith, but rather, with the content of faith.
Let’s look again at John 20: 29. It can seem that Jesus is saying that it is blessed to believe without evidence. But does the context really lead to that conclusion? Consider the Easter appearances of the risen Jesus to the women at the tomb, to ten of the disciples that evening, and to the disciples on the Emmaus Road. Were any of these disciples expecting to see Him resurrected? Absolutely not! They all started out skeptics, like Thomas. So why does Thomas seem to earn a rebuke? John 20: 26 records that Jesus appeared to all of the disciples, with Thomas present, eight days after he appeared to the all of the disciples, but with Thomas absent. Thomas surely had ample opportunity to question and consider the multiple appearances of Jesus to over a dozen of his friends. Would they be wrong about such a serious event, given the danger they could still be in as the close followers of someone crucified for blasphemy? From the context, it seems that a very reasonable reading of John 20: 29 is that Jesus is correcting Thomas for not believing reliable eyewitness testimony. Like all Christians since the New Testament time, Thomas had abundant evidence to believe. It would be improper for people who have received adequate evidence to demand special signs as a condition for their belief in Jesus' resurrection. Nevertheless, Jesus also graciously gave Thomas the evidence he demanded. Thomas shows us that some people, for whatever reasons, simply need more convincing evidence to believe than do others. Thomas demonstrated the sincerity of his stronger skepticism. After receiving the needed evidence, Thomas joined the apostles in risking his life for his testimony of Jesus' resurrection in Jerusalem. Later he went to India, where he established churches before being martyred for his belief and testimony.
Tying it Together
John 20: 30-31, which comes immediately after the verse we just considered, states “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Early in this piece I wrote about how my students would not park and spend the day at a road sign for a destination. They wanted to go to the destination, and expected to see signs that confirmed they were going the right direction. The verses just quoted indicate that Jesus’ signs, including miracle evidence, are for the purpose of enabling belief that Jesus is the Christ. An earlier verse, 1 John 1: 3, states that our goal is “fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ.” Belief, then, is beyond mental assent. It is active trust in God who we can fellowship with personally. Signs, including nature, history, fulfilled prophesy, philosophy, and miracles, tell us we are on the correct path to God.
What are some of the objective signs that might confirm belief that Jesus is the Christ? A brief, general listing of some of them breaks down into two groups. The first group of signs supports the existence of a theistic God, who made the universe and is not connected to it as part of His existence. These include the Cosmological Argument for the beginning of the universe, the Teleological Argument for Design in the universe and in life, and the Moral Argument for objective moral values. The other group of signs supports a distinctive Christian faith. These include the historical reliability of the New Testament, fulfilled prophesy, Jesus’ claim to be God, and His miraculous confirmation of that claim by His resurrection. I have written more about these evidences and listed other resources in my article “The Main Thing: Jesus the Christ, Crucified and Resurrected.” It can be found at: http://www.reasoningfaith.com/the-main-thing.html .
Thank you for taking time to read this writing. I hope it proves to be profitable for you.
Scripture quotes are from the English Standard Version of the Bible.