The American church is intellectually asleep. Pews are filled with shallow, unengaged minds that are still feeding on milk and cannot handle meat. Take a look at the sermons you see in the church and the Bible studies Christians have together. You will be hard-pressed to find sermons these days that challenge our hearers intellectually. Churches are filled with self-help pep talks and motivational speeches that do nothing to deepen our understanding of our faith. Pragmatism wears the crown and has displaced genuine discipleship. Bible studies held in homes (or wherever) seem to not get any deeper than “What does this passage mean to you?” or just simply being an echo chamber where everyone, who already agrees with each other, just rehashes the same ole stuff we have all been saying all of our lives in the church. Having been raised in church all my life, how many times do I need to hear the same simple lessons repeated over and over again, never moving on to the deeper truths of the faith? Yes, I know God is faithful in my troubles. Yes, I know God has a plan for my life. Yes, I know that we should keep our eyes on Jesus. Yes, I know that we should be virtuous. I know. I know. I know.
Lest I be misunderstood. I am not saying that being reminded of these things is not important. On the contrary, being reminded of these things is vital to our discipleship. The Gospel needs to be believed daily. We need to stir each other up to good works weekly. I strongly recommend reading God’s Word all of your life—not just once. My point is simply that while the simple issues of the faith, the things we can all grasp even as young children, are truly important, we should also, as mature disciples of Jesus Christ, press on to the more mature and deeper aspects of our faith. It is not a choice between the two. It is about embracing both. When I was born, I was fed milk—only milk. Eventually, I ate baby food. Even further, I began to eat solid food. I finally reached a point where I could eat a whole steak (medium-well, please). But I never once abandoned my love for milk! I love milk. I still drink it every day, but it is not the only thing I consume. I have moved on. Analogously, as young disciples of Jesus, we are fed the simple matters of the faith, but it should not stop there. Let us also press on towards maturity, to the deeper things of the faith. This does not mean that we completely neglect the simple matters. It just simply means that we keep the simple matters in mind while also engaging our minds in the deeper matters also.
At the very core of my heart is the desire for a revolution across the church of America. What does that revolution consist of? I deeply desire to see an intellectual revival—a revival of the mind of the church. I so badly want people to take truth seriously and pursue it with intellectual rigor. I long for the day that the Christian worldview is one again taken seriously in public academia. But I see two things (among others) being important in order for this to happen. First, we need to correct what it means to have faith. What is faith? More specifically, what is the relationship between faith and reason? Is “Just have faith” a good answer to the question, “Why should I believe Jesus rose from the dead?” What does that even mean? Is faith opposed to logic and reason? Second, if someone is asleep (especially if he or she is a heavy sleeper), it may take more than a gentle “Good morning” to wake them up. You might have to shake them up a bit. You may have to shout, turn on the lights, take off the covers. By analogy, it seems like that is what it will take to wake the average Christian up from his or her intellectual slumber. In actual practice, this will include challenging their faith by bringing up ideas, questions, and objections that they have probably never heard of. Additionally, it will include some rebuke and exhortation about their lack of thinking. So, that is what I will express in this article: my thoughts about the relationship between faith and reason. Moreover, I will present a challenge for Christians by questioning if we really even understand the Christian faith.
Why We Believe Christianity: Faith and Reason
If someone were to ask you the following question, what would you say: “Why should I believe that Christianity is the truth about reality?” To be more specific, imagine someone asks you, “Why should I believe that God exists? Why should I believe in an all-powerful, invisible being that I have never heard, seen, or touched?” Many (probably most) Christians in a discussion like this will eventually say, “Well, it’s just something you accept by faith.” Let’s think about this for a moment.
Let me quote the most famous atheist of our day’s take on faith. “Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, [a] lack of evidence.” That’s Richard Dawkins. He has influenced countless—thousands of—people, with his ferocious attacks on Christianity and belief in God. Do you want to know the sad reality of this? This seems to be exactly how the average Christian, or at least many Christians, think about faith too. Though they wouldn’t frame it in the pejorative and insulting way Dawkins does, the idea is the same. I’m afraid that, if this is the case, we have a badly mistaken view of faith. Philosopher JP Moreland in his book, Love Your God With all Your Mind, comments on this saying, “while few would actually put it in these terms, faith is now understood as a blind act of will, a decision to believe something that is either independent of reason or is a simple choice to believe [something] while ignoring the paltry lack of evidence for what is believed.” In other words, as Mark Twain said, “Faith is believing what you know ain’t so.”
Now, if that indeed is our understanding of faith, just imagine the implications of this kind of thinking. The Apostle Paul should have avoided reasoning with the pagan philosophers in Acts 17 or with the Jews about the Messiah. Why reason with people and try to persuade them of the truth, as Peter did in Acts? Why point people to evidences for the authority of Jesus, as Jesus did for Himself in John 5? Again, ask yourself: What do you think you should do if a young teenager from your church approaches you, willing to believe but struggling with doubts? When he or she asks you tough questions, should you just tell them “I don’t know. Just have faith. Stop asking questions” and let him crumble under the weight of his doubts? Surely not. Indeed, this exact attitude is one reason for the mass exodus of young people from the church in recent decades.
One thing that is so shocking about this is that we don’t think like this at all in other areas of our life. If you decide to buy a house, you will apply your mind diligently to make sure it is the best decision for your family concerning your finances, the housing market, location, etc. We analyze our favorite sports teams down to the smallest detail and present reasoned arguments for why we believe a particular team will win this year. If we want to buy a new pickleball paddle, we will research what people say about certain paddles, ask for opinions, examine different brands, and more to make sure we make the right decision. Examples abound. But as far as—you know—deciding about the truth of ultimate reality, the nature of God, what God wants us to do and believe, which all determines where we will spend eternity after death, eh, I don’t know. We don’t really think about it that deeply. Besides, it’s a matter of the heart. Just have faith. Imagine you are someone who believes in God but wants to know what religion is true. You go to a debate between a Muslim and a Christian. Both men on stage are doing their best to persuade you of the truth of their religion. Both religions are fundamentally opposed, and according to each religion, if you are wrong, that will have eternal consequences for you. How should you decide? Should you just say, “Eeny-meeny-miny-moe” and arbitrarily choose one? Should you flip a coin? Should you just say, “Well, I was born in America, and everyone else here is a Christian, so I’ll stick with that”. Or should you carefully evaluate each of the options, thinking deeply about ultimate truth, asking God to lead you to the truth? It’s just incredible that this is how so many Christians seem to think. You are staking the eternal outcome of your soul on the truth of this religion, and you’re not even sure how to prove that it’s true? Do you honestly even know that it is true? Do you even care?
Now, Scripture certainly does highly value faith. Paul names the three high virtues of faith, hope, and love, asking us to abide in these. So, let’s not discard faith. Rather, let us properly understand faith. JP Moreland goes on, saying, “By contrast with this modern misunderstanding, biblically, faith is a power or skill to act in accordance with the nature of the kingdom of God, a trust in what we have reason to believe is true. Understood in this way, we see that faith is built on reason. We should have good reasons for thinking that Christianity is true before we dedicate ourselves completely to it. We should have solid evidence that our understanding of a biblical passage is correct before we go on to apply it. And so on.” It seems to me that faith is more of a moral quality rather than an epistemological one. It seems that when Jesus calls us to have faith, He is speaking of an attitude of humility and trust—not just blind and arbitrary belief lacking no reason for the belief. I have faith in my wife to be a good wife, but I don’t have faith in her for no reason. I have spent hours and hours in conversation with her. I have examined her behavior. I know what she is passionate about. I have good reason to trust her, which is why I do. I have faith in Jesus to save me, but it isn’t a blind, arbitrary leap in the dark. It isn’t only because I was born in the southeast of America. No, there is good reason to believe that He really is The Son of God, which is why I trust Him.
A Deeper Grasp of Christianity: Understanding
The need for intellectual revival does not stop here. This doesn’t just apply to becoming a Christian or making sure Christianity is indeed true, but it can also apply to thinking through your faith as a Christian. The question here is: Do you truly understand what it is that you claim to know? Is it even possible to know something before you understand what it means? You can see all over Proverbs the plea to seek not only wisdom and knowledge but also this thing called understanding. But, what does it mean to understand something? I think it is easily illustrated. Imagine a parrot after hearing you say, “Jesus died for my sins”, repeats back to you, “Jesus died for my sins.” But then following the parrot’s words, you ask the parrot, “Okay, now what does that mean?” Is he capable of answering that question? Does he understand what it means? Obviously not.
Let me give an example more specific to us as Christians to get our minds engaged with what I’m trying to get at here. As Christians, we believe that Jesus is God. He wasn’t just a good man or teacher. No, He is God through and through. And we believe that God’s nature is best defined as a Trinity. Now, the question: Do you know how to define and articulate the doctrine of The Trinity? Think to yourself: What is the doctrine of The Trinity? Answer that in your mind. Also, and importantly, can you defend it in the face of objections raised against it? For example, on your understanding of Christian theology, try to refute this argument.
1. There is only one God.
4. The Father is God.
3. Jesus is not The Father.
Therefore, Jesus is not God.1
What is at the center of your being?
At the very heart of our religion, indeed what distinguishes Christianity from all other religions is the doctrine of The Trinity and the deity of Jesus Christ. That is at the core of our faith. That is what Christians understand about the nature of God. But it seems to me that many Christians probably have a difficult time even articulating, much less intellectually defending, the unique, Christian understanding of God. And this is only one example that indicates a common issue in the church at large. This shows for many of us that we really don’t deeply understand what we claim allegiance to. Indeed, how can you even claim to know that God is a Trinity if you don’t even understand what that means? If this is challenging to you, I want you to be honest and ask yourself: “What am I doing?” This isn’t some trivial matter reserved for the academic theologian in his ivory tower. This isn’t something reserved for academic journals. No, what you believe about God is the most important thing about you. What is true about God is the most important thing in reality. Let me boldly say that if you are an expert in any mundane thing of life (TV, sports, music, politics, etc.) but cannot give a basic articulation of God’s nature and defend it against objections, your priorities are completely out of line.
If you are an expert in any mundane thing of life but cannot give a basic articulation of God’s nature and defend it against objections, your priorities are completely out of line.
This is about God—the very One who created you for His glory, The One who keeps breath in your lungs, The One whom you should worship and adore, The One whom Jesus said should be loved with the entirety of your being: your heart, soul, and mind—all of you. God should be at the very center of your everything. He should be your center of gravity. He should take up your thoughts through the day. He should mean more to you than anything.
Do you know Him as well as you know other things in life, or have you set God to the side, reserving Him for Sunday mornings and 10 minutes of Bible reading every day? Let me ask you again: What are you doing? Do you really understand what you claim to believe? That’s different than being able to merely repeat whatever it is that you’ve been told all your life by your parents, friends, church, community, etc. Again, a parrot can repeat something you say, but if you were to ask the parrot, “What does that mean?”, you won’t get an answer. Sadly, it seems that we have many people in our churches today who can do no more than the parrot. They don’t truly understand.
My Encouragement for You
My encouragement for you is this: Do what Scripture says. Seek knowledge. Acquire wisdom. Gain understanding. Value truth above all things. Make sure you know the truth, asking God to lead you to it and using your God-given faculties of reason. Examine yourself, making sure that God is the very center of your being, which includes thinking deeply about Him and seeking to love and understand Him with all of your mind.
Notes
- This argument can be refuted by noting the difference between an “is” of identity and an “is” of predication. To say that Jesus is God is to predicate deity to Him. Understood in this way, the argument turns into a non-sequitur. You can translate it as follows.
1. There is only one divine substance.
2. The Father is divine.
3. Jesus is not The Father.
From these, nothing pertaining to Jesus lacking divinity follows. ↩︎