This past week, as I was working on a sermon about the fruits of the spirit (Galatians 5:16-26) I was struck by a contradiction in how we talk about “faith.” At first I thought about this contradiction as a paradox, two opposing views, both of which are true. But as I write this, it seems more ironic than paradoxical, the assertion that at first, superficially, seems true is actually false and its opposite is true.
Here are the two parts of the contradiction which I noticed:
- Faith in God is a matter of trust. And trust works its way out in the real world by yielding some control of our lives to God. In the context of Galatians, Christians allow themselves to be led by the spirit of God only when they have faith in God. The greater your faith, the more of your life you allow out of your control and into the leading of the Spirit.
- Many religious people, people of faith, desire a sense of certainty and control and expect their religious faith to give them that control. This is expressed in common statements such as, “When we get to heaven we’ll understand the reason for this tragedy,” and “I know that God is in control.”
In part this contradiction arises from the various of meaning of “faith” in our English language and from the interactions of these meanings. Here are three relevant definitions of faith from Dictionary.com:
1. confidence or trust in a person or thing.
2. belief that is not based on proof. …
5. a system of religious belief.
If a person is seeking to have an explanation of the world that makes sense and that fits into a logical order then a good place to find that is in faith as (5.) a system of religious belief. Theologians work long and hard to make their systems internally consistent. Once a person takes a leap of faith—accepts a particular (2.) belief that is not based on proof—and dives into a particular system of belief, then everything makes sense, or at least everything will eventually prove to make sense. Inside the system, there is a sense of control; it explains how and why everything fits together. In a sense, the thing that this sort of religious person trusts (1.) is (5.) a religious system. And a system is well controlled; it is designed to be free of contradictions and surprises. Taken to extremes this type of faith leads to legalism and fundamentalism.
But if a person desires to know God then everything is turned on its head. Faith is (1.) trust in a person, God, and not trust in (5.) a system of religious belief. There is no one-time leap of faith out of one system of belief and into another. (Although trusting in God is often accompanied by a completely new way of seeing things.) Faith in God demands constant renewal because God is anything but predictable or controllable; God is mysterious and full of surprises. The name which the Lord claims when Moses questions him at the burning bush is a classic example of this, “I will be who I will be.” (Exodus 3:14) As God becomes who God is becoming those who have faith in God must trust, and trust, and trust, and trust again. When we talk in terms of a relationship with God “faith” loses its sense as a noun and takes on the sense of a verb.
Most religious people live somewhere between the two poles I have outlined here. We have faith in God and we have faith in a religious system (which includes a doctrine about faith in God). Most of us enjoy the certainty of our religious system even as we enjoy a relationship with the unfathomable, uncontrollable, living God.
Ironically, when faith is defined as a system of religious belief certainty and control take over and faith, in the sense of trust, can get squeezed out.
For my part, I want to know God and that demands that I grow in faith. This will happen only in so far as I give control of my life more and more over to the living God. And the faith which allows me to yield control of my life also demands that I yield control of my faith-as-a-system-of-belief.
articles of faith are indeed
rules of the will—graceless
faithless.
The door I flung my weight against
was constructed to open out
towards me. — Denise Levertov
