HER FAITH INSPIRES 227: Can you believe in God without evidence and reason?

Season: 10 Episode: 150

Listen to episode 146 in Spanish:

Summary:

What is faith? If you asked a Christian, they likely can’t tell you. Chrisitans, like many unbelievers, think faith is believing in something you can’t see without evidence. Is it true that in order to have faith you can’t ask for evidence? Is faith opposed to logic and reason? Shanda recaps her conversation with an atheist on social media and shares the results from a poll asking Christians to define faith. This episode will not only challenge you to examine what faith is, but it will challenge you to examine the evidence for God and what you put your faith in.  

Quotables:

Recommended Resources:

Cross Examined Article: Is Teaching Your Kids About God Child Abuse?

Website: shandafulbright.com

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A few weeks ago I posted to my social media something I had been pondering. Since I often read and teach, I am always thinking about how students learn and why people arrive at their beliefs. I posted, “Beliefs, no matter how passionately held can be wrong. The question isn’t, “What do you believe?” The question is, “Is what you believe true?” 

A few atheists jumped on my post and agreed with me. They agree that beliefs must be grounded in reason. However, one atheist (who never says she’s an atheist but does mention that you can only arrive at a belief by empirical data – what you can test, observe, and confirm with the senses) – which means she’s a naturalist and naturalists don’t believe in the supernatural.

That eliminates God, meaning she’s an atheist. 

I’m going to recap some of our conversation through IG here, but that is not the entire point of this episode. I’m not here to teach you how to debate and atheist on social media. I want to have this conversation because what she believes about faith is very similar to what many Christians believe about faith – that reason and faith do not go hand in hand. That faith must be something that does not accompany evidence or you don’t actually have faith. My goal in having this conversation is so that Christians can better understand what faith is. If you know what faith is, you really know what you believe and you know why you believe it. 

I’m going to give a slight disclaimer before I start because this topic is tough one. I like to keep things basic and tie everything to Scripture. That’s not hard to do with a topic like faith. What’s hard is that I want to do it justice. I want to make sure I interpret scripture properly and leave this episode helping you feel more confident in your faith rather than more confused. So please Lord … let it be. 

I even called Albert to let him know what I’m planning on doing and he talked me through it.

The problem is that Albert listens to this episode before you all do so he’ll be the most critical and tell me later what I could have done better. That’s good, but it won’t help you. So let’s just pray it goes well and when he’s on the show soon, we can have him expand on the topic of faith and add to the conversation.

Before we get into the episode, I want to thank the ladies of the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Ellerslie, GA for their hospitality and generosity and the Anchored in Truth Conference last weekend. These ladies are awesome, organized, and a strong team. If you are in the area and need a solid biblically based church, go there. You will be loved and you will grow in our knowledge of Christ. 

Also, for those of you who want to learn, I will do the 7 Churches in Revelation study in the spring and the registration info will be out soon. Keep an eye out for it and if you do not receive my emails, go to shandafulbright.com to subscribe so you don’t miss any of the classes coming up. 

Alright, so the questions we’re going to answer today are: 

1. What is faith? 
2. Can you have faith and reason or is faith absent of reason? 
3. What are some things you should never tell someone when it comes to faith?

What is faith? 

First, let’s go over the conversation me and Sophia had on Instagram.  Remember, my post said: Beliefs, no matter how passionately held, can be false. Passion does not validate a belief. The question is not, “What do I believe?” The question is, “Is what I believe true?”

She said: “Fantastic point. What methodology do you use to determine a truth from a falsehood? 

I said: You have to trace the belief back to the source and test it. We’ve had these conversations before, you and I. So I think you know what I’m about.

She responded: I see. But what methodology d you use to test a claim? I know what you are about, but I don’t know your methodology to determine what is truth what is false. 

Now keep in mind that she and I have had conversations before and she argues that the only way to know truth is to observe it through the sense. She wants tangible evidence.

So I know this. 

I respond by saying: The truth is observable, testable, so it must be consistent. It has to match reality. We can use historical evidence, scientific evidence to verify the truth but it also depends on what the claim is to determine how to go about verifying its truthfulness. The principles of uniformity helps us with cases we observe today that we cannot observe in real time. So it depends on the claim and the method can be employed. The Socratic method is great in education settings, specifically. 

She comes back and says: Great. We totally agree there. (So far, she and I agree. But there’s going to be a diversion. Just wait for it). She continues: The problem is that you cannot do any of this with issues of faith. You can’t use critical thought or the Socratic method for supernatural claims. Christianity claims violate the laws of physics, laws of uniformity, etc. I don’t understand how you reconcile the two. 

Ok, so there you go. What’s the problem here?

The problem is with the word faith. According to her, faith is absent of critical thought (I mean, I should be insulted by this statement, but I’m not. She is not the only one who thinks this. In fact, Christians also believe this. We’ll get into that later). And as far as violating the laws of physics, and uniformity, she is speaking here of miraculous events. But there’s a whole lot wrong with that and these are the reasons we need apologetics in the church. Of course God violets natural laws when He performs miracles – that’s the whole point of a miracle. If smooth can be explained by natural laws, it’s not a miracle and God didn’t do it. But we cannot go down that trail. We have to stick to the topic – faith. 

Here’s what I should have done: I should have asked her, “What do you mean by faith?” She made the claim, she has to prove it. But I didn’t because it’s social media and I didn’t feel like conversing with her because she does not listen or budge. Again, I’ve had these conversations with her already and we get nowhere. 

But here was my response:

We all have to have faith to come to a conclusion on something we weren’t present to physical observe – like the beginning of the universe. But faith only comes in once you’ve arrived at the belief, not before. Why would I put my faith in a claim there is no evidence to support? That’s called a hypothesis and it needs to be tested. That’s where those who don’t believe in God misunderstand what faith is. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Notice here that there is substance and evidence when there’s faith (trust in the thing you cannot see). But I can see why you would conclude that many Christians have faith without evidence. Many Christians don’t understand what faith is and don’t know how to articulate it. 

She says: We have evidence for natural phenomena that is unseen. Oxygen for example. No need to use faith in the slightest. We rely on data and evidence to make conclusions. If you point out a belief I carry that has poor evidence then I’ll drop it and revise it. The version I read is assurance of things unseen. Or confidence of things unseen. Faith does not require evidence. There is no evidence for religious claims. 

Again, she should have to prove this because she made the claim.

There’s a lot of difficulty in having these conversations on social media. There’s not a lot of room for writing anyway. 

I respond: You don’t have to have faith oxygen exists but you do have to have faith the universe operates under certain laws that support life on earth (we call these anthropic constants and there are 122 of them, showing design in the universe). How do you know for certain that you’ll be able to breathe tomorrow? Only because you have faith that everything will continue to operate under its design. I have faith in the way the universe was designed because I have faith in the designer. You can say the universe is here by chance but you still have to have faith it’ll be here for you tomorrow. 

That was it. There was no more dialogue after that, but it got my wheels spinning because faith is so misunderstood. I want to break down a few things I said in this thread that I feel are important for us as christians to know so that we can better understand why we believe in God and how we’ve arrived at that belief.

First, what is faith? 

Hebrews 11:1 says, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” 

The NIV says, “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”

The CSB says, “Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.”

There are two parts to this: One is the intellectual part of the faith and the other is trusting in the thing that we cannot see or do not have direct evidence to prove. Does that mean we don’t have evidence for God? No. 

Verse 3 helps us with verse 1. It says, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” 

Here you see the arrival of the belief – believing that an invisible God spoke the world into existence so that what we see was created by the unseen.

That is where faith comes in.

Faith accompanies belief but it comes after belief. It cannot come before because faith requires reason and evidence. Romans 1 tells us that creation speaks to God’s existence so that through what was made we see His invisible attributes and divine nature so those who deny the truth are without excuse. Our faith in an invisible God is built on the evidence of what He has created. 

The good news for us is that through scientific evidence, as Sophia and I discussed, we see intelligent design in the universe. Albert Einstein discovered the universe had a beginning and if it has a beginning it has a cause. We do not have blind faith. 

There are Christians who will tell you that you just have to have faith when it comes to believing in God. But what does that mean? Faith based on what? When Christians say you just gotta have faith and do not give you the reasons for faith based on the word of God and His world that He created, they are no different than atheists who say faith and reason are juxtaposed. 

I also think it’s interesting that Paul says this in 1 Corinthians 13:13, “ Now abide these three – faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

Why is love the greatest?

You only need faith for what you cannot see. You only hope in what you don’t have. But you love at all times. When we see God, we will no longer need faith. When we arrive in heaven, we will no longer hope for what we now have. But we love God now and will love God on the other side of the sun. 

This means that faith is not only believing with evidence. And it does not mean evidence is all that is needed to arrive at a belief. How do we know? Because James said even demons believe and tremble. The demons know God exists but they do not trust in Him. So head knowledge is not enough. We need both confidence in what we know – the intellectual part of our faith – and trust in the God whom we cannot see but believe to be the reason for the world we live in and the home that awaits us after this life. 

So faith is trusting in what you cannot see. That means faith is required of atheists as well. They cannot explain the single celled organism, where it came from, but the one they claim all life on earth derived from, yet they trust that is why they’re here. They have the same evidenced we have yet they come to a different conclusion – what we call a belief. They then have to have faith that there is no God. They won’t call it faith because they think faith is a bad word. Only Christians have faith. 

And that brings me to my next point: 

Faith is not just a Christian term. 

You have to have faith that your spouse won’t cheat on you. Now I don’t think my spouse will cheat on me. But can I be absolutely certain that my spouse will never cheat? I can say I am very confident that he is loyal and loves me and would never do such a thing, but that’s because I put my faith in him because I know who he is. I know his character and his convictions. So I have great faith in the man I married and his loyalty. But I still have to have faith that he’ll do what he says he’ll do. 

We put our faith in a lot of things. You put your faith in elected officials based on what they tell you they will do when the get in office. You can only trust in what you know about them. But it’s not blind faith. 

You have to have faith that your boss won’t fire you.

You might feel like you have a secure job, but you can’t say with 100% certainty that your job will be there for you one year from now. You have to trust that your bosses are telling you the truth when they say their company is doing well. 

So don’t think that faith is only for Christians and because we believe in an invisible God, then we are ignorant and that means faith is blind and without reason. People who say this are actually ignorant. 

I said a few weeks ago that discipleship is not only a Christian term. Everyone is a disciple because discipleship is a student or follower of a teacher or philosopher. My kids and I were talking about the instagram discussion I had with Sophia because I want them to think through these things and understand what faith is.

One of my boys looked up the definition of faith on Google and this is what it said: the first definition was something about putting your trust in someone or something – so even Google agrees that faith does not only pertain to religion. But the second definition is quite telling. It says, “strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof.”

This is insane. It’s really misleading and misguided.

Google doesn’t have any idea of what faith is from a Christian perspective and what they’re saying is that anyone who believes in God has no basis for their faith. 

But again, Google is a secular company that redefines the meaning of words all the time. Do you expect anything different from Google? I sure don’t. What’s important is that Christians understand what faith is. When Christians only say what they believe and do not say why they believe it (reasons, evidence) then they are no different than Google. They actually validate Google and the rest of the secular world when Christians cannot explain why Christianity answers the worldview questions in the way that aligns to reality. 

And when Christians cannot explain what faith is – that it is trusting in a God we cannot see yet we see the evidenced of His attributes in the created world because He designed it and spoke it into existence, then we are in fact ignorant and sound like a bunch of morons. 

Can you have faith and reason or is faith absent of reason? 

Let’s be clear about this: God demands faith. Hebrews 11:6 says, “6 Now without faith it is impossible to please God, since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” So does that mean you should just have faith for the sake of having faith? Go back and read all of chapter 11. All of the faith giants in this chapter lived in accordance with their belief in God. That means they pleased God by obeying Him.

Abraham left his home for the promised land. Enoch walked with God and God took him. Abel offered a better sacrifice than Cain. Do you see that the author of Hebrews is talking about their works that was the evidence of their faith which came by obedience after they believed in God? This wasn’t blind faith. Just because God demands faith does not mean it is without reason. You better know why you believe in God because if you have not been persuaded to believe in God for good reasons, you can be persuaded to believe in something else. Good reason better 

When Jesus walked on water in both Matthew and Luke, His disciples were fearful and doubted.

Jesus asked them a question. “Where is your faith?”

Why did Jesus ask them that? Did He expect them to have faith just because He told them to have faith? Consider this passage of scripture: John 10:37-38 (NLT) says, “Don’t believe me unless I carry out my Father’s work. But if I do his work, believe in the evidence of the miraculous works I have done, even if you don’t believe me. Then you will know and understand that the Father is in me, and I am in the Father.”

Jesus makes it clear – don’t believe me unless I show you the evidence of who I claim to be. Jesus performed miracle after miracle. We’re talking lame walking, deaf hearing, blind seeing, dead raising to life and still the religious leaders asked for more evidence. Jesus said He’s been showing them the evidence – miracles. “If you don’t believe my words, believe the works that I do because they back up my claim to be God.”

Jesus did not expect belief without evidence.

You shouldn’t believe in something you don’t have evidence for. That’s stupid. We believe in God because there is good evidence that He exists. And by the way, evidence for God is scientific (the attributes of the universe and design of the universe) and it’s historical (the historical reliability for the New Testament documents and what the eyewitnesses claim). We also have archaeological evidence that shows the historical figures in the NT documents really lived during the time of the writings.

We have manuscript evidence that shows what is recorded in the NT documents has not been altered and confirms the integrity of its message. So Christians who do not examine the evidence and understand why Jesus is the Son of God and why you should put your faith in Him are believing for what reason? Again, if you are not convinced God exists because you were not persuaded with reasons then you can be persuaded to believe in any other religion or belief system because you don’t care about what makes sense. 

That might seem harsh, but I cannot express it enough – we need to know what we believe and why. 

What are some things you should never tell someone when it comes to faith? 

First, don’t tell them, “You just gotta have faith.” When young kids or young Christians or anyone for that matter comes to you and asks a question about God, do not reply with, “You just gotta have faith.” How do you expect them to increase their faith? Do you think they can just muster up some more faith? It doesn’t work like that. 

Romans tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. When someone comes to you with a problem or question, find the answer. Guide them through the word of God. Show them where God addresses the issue in His word or reassure them of who God is. We serve a powerful God and the universe itself speaks to an all powerful, wise, and intelligent being.

As they ponder whether or not He can be trusted, take them outside and point to the heavens that declare His glory and majesty and tell them why an all powerful God is more than capable to answer their prayers because not only is He personal because He created everything they see, but He is personal because He knows the number of hairs on their head, and is acquainted with their ways and knows when they sit and when they rise. 

You can increase their faith by showing them the evidence of His world and the assurance of His word.

Not by telling them to “just have faith.” 

Second, don’t tell them they can’t ask questions because it shows a lack of faith. God is not afraid of our questions. I am currently studying all 4 gospels and writing down every time Jesus asked a question. I’m loving it!! Do you know how many questions Jesus asked? A lot! And if He is God, doesn’t He know everything? Why ask questions if you know all things? Because God encourage questions because they are not for His benefit they are for ours. When Jesus asked questions He zoomed in on the problem of the heart. He asked, 

“Where’s your faith?” 

“Is your heart hard?”

“Do you want to be made well?”

“What do you want me to do for you?”

And a whole host of other questions.

Asking questions does not mean you do not have faith. As a teacher, if my students don’t ask questions I know they’re not interested in the material. As a teacher, I know a student is learning when he asks questions. If my students don’t ask questions, I wonder why they’re wasting their time and mine. There is a difference between asking God a question and questioning God. One is seeking after wisdom and the other is seeking to question His judgment. We would do well to know the difference. 

Finally, don’t tell someone the reason they’re in the situation they’re in is because they don’t have faith.

Is every mishap, misstep, mess up and missed opportunity a punishment for not having enough faith? I mean, if you think that then how do you reconcile all of the disciples being beaten, tortured, and killed for their faith in Christ? Do you think they had enough faith? We cannot say that because someone is sick then they don’t have enough faith. That is false doctrine and is part of the word of faith movement and is not biblical. 

I am so passionate about this topic because Christians have made a bad name for themselves because we stopped being able to articulate a defense of the faith. We stopped giving answers for the hope that is within us and we became the exact thing Google says Christians are – people who put their faith in God without evidence. Not all Christians do this but a majority who all themselves Christians do.

How do I know? Well, let’s take it back to my most quoted stat on this podcast – 64% of Americans claim to be Christians yet only 4% have a biblical worldview. That means those who claim to have faith don’t even know the faith they claim to have. It’s a sad reality but we can change it. How do we do that? Christian education – and I’m not just talking about the kids. I mean whole family discipleship. 

Close:

I want to close this out today by encouraging you to create a short pitch of what faith is. The best way to do this is to imagine explaining it to a 5th grader. If a 5th grader asked you what faith is, how would you respond? What if your answer was a make or break moment for that 5th grader? If your answer wasn’t convincing, maybe that 5th grader would walk away with a question mark looming over their head? Because if we cannot explain this to a 5th grader, we don’t know our faith well enough. 

And just so you know, the average American reads at about a 6th grade level. Less and less people read books on audio today than ever before. We would do well to keep things that simple anyway. Our culture is dumbing down with both intellectual capacity and attention span anyway. Keeping things compact and to the point are necessary for understanding. 

https://www.gotquestions.org/false-teachers.html