Monday, October 26, 2015
467 - Insufficient Evidence
Spirituality Column #467
October 27, 2015
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville-Geist
“… faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” – Hebrews 11:1
It is stated no more clearly than this anywhere else in the Bible: faith is about spiritual sureness, not physical proof. Human comprehension of and confidence in the divine requires something beyond evidence and definition.
Old Testament history, laws, scripture, landmarks, prophets and the story of Israel provide a trail of earthly evidence of God’s plan for His chosen nation. Even with so much cultural structure and religious direction, the Jews still had to take it on faith that their unique story represented God’s will and purpose. Consider Noah, Job and Abraham and their remarkable faith in the One True God even before the Hebrew covenant, tribes, Moses, Ten Commandments and law.
The New Testament’s eternal truth of Christ is so much more unimaginable.
The Gospels attest to the arrival, purpose, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus. In Acts the disciples receive the Holy Spirit, live as Christ’s church and tell the world about Jesus. Paul’s 13 letters describe God’s son Christ Jesus fulfilling God’s laws and prophecies while redrawing man’s expectations to include, through faith in Jesus, gracious forgiveness of sins and adoption into God’s glorious Kingdom. Hebrews – the book – proclaims Jesus as entirely sufficient for all this; in Jesus the world is entirely new. Instead of failure and being judged in sin, humanity has hope in the redeeming, saving grace of Jesus Christ (John 3:16). God’s promise to Israel is completed in Jesus for the entirety of humanity – humanity created in God’s image with the breath of the Spirit and the Word, Jesus, that showed up in history, time and location as the Messiah Christ.
Evidence? How about God in the flesh, with teaching, miracles, love, wisdom, courage, humility and the ultimate purpose of saving all mankind?
“Naw, that’s just a story; I got real problems,” folks say. Jesus just isn’t sufficient.
For a moment put aside the pervasive intellectual misdirection of the evidentiary narrative of ancient Greek philosophers and modern humanists, who endeavor to define the undefinable with arrogant insistence on the sufficiency of man’s inexplicable brain to discover truth, and the sovereignty of man’s unexplained being to assign purpose.
It’s really so simple:
Why are we here? Because of God, for His glory.
Why do we have hope, light and truth? Because of Jesus Christ.
Why do we know it? Because of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus is sufficient for all this not because He’s all we have, but because He’s all we need. The point is lost when we look outside our faith.
Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) ignores ghosts at Halloween the way secularists ignore Christ at Christmas.
October 27, 2015
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville-Geist
Insufficient Evidence
By Bob Walters“… faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” – Hebrews 11:1
It is stated no more clearly than this anywhere else in the Bible: faith is about spiritual sureness, not physical proof. Human comprehension of and confidence in the divine requires something beyond evidence and definition.
Old Testament history, laws, scripture, landmarks, prophets and the story of Israel provide a trail of earthly evidence of God’s plan for His chosen nation. Even with so much cultural structure and religious direction, the Jews still had to take it on faith that their unique story represented God’s will and purpose. Consider Noah, Job and Abraham and their remarkable faith in the One True God even before the Hebrew covenant, tribes, Moses, Ten Commandments and law.
The New Testament’s eternal truth of Christ is so much more unimaginable.
The Gospels attest to the arrival, purpose, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus. In Acts the disciples receive the Holy Spirit, live as Christ’s church and tell the world about Jesus. Paul’s 13 letters describe God’s son Christ Jesus fulfilling God’s laws and prophecies while redrawing man’s expectations to include, through faith in Jesus, gracious forgiveness of sins and adoption into God’s glorious Kingdom. Hebrews – the book – proclaims Jesus as entirely sufficient for all this; in Jesus the world is entirely new. Instead of failure and being judged in sin, humanity has hope in the redeeming, saving grace of Jesus Christ (John 3:16). God’s promise to Israel is completed in Jesus for the entirety of humanity – humanity created in God’s image with the breath of the Spirit and the Word, Jesus, that showed up in history, time and location as the Messiah Christ.
Evidence? How about God in the flesh, with teaching, miracles, love, wisdom, courage, humility and the ultimate purpose of saving all mankind?
“Naw, that’s just a story; I got real problems,” folks say. Jesus just isn’t sufficient.
For a moment put aside the pervasive intellectual misdirection of the evidentiary narrative of ancient Greek philosophers and modern humanists, who endeavor to define the undefinable with arrogant insistence on the sufficiency of man’s inexplicable brain to discover truth, and the sovereignty of man’s unexplained being to assign purpose.
It’s really so simple:
Why are we here? Because of God, for His glory.
Why do we have hope, light and truth? Because of Jesus Christ.
Why do we know it? Because of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus is sufficient for all this not because He’s all we have, but because He’s all we need. The point is lost when we look outside our faith.
Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) ignores ghosts at Halloween the way secularists ignore Christ at Christmas.
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