Believing in God is one thing; believing in the Triune God is another. Believing in Jesus is not the same as believing in the resurrected, triumphant Savior. Agreeing with the Bible is not the same thing as having faith.
I have a good friend who agrees that the Bible is true, but he isn’t a Christian. Something is missing. If someone believes the evidence regarding the virgin birth, Christ’s death, and his resurrection, does this make him or her a Christian?
Even Satan believes these things, so what makes faith different from belief? I’ve been trying to formulate a concise and intelligent position regarding this subject for some time.
What Is Belief?
I’ve heard this a lot from counselors and pastors and it’s helpful: people tell you they don’t believe in anything, and that’s not true. Even non-religious people operate by a set of beliefs, which includes a moral framework derived from a worldview.
Out of this worldview, each person engages with people, events, and culture. Maybe you’re always negative and expect the worst; perhaps you choose to think positively because it’s better for your health.
But there again, where does one come up with the guidelines? When someone says there is no God and that the world just is, and we live by the rules created by society until we die, this person still believes that the rules of society are generally reasonable; he pays his taxes, doesn’t kick puppies, and refrains from murdering people who drive him crazy.
If he has faith that most other people will follow those rules, he can sleep at night. He might assert that there can be no other reasonable worldview than his; that people who believe in God are stupid: that is still a belief based on assumptions or experience paired with an attitude.
What Is Faith?
What if I didn’t believe in God and I thought that the world was created by a series of random processes? That when I died, that would be the end; I’d rot in the ground.
Then I was diagnosed with a terminal illness. Say this didn’t change my mind: I wasn’t interested in hearing your evidence for the existence of a good and loving God. I didn’t want to know what you had to say about sin and mercy and eternity.
It takes a lot of faith to maintain that belief in the face of death: that the Christians are wrong, and I don’t need to reconcile with Christ, confess my sins and accept his forgiveness.
It takes faith to assert that the thief on the cross was just desperate and in pain; that Jesus was deluded or arrogant to give him false hope for eternity.
I’d have to possess a strong faith in my position not to ask my Christian friends if they thought God would forgive me for snubbing him all these years.
A Reasonable Faith
A lot of non-religious people think that faith is blind. You take a leap into the unknown on the basis of feelings and longing for your truth to be the truth. Some individuals believe that all Christians are just very desperate people clinging to some fantasy because life just sucks.
Or they think we think we’re better than everyone; somehow qualified for salvation, and they’re not. On the basis of this position, they reject God.
Faith, however, is not wishful thinking. Real faith is intelligent. Paul said, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Romans 12:2). Don’t be a mere sponge, taking in everything people tell you and accepting it; use your critical thinking skills.
Paul intelligently argued the case for Christ all across the Roman Empire. And Luke’s gospel is a masterpiece of logic. Furthermore, Christ told his disciples, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37, emphasis mine).
Have you ever attended an Alpha course? It’s a fascinating and logical approach to Christianity, which appeals to the heart and the mind.
When you learn the historical, textual, and psychological arguments for the veracity of the Bible, and see the number of scientists who believe in the resurrection, you cannot rationally propose that all Christians are brainwashed fools.
When you hear the testimony of a once violent man, you can’t believe that God only saves “good” people. He saves sinners, and we’re all sinners.
You might disagree with what they are saying, but that disagreement will have to be based on logic, not assumptions about the sorts of people who believe in God. Otherwise, your competing position starts to look wishy-washy.
Sure, there are plenty of individuals who conflate Christianity with Eastern mysticism, who think all roads lead to God.
They do not, however, represent an informed, logical picture of Christ or a saving faith in Christ alone. Thoughtful Christians don’t look to those individuals for wise guidance either.
Belief Vs. Faith
I wonder about the friends in my world who don’t love Jesus, but who think the Bible is true. Something is missing — they aren’t Christians.
A contributor at GotQuestions.org put it this way: a lot of us believe that certain people existed, such as Alexander the Great. His soldiers “had faith in him [to] lead them into battle, and expand the Greek Empire. However, it would be safe to assume that no one alive today is trusting him to do anything for them.”
Another illustration goes like this: the average person believes in healthy eating and exercise to promote physical and mental well-being; they just haven’t applied that set of beliefs to their own lives. They haven’t made a commitment based on the facts.
And the same is true — the article continues — regarding God. Many people believe what the Bible says. They believe the core tenets relating to Christ’s birth, death, and resurrection; the Trinity; the trustworthiness of the Bible.
Yet, “if they have never committed themselves to God, if they have not trusted Him, then they do not have faith or biblical belief in Him. [...] Biblical faith is trust and commitment that results in a change of behavior” (Ibid.).
Your behavior will change if you commit to Christ because your heart changes. You want what God wants because you love him.
The Different Faces of Faith
The last part of this article that I read described how one can believe and have faith and be obedient to Christ but still sweat buckets when she takes an exam or starts a new job or talks to someone about Jesus. We don’t like the unknown, it scares us.
But a person who does the scary thing, even though she is physically sick about it, is able to go through with it because she knows she isn’t alone. She talks to Jesus, submits to his will (not all the time, but she’s trying), and knows he will not abuse her trust. He deserves her faith and her worship.
She doesn’t just know the facts about who Jesus was and what he said; she applies them to her life. She makes time for church fellowship and Bible study.
She has given up worrying (most of the time), overeating (again, she’s trying), and binge-watching TV in order to avoid social interaction. She’s not perfect, but it’s clear that a transformation is taking place.
Her faith is not better than or inferior to the faith of a confident person who loves exams or talking to strangers. Their faith starts with a work done by the same Holy Spirit who is in every faithful Christian.
Am I a Christian?
Are you asking that question? The answer is really simple: do you believe you are a sinner in need of a Savior? Do you believe Jesus is the Savior? Do you love him? If you have invited him into your life as your Lord and Savior, he is doing a sanctifying work right now.
Keep talking to him, confessing, repenting, and worshiping, and he will do the hard work of showing you that your faith is not misplaced.
In fact, he already did that, and you know it too: if you believe that Jesus died on the cross and rose again on the basis of strong evidence, then you can have faith that Christ can be trusted with your life.
For further reading:
What Is the Difference Between Religion and Spirituality?
What Is the Spiritual Gift of Faith?
What Does it Mean Even Demons Believe?
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/francescoch
