Faith and Sight

I heard a not-so-good sermon today. I feel a bit unsatisfied. So, I got home. I first started to read today’s newspaper. Then I read three chapters out of N. T. Wright’s new book Small Faith—Great God: Biblical Faith for Today’s Christians. 2^nd ed. (Downers Grove: IVP Books, 2010). The book is compiled from sermons he preached in and around Oxford. The book was first published in 1978. It was republished in 2010. The sermons preached 30 years ago in U.K. still have something to say to a Christian like me in the U.S.

In the chapter Not by Sight, Wright uses Hebrews 11:6 to talk about faith. “Without faith, it is impossible to please God.” We usually think that faith casts away doubt and fear. Faith is positive in a sense that it is “a total certainty about the meaning of life, a complete and clear knowledge of God that enables the person of faith to march calmly through life without batting an eyelid at all the problems and difficulties most of us face.” (p. 34) He points out that Hebrews 11:1 doesn’t agree with this understanding of faith. “What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see.” Wright notes, “Faith is the opposite of sight.” It’s a simple truth, but it clarifies some misconceptions about biblical faith and puts Christians who have “less faith” at ease. Paul would agree with this kind of understanding in 2 Cor. 5:7, “That’s why we live by believing and not by seeing.”

Wright then elaborates, “Faith is the willingness to think and act on the basis of what we know of God (what may be very little) and to trust him that he will not let us down. This is equally applicable to people who have believed in God for years but who need faith to see them through the next day, and to people who have never really been sure whether they believed in God or not and therefore need truly to have that faith for the first time.” (p. 34)

“It was by faith that Noah built an ark to save his family from the flood. He obeyed God, who warned him about something that had never happened before” (Heb. 11:7a). God told Noah to build an ark before the flood. He built a big ark with time, money, and energy (in a bright, sunny day?). People might walk by and say nonsense to him. Noah himself might even question himself and God while he was building it. But Noah acted on the basis of what he knew of God and trusted that God would not let him down. He obeyed what he heard from God. He started to prepare even though he might do it with fear and trembling (cf. Ps. 2:11).

“It was by faith that Abraham obeyed when God called him to leave home and go to another land that God would give him as his inheritance. He went without knowing where he was going” (Heb. 11:8). Once again, Abraham embodied the Hebrews 11:1 principle—it is not by sight, but by faith. There is no “heavenly map of the world” but only “bare promises.” (p. 35)

The Lord says,

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart;

do not depend on your own understanding.

Seek his will in all you do,

            and he will direct your paths” (Prov. 3:5-6).