On Faith, Pt. 3

Faith is based on evidence

Faith, by nature, is always without certainty, but it is hardly ever without evidence. It is a fool who chooses faith apart from any evidence. Everybody lives by faith in some aspects of their lives. In most cases where there is an opportunity for faith, it is usually a choice between faith in this thing or person or faith in that thing or person, or faith in an event happening or faith in it not happening. Rarely are we presented with faith as one option and complete certainty or fact as the other.  We all use logic to compile the evidence and choose where to place our faith. When it comes to matters of faith, people may disagree on the weight to give certain evidence, but they can rarely argue that there is no evidence whatsoever.

Much evidence for faith is relational

If faith is almost always accompanied by evidence, then a look at the characteristics of that evidence will help shed some light on our understanding of faith. It seems to me that quite often the evidence on which we base our faith is relational. What I mean is that it is affected by whether or not we deem another person, group, or entity trustworthy. We will take the risk of putting our faith in another if we trust their character. Our faith is a recognition of one’s faithfulness or goodness. When I open a history or science book to learn something about the subject, I am showing that I trust the character of its authors, or maybe the publishers of the book. When a little boy obeys his parents when they tell him not to play in the road, he is trusting in the goodness of his parents. The faithfulness of the parents is the evidence for the faith of the child. There may be other evidence that influences the child not to play in the road, but his confidence in his parents’ goodness certainly plays a major role. When faith is affected by the character of its object in this way, there exists a relationship between the possessor of the faith and its object. In such instances, faith is not simply an intellectual, cognitive belief but becomes synonymous with trust. Not trust that a certain belief is true, but trust in a person. It is a decision to trust a source. Furthermore, when faith is embedded in trust in another individual our source, when it has this relational component, it is hardly ever a one-time decision to have faith, but is usually part of an enduring confidence in the faithfulness of that particular individual or source. We see this in most cases of learning.  

A faithful source leads to confident faith

Much of what we “know” we learned from teachers or reading up on a subject.  In both cases, for any learning to happen, we must make a decision to trust in the source.  Lesslie Newbigin, in his book “The Gospel in a Pluralist Society”, has the following observation: “If we consider what is involved in learning to know anything, we will see that knowing has to begin with an act of faith.  We have to trust the evidence of our eyes and ears, or, if we are learning a language, or learning science or history or any other branch of knowledge, we have to begin by trusting those who undertake to teach us” (19).  Learning in this sense is rarely a matter of trusting individual bits of information, again and again, at each and every point, but is most often an enduring decision about the trustworthiness, or faithfulness, of the source.  In fact, Mirriam-Webster’s definition of faith also includes the words:  “steadfast in affection or allegiance.”  It is with this understanding of faith that we say things like, “I have faith in my friends,” or “I have faith in the government.”  In saying these things we profess something of an allegiance on our part.  Such statements reveal the relational aspect of faith, and how the faithfulness, trustworthiness, or goodness of an individual or source leads to confident faith.