What Is Faith?

Christians have faith in Jesus Christ. People of other religions have faith in their prophets or the truth of their doctrines. What does the word "faith" mean, though? According to Merriam-Webster.com, faith is "firm belief in something for which there is no proof." Similarly, belief is defined as "a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing." These are fair enough definitions, but let us probe deeper. Faith is defined in terms of belief, and belief in terms of trust and confidence. The idea seems to be that faith in some idea is a cognitive acceptance of the truth of that idea, but that the idea is not proven true. We do not have "faith" in something that is proven - we simply recognize it as true. How, then, can one have faith in the unproven, if faith is some mental or emotional acceptance. Surely we cannot know with certainty that something unproven is true, so what does it mean to accept it as truth? My understanding is that one has faith in an idea if one subjectively or emotionally embraces the truth of the idea despite some level of objective uncertainty, and then lives and acts as if there were no doubt to its truth. You could sincerely believe something unproven and be unaware of the uncertainty, but this would be somewhat of a delusion - I am thinking more of faith that is aware of reality and recognizes the uncertainty, but is still able to embrace something as true.

Of course, now we come to the issue of probability - is it reasonable to have faith in something that is estimated to have a 30% likelihood of being true? Is it reasonable to accept it as true, despite the 70% uncertainty? No. How about faith in something that we are 99% certain is true. Yes - it would almost certainly be reasonable to both subjectively embrace it as truth and live in light of its truth. Where, then, is the line between reasonable faith and unreasonable faith. I don't think there is a definite line, but the important point is that it may be reasonable to accept something as true despite some level of probabilistic uncertainty to its truth.

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Music Is Revelation

I think for many of us, including myself, music brings us closer to God than almost anything else. In a way, we perceive who God is through music - his power and majesty and strength, or his beauty, or his love, or the joy and hope that he gives, or his holiness and infinite perfection, or other facets of God's character - in a unique and powerful way. We get a glimpse of what he is like. In the same way, music can give us a glimpse at the horror of evil and suffering and all that is not of God. Music is part of "what has been made" (Romans 1:20) and it is a way to see a brief shadow of "God's invisible qualities - his eternal nature and divine power." There is something really deep and beautiful in music - it can't be conveyed in words, but you know it when you hear it. Because music speaks so powerfully to me of what God is like (and yet we only get the faintest and most remote echo of the fullness of that reality), I decided to list some of my favorites (best are in bold), organized by what they mean to me.

The Great Battle:

• "The Battle" from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
• "Optimus" and "Autobots" from Transformers, "Matrix of Leadership" from Transfomers 2
• "Here Comes the King" by X-Ray Dog
• "Tieres" by Brand X
• "Bearing the Cross" from The Passion of the Christ
• "Gathering All the Na'vi Clans for Battle" from Avatar
• "Mind Heist" by Zack Hemsey
• "Heart of Courage" by Two Steps from Hell

The Victory:

• "Resurrection" from The Passion of the Christ
• "Time" from Inception
• "Forth Eorlingas" from The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
• "Homeland" from Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron

The depth of the Passion, the mystery of Eden and Gethsemane, of Incarnation:

• "Themes from the Passion," "The Olive Garden" from The Passion of the Christ
• "What Wondrous Love Is This?," "I Remember Well" by Fernando Ortega
• "Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence" by Fernando Ortega

Love, beauty:

• "Clair Voyant" by Two Steps from Hell
• "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" by Fernando Ortega
• "Nuvole Bianche" by Ludovico Einaudi
• "Rose" from Titanic

Other themes from the Great Story:

• The Tree of Life trailer (greatness)
• "Becoming One..." from Avatar (the wonder of creation)
• "Binary Sunset" from Star Wars (hope, longing)
• "A Gift of a Thistle," "For the Love of a Princess" from Braveheart
• "My Name is Lincoln" from The Island (adventure)
• "Falls" from The Mission
• "A Small Measure of Peace," "A Hard Teacher" from The Last Samurai

Best of all, more favorites from Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia:

• "The Road Goes Ever On" Parts I and II, and "May It Be" from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Complete Recordings
• "The Return of the King," "The Grey Havens" from The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
• "Evacuating London," "From Western Woods to Beaversdam," "Only the Beginning of the Adventure," "Lucy Meets Mr. Tumnus," "Father Christmas," "The Wardrobe," and of course "The Battle,"  from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
• "Arrival at Aslan's How," "The Duel" from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

And a few favorite songs by Fernando Ortega:

• "Creation Song (Glory to the Lamb)"
• "Lord of Eternity"
• "Sing to Jesus"
• "Let the Words of My Mouth"
• "No One Else"

Each of these help me understand the Great Composer and Author a little bit more. They convey, in a limited way, his power, beauty, wisdom, mystery, and majesty, with which he has filled creation. For me they are a foretaste of the hope and joy of knowing God, and in ways they tell the story of redemption that God has written. Listening to great music, like many things, can be turned into an act of worship.
-Elliot

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C. S. Lewis on the Trinity

I expanded this post into a series of eight posts on the Trinity, starting here.



In part IV of Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis describes the doctrine of the Trinity:

“[T]he mysterious something which is behind all things must be more than a person…something superpersonal…The whole purpose for which we exist is to be taken into the life of God.”

Lewis uses the analogy of dimensions in space, describing how God’s “dimension” is at a higher level than ours; we cannot to fully comprehend the Trinity:

“As you advance to more real and more complicated levels, you don't leave behind the things you found on simpler levels; you still have them, but combined in new ways—in ways you couldn't imagine if you knew only the simpler levels…On the Divine level, you still find personalities; but up there you find them combined in new ways which we, who do not live on that level, cannot imagine. In God’s dimension, so to speak, you find a being who is three Persons while remaining one Being…Of course we cannot fully conceive a Being like that: just as, if we were so made that we perceived only two dimensions in space we could never properly imagine a cube.”

When thinking about the Trinity, we should not think it is an impossible contradiction or bad math (1+1+1=1).    The idea is that there are three distinct persons, so tightly knit together that the three are united as one being.  "Being" is something different than "person."  We do not know exactly how, and these words are no more than imperfect analogies to our human experience.  All we can say is that the life of God is both more complicated and simpler than the human experience.  There is both unity and diversity in the being of God; God is "the One who lives as three."  And to a large extent, we must be content with not knowing how this works.  After all, we are talking about God; we cannot expect our minds to be capable of fully grasping the infinite.

In a later chapter Lewis describes the three persons of the Trinity in more detail. He says that although there was never a time when the Father existed and the Son did not, the Father is nevertheless the cause of the Son*, and that this is what is meant by “begotten Son” or the Son “proceeding” from the Father. The Son is “streaming forth from the Father, like light from a lamp…He is the self-expression of the Father.” As the author of Hebrews says, “The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word” (Hebrews 1:3). Lewis goes on to say, “God is not a static thing – not even a person – but a dynamic pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama.” He then comes to the third person of the Trinity. “The union between the Father and Son is such a live concrete thing that this union itself is a Person.” Lewis goes on to describe how this can be, and he describes the different roles of each person in the Trinity in bringing us humans back into the life and love of God (how the Trinity brings about this history of the redemption of a fallen world and humanity). The Son, “streaming forth from the Father” enters the world and becomes a man; he is the Mediator, the bridge between us and the Father, and our way of knowing what the Father is like. The Holy Spirit is within us and acts through us. Like the Son, the Spirit reveals God to us, but in a different way. Understanding the Trinity also helps us to understand how “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Even before the creation of the world, there was love within the Trinity, and it is out of this life and love that creation came to be.

*I am not quite sure I agree with the idea of God the Father being the cause of God the Son. The idea of causality is, well, not as simple as it seems, I think. I think we should be careful when saying something is the cause of something else. It seems to me a strong word with which to describe this mysterious relationship between the persons in the Trinity.

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The Eucatastrophe: Christianity in The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Narnia

J.R.R. Tolkien coined the term "eucatastrophe" meaning a good "catastrophe," or an enormous event where there is a sudden and epic change from very bad to the absolute triumph of good. The great evil is defeated by the greater good. This idea comes across in the writings of Tolkien, Lewis, and J.K. Rowling, and is at the center of Christianity...

In The Lord of the Rings, Frodo and Sam struggle hopelessly into Mordor to destroy the ring, and Aragorn leads the Host of the West in a desperate attack on Mordor to draw the Enemy's gaze away from his own land. It is the only chance of victory, but it is essentially a kamikaze mission - there is just a "fool's hope." But somehow, out of despair comes hope and ultimate victory - the ring is destroyed and the Enemy defeated. In a similar way, Gandalf earlier fell from the Bridge of Khazad-dum to what appeared to be his end, but in a remarkable battle with the balrog he is victorious and is brought back from death (the book says he passed through darkness and was "sent back" to complete his task), returning in triumph and greater power as Gandalf the White.

In The Chronicles of Narnia, Aslan sacrifices his life for Edmund and is humiliated and killed. The Narnians, led by Peter, go into battle without him. In the movie version, the sense of hopelessness comes across since they know of Aslan's death before the battle. But Aslan returns from death, joins the battle and defeats the White Witch. Absolute defeat is turned to absolute victory.

In Harry Potter, Harry intends to sacrifice himself for his friends and goes to his death. He faces death and passes through death, receiving Voldemort’s killing curse. In a mysterious, “eucatastrophic” turn of events, though, Harry returns from death and Voldemort’s apparent victory is turned to defeat. Good is greater than evil, love triumphs.

Tolkien, Lewis, and Rowling are all Christians, and their stories and worlds reflect the Great Story in this real creation, God's history of redemption, and at the center of this story is the resurrection of Jesus Christ - the ultimate, real eucatastrophe. Jesus was arrested, beaten, scourged, crucified, and killed. He had brought a message of love and selflessness, yet also of power and the fulfillment of hope for a Messiah and the ushering in of the Kingdom of God. Now he was dead, and this hope was gone. But then, somehow Christ was resurrected, returning from the dead and triumphing ultimately over death. Tolkien writes "The Resurrection is the eucatastrophe of the story of the Incarnation — This story begins and ends in joy."

How, though, in each story did this happen - how did absolute good triumph absolutely over absolute evil? In each story it is very similar, and it again reflects the real story.

In The Lord of the Rings, Gandalf describes how the Enemy would never expect his enemies to attempt to destroy the ring. Rather he would expect them to seize it for themselves in a self-centered desire for power, as he himself would. This is why Aragorn's attempt to draw his gaze to the mighty captains of the West was so successful. Sauron knew the ring had been found, and his greatest fear was that a new dark lord would arise in power to replace him. He could not comprehend a non-selfish course of action.

In Narnia, the Witch knew there was a deep magic, a law that said that the blood of a traitor belonged to the Witch. Her knowledge was limited though, for she was no more than a created being; there was a deeper magic from before the dawn of time, a magic authored by the great Emperor. Aslan says "wh en a willing victim who has committed no treachery is killed in a traitor's stead, the Stone Table would crack and even death itself would turn backwards." The deeper magic was a law of sacrifice and victory over death, a deeper truth.

In Harry Potter, Voldemort, being shrouded in the darkness of evil, cannot comprehend the ways of good – the deeper magic of love and sacrifice is beyond his grasp, and his foolish ignorance betrays him. Voldemort’s life is mysteriously linked to and dependent on Harry because Voldemort took Harry’s blood into his own body in order to accomplish his dark resurrection. In so doing he unknowingly kept alive in himself the life-giving power of sacrificial love (see chapter 35 of Deathly Hallows, “King’s Cross”) – the power of Harry’s mother’s love, which had protected him, and now the power of Harry’s love for his friends, which shields them from harm as Harry lays down his life for them. Put simply, Voldemort had no hope for himself apart from his dependence on Harry, on what is good and true and right, and in killing Harry he ensures his own doom. Harry returns from death and defeats his enemy. Good is greater than evil, and what seemed to be defeat was mysteriously turned to victory. Love triumphs.

None of these evil characters saw it coming, because they couldn't understand the ways of love, they couldn't understand good. Good came first and was always greater than evil, which is just a parasite (as Lewis describes in Mere Christianity). It is the same in the Great Story. Satan must have thought his victory was at hand at the cross, but he could not understand God's ways, the way of love - love is selflessness, being for others and not self, and this is just what Jesus did at the cross. He gave himself. Satan could not understand it, but he was a created being, and his knowledge and perception of truth was severely limited because of his rejection of God. But Jesus knew what he was doing, telling his disciples that he would die and then return (Matthew 20:17-19).

Each one of these stories is a reflection of the story of Jesus Christ. This was what the authors intended (even Rowling, I think). Although there are obvious differences between most of these protagonists and Jesus (only Aslan was really a metaphor for Jesus), they are nonetheless strikingly similar in other important ways. Many stories reach a climax where it looks like the bad guys will win, but there is a happy ending, and these too reflect the innate human knowledge that good is victorious over evil. But epic tales like those of Middle-earth, Narnia, and Harry Potter stand out because the battle between good and evil is real, absolute, and on an enormous scale, and the triumph over death is sudden and complete. The good is truly good and beautiful and centered on love, and the evil is truly evil and horrible and centered on selfishness and desire for power. These stories, more than others, reflect the deep human knowledge of God's story and his eucatastrophic victory over evil in the primary world; we create worlds and stories of our own, imitating our Creator, just as we ourselves are created in the very image of God.

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God: Incomprehensible and Omnipotent

If you are a Christian, like me, you seek to know God. But how can we ever know God? – he is so infinite and majestic and beyond our human comprehension and everything that he created. In this life, God has only revealed himself to us through his creations (except in Christ, but even Jesus Christ, despite being the “exact representation” of God and showing us what might be called the most important, the core things about God (John 1:18; 14:9), was not a complete revelation of everything about God) so we can only know him based on this limited revelation. Furthermore, we have finite human minds – in this life we are not capable of fully understanding God. We can only say what he is like, and compare/contrast him to his creations (which are filled with his beauty and majesty). Psalm 36:6 – “Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep.”

In Exodus 33:20 God says “you cannot see my face, for no one may see my face and live.” At times in the Old Testament people saw a vision or form of God, but they still lived because God had not fully revealed himself. In Judges 13:18, God says his name is “beyond understanding,” and to Abraham he says simply “I AM.”

We tend to describe God with certain attributes, phrases, and words. The problem is that in describing God we use language, and human language is limited to the human realm. Each word and phrase carries certain connotations and ideas, and when we hear these words we can only think in human terms. For example, we say that God is good. We get an idea of what “goodness” is through our experiences and what we see in the world and in ourselves, and we say that this is what God is. But God is so different, so much greater than what we can perceive that when we say God is good, it is like looking at stars and saying they are bright – if we were closer to them they would be really bright, like the sun, and if we were really close they would annihilate our retinas along with the rest of us. God is good, but we only have the slightest idea of what that means. As Paul says “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”

Furthermore, we try to base our understanding of God off of limited words like “good,” “love.” But God is the definition and the source of these ideas, and he sets the standard for what we understand as “goodness.” What is love? What is good? God. Although it is helpful to understand God based on what we experience by saying “God is good,” we should remember where this goodness comes from – “goodness is God.”

One attribute we describe God with is omnipotence – God can do anything. But this leads to confusing questions like “can God create a rock so big he can't lift it?” When we think about power, we think in human terms, and differentiate between the ability to do something and the desire to do something. But God is God. There is nothing which is in accordance with God's will and yet God cannot do. Unlike us, God can do whatever he wants. So, when we think of God, the line between being able to do something and not being able to do something, and the line between desiring something and not desiring something, are the same line. That is why we can sensibly talk about God not being able to do things, whereas God would not be God if it was his will to do something, and yet he could not do it. The things which God cannot do are things which are not in accordance with his will. So, no – God "can't" create a rock so big that he can't lift it. God can't go against the laws of logic (ie. he can't create something that doesn't exist). Why the heck would he want to? God can do whatever he wants – whatever is in accordance with his character, which does not change (James 1:17). That is what omnipotence means. Is there a distinction between God choosing not to do something because it is not in his character to do it (ie. not to destroy his creation), and being "unable" (I put this word in quotes because I think it would be easy to associate it with connotations it has for human inability) to do something because it is not in his character (ie. being unable to create a thing that doesn't exist)? I would guess that the answer is no. God is the source of everything, even the laws of logic. The crucial point is that a logical and sensible reality is simply an “outflowing” of WHO GOD IS – he is that original entity from which ALL else comes, even logic itself. God comes before all and is the source of all. Thus he does not go against the laws of logic because that is not in his character/nature. When we describe God, using the words "can" and "will" both present problems. It is misleading to say that God cannot do something because this seems to imply that there is some external standard to which God must submit. Likewise it is misleading to say that God "will not" do something (as in, God "will not" defy logic) because the terminology implies that what God chooses against is even a remotely reasonable possibility to be chosen against. The fact is it is not even a remotely reasonable possibility because it is not in accordance with God's character. The best way to say it is that God simply does (rather than chooses to do, or is able to do) whatever is in accordance with his will. He acts out of who he is. God acts within the bounds of what we observe to be logic BECAUSE he is a "logical" God and NOT because he is held by some external standard or constraint of logic. So, when I apply the word "cannot" to God I mean something to the effect of "does not do what is not in accordance with his nature." I also mean the same thing when I say "will not." If God can only act in accordance with his own nature, with who he is as a truthful, just, loving God, is he not limited in some way? No, because no one is forcing God to be who he is. Why is God the way he is? He simply is - the I AM. And his will is in accordance with who he is. That is a mystery, but I can live with it.

In this whole discussion we have been stuck with using human language and with our limited human minds (this is an even greater hindrance). In the end we can only comprehend so much; we must be satisfied to know that God is who he is and therefore he does what he does. In his book The Pleasures of God, John Piper brings together omnipotence and the happiness of God in an effort to understand who God is more fully, and what is meant by sovereignty and omnipotence. Piper cites Psalm 115:3 ("Our God is in the heavens; all that he pleases, he does") and Psalm 135:6 and then says that "all that he does he takes pleasure in. He cannot be kept back from doing what he delights most to do. And he cannot be forced to do what he does not delight in." Piper demonstrates the biblical truth that the delight of God in all things is at the center of what is meant by omnipotence.

So how do we know God? By looking around at what he has revealed in creation, in history, and in our own hearts. But we must remember that we are only seeing a fraction of a glimpse of the truth. God can’t be put in human terms – all we can do is say, “that is a beautiful sunset, and God made it, and that is what he is like, except for in a completely different and infinitely greater way.” The fact that God is beyond our full understanding should itself fill us with awe and wonder at who he is and what he has done. Jesus Christ is the closest we will come in this life to fully knowing God, so to know God, we should look most often to Jesus of Nazareth – his life, his words, his actions, his interactions with his disciples and other people...

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God: Incomprehensible and Eternal

I am a huge Lord of the Rings fan, and in the book Tolkien talks a lot about Frodo’s story and Sam’s story, and how all the stories of all the characters and events are part of one great Story. I think we should look at our lives in the same way – God has written a great Story and brought it into being, and we are part of it, but only a small part. This life is not our home – we are passing through, on a journey…

“You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath.” – Psalm 39:5

God’s plan of redemption for history, of taking a fallen world and bringing a greater good out of it, is so absolutely enormous and completely perfect. Everything God has made and done has a purpose and plays a part. We can only see a very little part of it all, because we are only human beings with limited minds, and because God has only revealed some of it to us. But God has given us minds and hearts to wonder at what he has done…

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” – Ecclesiastes 3:11

"The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world." – Psalm 19:1-4

“For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” – Romans 1:20

God has put a lot of beauty and majesty into what he has done (from the natural world to people to his gift of salvation through Christ), but think how much more beautiful and majestic the Creator himself must be! Of course we can’t yet see all that God is, only what he has shown us. Think how infinitely beyond us he is, in knowledge and power and wisdom and sovereignty.

"Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen." - Romans 11:33-36

“How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand.” – Psalm 139:17-18

God truly is beyond us, and yet think of all he has done to reveal himself! The book of Ecclesiastes talks about how, without God in the picture, everything is meaningless. But if we remember God we will see how he has filled everything with meaning and purpose. Imagine what would be done for God's kingdom if we lived every moment and looked at every person and thought every thought in light of eternity!

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