Era of the thinking Christian III
This is a further extension or rather, an addendum to my previous posts on thinking Christians.
On the issue of faith and reason, I need to concede that there is a limit by which intellectual arguments and reason can go in building our faith in Christ. The downfall of this is that once we completely base our faith on reasons and intellectual arguments, we fall hard when people come in and attempt to knock away that basis by which we build our faith. This is true, and this is the danger. Helping out brothers and sisters in dealing with the intellectual stuff of the faith, I come to realise the limit. It is not to say that someone will come out with something intelligent to knock the intellectual in me down. But this is to realise the limit of human reasoning and investigation to build our own faith.
So what am I driving at? I am not saying that our intellectual pursuit is futile in our faith, but it has to go beyond that. We still need to learn to reason out our faith and be able to make intellectual and intelligent defense for our faith when times call for it. Yet, faith in God has to go beyond that. As JP Moreland told Lee Strobel at the end of an interview, there is one evidence, after considering all the intellectual evidences, that one must look into in order to affirm the validity and reliability of the gospel: the experiential experience. It is only by experiencing Jesus that we know that God is real.
Why am I saying all these? I know beyond a reasonable doubt that God exists, and Jesus lived and died and resurrected. This I know and can reason intellectually. But I am thinking, what if one day someone really shoot me in the foot with something that is unexpected that I am even unable to refute? Does that mean that my experience with God has been fake all these while? Does this mean that I am living a lie? At the end of the day, it is knowledge that God is real and the tangible experience that I have with Him that will sustain my faith, not intellectual arguments.
Yet, I am still not agreeing with Soren Kierkegaard or any other existentialist Christians. My basis for this comes from reflecting on the lives of the early Christians. These people had faith because of their direct experience with the resurrection, not with intellectual arguments about the resurrection. But yet, look at Stephen and Paul.
I rest my case.
On the issue of faith and reason, I need to concede that there is a limit by which intellectual arguments and reason can go in building our faith in Christ. The downfall of this is that once we completely base our faith on reasons and intellectual arguments, we fall hard when people come in and attempt to knock away that basis by which we build our faith. This is true, and this is the danger. Helping out brothers and sisters in dealing with the intellectual stuff of the faith, I come to realise the limit. It is not to say that someone will come out with something intelligent to knock the intellectual in me down. But this is to realise the limit of human reasoning and investigation to build our own faith.
So what am I driving at? I am not saying that our intellectual pursuit is futile in our faith, but it has to go beyond that. We still need to learn to reason out our faith and be able to make intellectual and intelligent defense for our faith when times call for it. Yet, faith in God has to go beyond that. As JP Moreland told Lee Strobel at the end of an interview, there is one evidence, after considering all the intellectual evidences, that one must look into in order to affirm the validity and reliability of the gospel: the experiential experience. It is only by experiencing Jesus that we know that God is real.
Why am I saying all these? I know beyond a reasonable doubt that God exists, and Jesus lived and died and resurrected. This I know and can reason intellectually. But I am thinking, what if one day someone really shoot me in the foot with something that is unexpected that I am even unable to refute? Does that mean that my experience with God has been fake all these while? Does this mean that I am living a lie? At the end of the day, it is knowledge that God is real and the tangible experience that I have with Him that will sustain my faith, not intellectual arguments.
Yet, I am still not agreeing with Soren Kierkegaard or any other existentialist Christians. My basis for this comes from reflecting on the lives of the early Christians. These people had faith because of their direct experience with the resurrection, not with intellectual arguments about the resurrection. But yet, look at Stephen and Paul.
I rest my case.
You seem to have changed the way you present your blog :) Now it seems your driving in a more "journalist" type of writing style :P
ReplyDelete(I was just reading Lee Strobel's Case for Christ and find your styles similar)
Personally I find that many times Christianity is best presented in a perspective that combines both Logic and Faith! It supports each other like the North pole and South pole!
I think one of the points that I really agree with you is when you place too much emphasize on intellect, what if? One day someone who is actually ultra smart and bring you down in a debate. Are you still able to "stand" and believe?
So it's best to build our relationship with both! :)