Holy scriptures able to make us wise
Editor:
Tad Mitsui writes interesting, challenging and illuminating letters. I agreed entirely with “No human possesses knowledge of eternal truth” (Feb 6) up until I read, “Many of us believe in God but are not 100 per cent sure. That’s why it is called “faith” not knowledge…. We call it belief or faith because we don’t know for sure.”
This conflicts with the biblical definition of faith: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).
Such faith is not blind self-generated wishful thinking. It is certainty based on what is revealed in Scripture.
This has been the historic belief of orthodox Christianity (not just modern fundamentalism) since biblical times.
I turned from Tad’s letter to a daily devotional where I read: “When Christians pray, they are not merely launching wishes out to an impersonal cosmos. Christian prayer speaks to the divine Creator of the universe, the one true God who is the Lord of heaven and earth. And how do we know this God? Though God has revealed himself in his creation, we can know God personally only through his written Word and through prayer.”
To this I would add that the written Word points to the Word made flesh (John 1:14), Jesus the divine Son of God, who said: “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father, but by me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well” (John 14:6-7a).
Liberal critics question the authenticity of these sayings and teach that God is ultimately unknowable. But this is based on dated 19th century theories of textual criticism, discredited by more recent discoveries confirming what Sir Frederick Kenyon, former director of the British Museum, was able to say already earlier in the 20th century, “The Christian can take the whole Bible in his hand and say without fear or hesitation that he holds in it the true Word of God, handed down without essential loss from generation to generation, throughout the centuries.”
Lack of certainty may seem more humble, but in reality it involves human rationalism (which is not the same as informed reason), rather than humble submission to divine revelation that has been tested and found true throughout the centuries: “the Holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 3:15).
J. Cameron Fraser
Lethbridge