Good morning! As a follow up to my previous entry where I talked about how faith was necessary for salvation (getting into heaven). The most common objection people have to this is "Why does God require faith? Why doesn't God "prove" Himself to us so there is no need for faith?" .
I know this is a common struggle for BOTH believers and non believers so I wanted to make sure I addressed this fully, so I am going to cheat a little bit today (is cheating even possible on a blog? IDK ) because I have work, have to pack for LA, and also coach basketball.
So today is not my writing... the answer is actually from my favorite website!!! www.gotquestions.org. It has answers to over 300,000 questions about religion and it's pretty much amazing. So here it is. It's a long read.. READ UNTIL THE END! I promise, it will be worth it because the most powerful examples/arguments are there. Think of it like a big box of cereal that has a toy at the bottom and you have to eat your way through the cereal before you find it. AND NO, dumping out the cereal in a bowl and just getting the prize... i.e. fast forwarding to the very end of this article is not the way to do it! You'll be missing out . Trust me.
Our relationship with God is similar to our relationship with others in that all relationships require faith, and I can never and will never fully know any other person. Proverbs 14:10 says, "The heart knows its own bitterness, and a stranger does not share its joy." We are even incapable of knowing our own heart fully. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart is wicked and deceptive, and this verse asks concerning the human heart.
Because we are incapable of fully knowing fellow humans, to some degree faith (trust) is an integral ingredient in all relationships. If we cannot know our fellow finite human beings fully, how can we expect to fully know an infinite God? Even if He should desire to fully reveal Himself, it is impossible for us to fully know Him. It is like trying to pour the ocean (seemingly infinite in quantity) into a quart-measuring jar (finite)... impossible! But nonetheless, even as we can have meaningful relationships with those around us that we have grown to trust because of our knowledge of them and of their character, so God has revealed enough about Himself through His creation (Romans 1:18-21), through His written word, the Bible (2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:16-21), and through His Son (John 14:9) that we can enter into a meaningful relationship with Him.
There have been times in the past that God has revealed Himself more "visibly" to people. (Exodus) God revealed His care for the Israelites by sending the miraculous plagues upon the Egyptians until they were willing to release the Israelites from their slavery. God then opened up the Red Sea, enabling the approximately two million Israelites to cross over on dry ground. Then, as the Egyptian army sought to pursue them through the same opening, He defeated this enemy by bringing the waters upon them. Later, in the wilderness, God fed them miraculously with manna, guided them in the day by a pillar of cloud and by night by a pillar of fire, visible representations of His presence with them. He also obtained water for this great number of people in the wilderness through miraculous means, including causing water to flow from a rock as Moses struck it with his rod.
Yet, in spite of these repeated demonstrations of His love, guidance, and power, they still refused to trust Him when He wanted them to enter into the Promised Land. They chose instead to trust the word of ten men who frightened them with their stories of the walled cities and the giant stature of some of the people of the land, and to ignore the counsel of two godly men who encouraged them to trust God who had always been faithful. These events, found in the books of Exodus and Numbers, show that God's further revealing Himself to us would have no greater effect on our ability to trust Him. For were God to interact in a similar fashion with all of the people living today, we would respond no differently than did those Israelites...our sinful hearts are the same as theirs. But even as a few of the Israelites chose to trust God based on what He had revealed of Himself in the past and were willing to trust Him for the future, (going into the Promised Land - Numbers 13:1-14:9), so we can choose to trust Him for our future based upon what He has already revealed about Himself and His character.
God has revealed enough of His nature for us to be able to trust Him. He has declared and shown through the events of history, in the workings of nature, and through the life of His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, that He is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-wise, all-loving, all-holy, unchanging, and eternal. And in that revelation, He has shown that He is worthy to be trusted. But as with the Israelites in the wilderness, the choice is ours as to whether or not we will trust Him. Often, one is inclined to make this choice based on what he/she thinks he knows about God rather than what He has revealed about Himself and can be understood about Him through a careful study of His inerrant word, the Bible.
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