How can I be sure of my faith?

Hang on a minute - being sure of something and having faith are opposites, surely?

What has faith got to do with 'being sure' of anything?  As one student put it - faith is “... believing the unbelievable, accepting something for which there is no proof. It is a blind leap in the dark.” But is it really just a leap in the dark, just wishful thinking?  

I heard a great story the other day.  A little boy has been in Sunday school learning about Moses and the people of Israel crossing the Red sea. When he ans his Mum got home, she asked him "so what did you learn in Sunday school?"

The little boy replied – “We learnt about Moses and the people of Israel crossing the red sea and the Egyptians getting drowned in the Red sea. "

“Oh – so what happened then?” Mum asked him interestedly.

"Well" he said “Moses and Joshua stood on the banks of the Red Sea. Moses had a missile launcher and Joshua had 2 detonators  that were connected to explosives under the sea. When the people of Israel came to the Dead Sea, Moses shot the Missiles into the middle of the water, creating a chasm for the people of Israel to walk through. Then, when they were through and the Egyptians who had been following were right in the middle of the sea, Joshua hit the detonator causing the sea to roll in over the Egyptians, drowning them all.”

The boys Mum was seriously worried by now – what were they teaching in Sunday school these days.  What sort of bad influences were shaping her son, so she reponded “I can’t believe they taught you that in Sunday school!” 

“Well, it’s far more believable than the version they told us” he replied.

Surely faith is a leap in the dark in order to believe something that any intelligent person would reject out of hande?

Real Faith

Well, of course the answer is no.  Faith is about making a decision, based on good evidence – and trusting that it is true. It is not proof. You can’t really prove anything absolutely.  Even in a court of law you only need to prove 'beyond reasonable doubt'.  And all sorts of factors make up that evidence.

If you knew me, imagine that I told you I am a Dentist (I am!)  You may never have seen me in a dental practice-  but you may still prove to believe me becasue of the evidence.  I seem reliable and relatively intelligent. I have no reason to pull the wool over you eyes and there is no reason why it should not be true.  So you put your faith in me as a Dentist.  Granted, some things need more evidence than others - and certainly, some of the stories in the Bible would need some evidence to believe, but the same process applies.

And when we look at the Bible, and the good news about Jesus Christ, the evidence stacks up.  It's a little bit like a house made of walls and a roof.  And roof needs solid walls built of plenty of bricks to support its weight.  One single brick is never enough.  The Christian faith rests on countless bricks or evidence which, collectively is enough to base a roof of faith and Christian experience on in order to keep out the wind, rain, cold and heat.

If you like, it is a little bit like crossing a rocky river.  You don’t just put your foot down anywhere – you check the evidence that each rock is going to take your weight and not topple over before standing on it.

In life we do it without thinking.  And so the Alpha course is about examining the evidence, as we have done over the last few weeks, to see whether it will take the weight. 

And I am confident that it does.  But a Christian is someone who not only has put their faith in the facts – but someone who knows that when Jesus died, he died for me. When Jesus died on the cross he took on himself all the things I have done – such as ………(fill in the gaps), and this means that I can now know him, have new life in him.

Paul puts it like this

“…those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore, for the old is gone. A new life has begun! ” 2 Corinthians 5:17

So, having examined again the evidence for the Christian faith, how can I be sure of my faith?  What are the signs that it is real?

New Life

Well, firstly,  we should expect to change – as this verse says - a "new life!".

But this experience of change varies from person to person.

I have a friend called Al. He had led an 'interesting life' and once told me his most frightening experience was being shot at whilst running around a farm in Columbia - 10 guesses as to what he was farming! He himself was an addict and an alcoholic. He became a Christian and stopped the drugs and the alcohol immediately – no questions, no problems. His life changed quickly and suddenly. But I know another guy called Michael who has a similar background (without the farming!) who still struggles with some of the stuff he struggled with before he became a Christian. So some people immediately know the difference, with others it is more gradual.

But when we become a Christian we become a child of God

“But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.” John 1:12

I know a couple who adopted 2 children. When they did they were told to both remove everything extra from their diaries for 2 weeks so they were both at home every night and for every spare moment. Why? So that the children knew something was different, they could be sure that these 2 people were their parents.

God is the same – he wants us to be sure

“I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.” 1 John 5:13

So, we can look for this assurance from 3 areas.

• The work of Christ

The first is the work of Jesus.

When I was a student we often had Jehovahs Witnesses knocking at our door. On one occasion I asked my Dad what he did when they knocked on his door.  He told me – "the first thing I do is tell them I know God, through Jesus and have absolute certainty that I am going to heaven. Can you offer me anything more?"  They can’t.

Most world religions revolve around some form of “earning your way to God”. Muslims believe when they come before Allah he will weigh up their deeds – good and bad, and make a judgement on that as to whether he will let them into heaven. Until that point, they don’t know - have so certainty or assurance. All other faiths are the same – except one.

People who follow Jesus know they cannot earn their way to God, the standard it too high.  Whatever we do,  God is way more perfect than we can imagine. So the heart of Christianity is that Jesus died so that the door is opened to heaven by our trusting him, not earning it from him! 

Verses in Isaiah, written 700 years before Jesus, and in John make this very clear

 “All of us have strayed away like sheep. We have left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet the Lord laid on him the guilt and sin of us all.”   Isaiah 53:6

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”   John 3:16

Jesus died becasue he loves us so much, yet we can't be with him because of our rebellion that seperates us from him.  On the cross Jesus dealt with our sin and opened the door to a relationship with God, and heaven on the basis of his work, not ours.  Therefore because of the work of Christ we can be sure of our faith.

 

• The word of God

The second place assurance comes from is the Bible – the word of God.

In 1961, in the student lounge of Princeton Theological Seminary, New Jersey, USA a press conference was held with one of the worlds leading living theologians – Dr Carl Barth. A reporter from the New York Times asked him – “What is the greatest theological statement ever made?”

After a long pause, with thoughtful reflection, Carl Barth responded “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so!”

So often it is easy to measure our faith in God on how we are feeling. The problem is, our feelings are often changeable and can be deceptive.  But God isn’t and neither are his promises

Here are a few.

Revelation 3:20 : "Look!  Here I stand at the door and knock.  If you hear me calling and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal as friends."

Matthew 28:20 : "Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you.  And be sure of this:I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

John 10:27-30 : "My sheep recognize my voice; I know them, and they follow me.  I give them eternal life, and they will never perish.  No one will snatch tham away from me, for my Father has given them to me, and he is more powerful than anyone else.  So no one can take them from me."

 

• The witness of God's Spirit

The third way we can be sure of our faith is the witness of God’s Spirit in us

When someone becomes a Christian, God’s Hoy Spirit comes to dwell within them. It is as though your DNA, what makes you is altered.  You are a new creation.

Romans 9:11 “The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as he raised Christ from the dead, he will give life to your mortal body by the same Spirit living within you.”

Just as the Spirit of God gave Christ life – he will change you too, both now (enabling you to recognize God’s voice and follow him - John 10:27-30 above) and in the future in heaven as he transforms us from within.

Did you know, with certain flowers – if you put ink in the water, it changes the colour of the flower. The ink is sucked up the stem into the petals which then change colour.

We are like that – as God’s Spirit works in us – he transforms us.

“When the Holy Spirit controls our lives, he will produce this Kind of fruit in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”  Galatians 5:22-23

 I don’t know about you, but I want to be like that!  And that is what Jesus is like.

I don’t know about you, but I want to be like that!  And that is what Jesus is like.

But he transforms our relationships too.  He makes us want to love God and follow him, to read our bibles, pray and worship him.  And he makes us want to love others and forgive them and serve them.

He also brings a real deep, inner heart conviction that we are God’s children – deeply loved by him. And for most of us – that is just what we need.

 

                                                                                                                                                        

This talk is based on the outline for the talk in the Alpha Manual.  For more information about Alpha visit Alpha.org