TTT #24 Who We Believe In is More Important than What We Believe

Although I have sought to make my as yet unpublished book Thirty True Things Everyone Needs to Know Now (TTT) of interest and of relevance to people who are not Christians as well as to those who are, this chapter speaks mainly to those who are (or have been) a part of the Christian faith.

Shifting Away from Jesus?

In recent years it seems that there has been an increasing shift away from the centrality of Jesus Christ in the thinking of some Christians.

It would seem that for Christianity to be considered as primarily about faith in Jesus would be a foregone conclusion, but there are now some Christians who seek to downplay the significance of Jesus for the sake of fostering better relations with people of other faith traditions

Christ and Christianity are largely relativized.

It is a shameful historical fact that Christians have often mistreated those of other religious faiths, and the move toward a position of respect for those who embrace different views is highly commendable.

But to what extent can one downplay the divinity or the uniqueness of Jesus Christ and still be a Christian in any meaningful sense?

Believing in Jesus

As I was working on this chapter, I just happened to read (again) the story of Augustine’s conversion. Upon hearing a child’s voice saying, “Take and read, take and read,” Augustine picked up the Bible and opened it at random to Romans 13:13-14. 

Those verses renounce the type of profligate life Augustine had lived for years. But they also, significantly, contain the words, “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Augustine went on to become a committed Christian and then a great theologian. Some call him “the father of Western theology.” But his conversion experience was not nearly as so much in what he believed as in whom he believed.

His faith was “putting on” the Lord Jesus Christ. It was not his belief about Jesus but rather his belief (trust) in Jesus that formed the foundation for all he later wrote about belief about Christ.

When I was a teenager, I remember hearing Baptist preachers emphasize, fairly often it seems, the difference between believing in and believing that. The latter, of course, is about what we believe, but the former is about whom we believe.

Believing that has to do with intellectual assent to statements or propositions. Believing in has to do with trust in a person. That was, and is, an important thing to emphasize, and people still need to recognize that difference.

Trusting in Jesus

In many of those church services where believing in was emphasized, “Trust and Obey” was often sung as a congregational hymn. The words of that old hymn were based on a testimony given by a young man in an evangelistic meeting led by the famous evangelist Dwight L. Moody.

It was quite apparent from the young man’s words that he knew little about Christian doctrine, but he finished his testimony by saying, “I’m not quite sure—but I’m going to trust, and I’m going to obey.”

Belief that is merely intellectual assent and often has little relationship to how one actually lives. Belief equated with trust, however, is much different: it means commitment to the one in whom that trust is placed—and when belief is trust, it includes obeying.

For Christians, what they believe about Jesus—and the many other doctrines of the faith—is important. But as human beings, whether people believe/trust in Jesus or in some other savior, teacher, guru, or whomever is of the greatest importance.

Truly, who we believe in is more important than what we believe.

[Here is the link to the entire 24^th chapter, which I encourage you to read.]

In Praise of Lesslie Newbigin

In the Jan. 8 posting on this blog, I made reference to the prevalent worldview of India. I do not know a lot about India, and, unfortunately, nothing from first-hand knowledge; I have long had the desire to go to India, but have not yet (and may never have) the opportunity to do so. But I have read rather extensively about India and the religions of India, and through the years I have been an appreciative reader of one who spent nearly four decades in India.

Lesslie Newbigin was born in northern England on December 8, 1909, so this past December there was some recognition in the media about the centennial observance of his birth. After completing his education at Cambridge University, he was ordained by the Church of Scotland in 1936 and sent as a missionary to Madras, now Chennai, the fifth largest city in India. In 1947 he became one of the first bishops in the newly formed Church of South India.

After serving a few years as the Executive Secretary of the International Missionary Council, Newbigin went back to India and continued to serve there until his retirement in 1974. But after returning to Great Britain, he continued an active life of teaching and writing. An article about him in the January 2010 issue of Christianity Today is titled, “The Missionary Who Wouldn’t Retire.” He had years of meaningful ministry back in England before his death in 1998.

I am particularly fond of Newbigin because of his book Honest Religion for Secular Man (1966), which I read during my first year in Japan, in late 1966 or early 1967. Since then I have profited from other books written by Newbigin, particularly The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (1989), which I have just finished for the second time.

In my Jan. 22 posting, I wrote about contextual theology. That is the subject of the twelfth chapter of Newbigin’s 1989 book, in which he writes, “True contextualization accords to the gospel its rightful primacy, its power to penetrate every culture and to speak within each culture, in its own speech and symbol, the word which is both No and Yes, both judgment and grace” (p. 152).

And then last fall, there was some discussion on this blog about religious pluralism. In that regard, I am in full agreement with Newbigin who contends that “we must reject the ideology of pluralism. We must reject the invitation to live in a society where everything is subjective and relative, a society which has abandoned the belief that truth can be known and has settled for a purely subjective view of truth” (p. 244 of the same book).

I have a list of the ten philosophers/theologians I have been most influenced by and most appreciative of. Newbigin is on that list, so I am happy to share this posting with you, in praise of Lesslie Newbigin.

Here is a 1996 picture of Newbigin: 

What Is True?

I have been trying to think what it means when someone says, "It may not be true for you, but it is true for me." That, to me, has seemed to be an illogical statement, for I have accepted what is called "the correspondence theory of truth" to be universally true.

The correspondence theory of truth holds that the truth or falsity of a statement is determined only by how it relates to external reality, whether is accurately describes (that is, corresponds with) what is real. In all situations, something is true if it corresponds to reality; it is false if it does not. There is no third possibility. Given that theory of truth, to say that something is true for me but not true for you is nonsense.

But people use words in different ways, and that evidently is case for the word true. From what I gather, some seem to use true to refer to ideas that they believe and are willing to live by. Since other people have other ideas they are willing to live by, those ideas are true to them. To that way of thinking, there seems to be no real problem if those ideas are contradictory. Obviously, that position is quite different from and contrary to the correspondence theory of truth--as well as different from the dictionary definitions of true.

My recent postings have been about Columbus, who clearly thought it true that the earth is round. So he was willing to set sail for the unknown West. The spherical nature of the earth was true for him in that he acted on what he believed. Those who thought it was not true that the earth is round would have nothing to do with the voyage. Even some on board Columbus' ships began to think it was not true and wanted to turn back. So, in a sense the spherical nature of the earth was true for Columbus, but not true for others.

But with the correspondence theory of truth, it is obvious that only one "belief," that of Columbus, was true. Those who thought that the earth was flat were in error. No postmodern or relativistic maneuvering can change that situation. Only Columbus' view corresponds to reality. Those who held to a flat earth view were wrong. Columbus' belief did not make the earth spherical, and the "flat-earthers'" ideas didn't change the fact that the earth is round. Relativism just doesn't work in some situations.

Of course, we don't have as much sure knowledge about many things as we do about the shape of the earth. It is not clear in a multitude of situations what does correspond to reality and what does not. But that lack of knowledge doesn't make it any more logical to say about anything, or about all things, "it may not be true for you, but it is true for me." Complete relativism is a logical contradiction in this way, and in others. That is why I believe that logical thinking cannot accept metaphysical relativism.

I certainly admit that there are problems with absolutism, as I have previously acknowledged. But the answer to absolutism is not relativism. I want to uphold a position that corresponds to reality and that is not self-contradictory. In spite of those who reject assertions about Truth (absolutes), I maintain that logical thinking demands such a position.

Why Reject Absolutism?

I received some strong comments regarding my posting about relativism, so I feel the need to address that issue further—but from the opposite side. What I wrote on September 11 stands. But in addition to my rejecting relativism, I need to make it clear that I also reject absolutism.

In my book "Fed Up with Fundamentalism" (FUF) I spoke out rather strongly about absolutism—and those words stand, too. "Arrogance and Certainty" is a section in "The Problem with Fundamentalism," the fourth chapter in FUF. I wrote (and still believe): "If people are absolutely certain that they are correct in their most basic beliefs and that those who disagree with them are completely wrong, these people are usually seen as being arrogant as well as intolerant" (p. 89). Some who read what I wrote in "Why Reject Relativism?" may have concluded that I am arrogant and intolerant.

But I also said this in FUF: "Just as most, if not all, fundamentalists do, I affirm the concept of absolute truth, and I firmly believe that Jesus is 'the truth' and 'the way' to Absolute Truth, which is found in the triune God. But this must be recognized as a belief to be affirmed, elucidated, and witnessed to, not as a 'fact' that makes it possible for me to be 'judge and jury' for all opposing viewpoints" (p. 91).

In other words—and perhaps I should have said this more clearly in FUF—I reject absolutism as well as relativism. (In fact, I reject most "isms" and basically agree with whomever said that all isms are contrary to the Gospel.) I condemn all of the atrocities, such as against indigenous people, that have been done by those who were absolutists--although I think that those atrocities were committed primarily because of power, greed, and selfishness rather than because of some philosophical (or theological) position.

Still, absolutism can be used to justify aggression and oppression of others--and people with power have done so through the centuries. But I do not and will not condone violence, including any suppression or violation of religious freedom, and I resolutely reject any type of absolutism that fosters violence, oppresses people, or denies the religious freedom of individuals or groups.

But, as I wrote before, I reject relativism also—and that rejection is partly because of the logical contradiction of any declaration that relativism is true. I agree with Dr. Braaten, who wrote in an e-mail, "I like the statement, 'There are no absolutes, and that is absolutely true.'" On a deeper level, I reject relativism partly because of its link to religious pluralism, which tends to oppose and criticize Christian missionary work overseas—and I will no doubt write about that matter before long.

Why Reject Relativism?

In my previous posting I said some negative things about relativism, and now I am writing more about why I think relativism is objectionable and should be rejected.

First, a definition of the term: Relativism is the idea that there is no absolute truth and that, consequently, all truth is relative to the culture or the religion to which a person or group belongs. I take this as more of metaphysical statement than an epistemological one; that is, it refers primarily to the nature of reality not to the way one knows what is real. That distinction is important, because I do not think that one can be absolutely sure he or she knows the absolute truth--and I will be addressing that problem in a latter posting.

There certainly is relativity apparent in the way reality is understood. The way any of us view the world is largely dependent upon the culture or the religion to which we belong, that is, upon the community, large or small, which has formed the "plausibility structure" which informs our judgments.

But while affirming epistemological relativity, I reject the idea of pluralism that renounces the making of value judgments among different cultural or religious views because since all are relative all are (potentially) of equal validity. According to metaphysical relativism, there is no absolute Truth that people or groups just understand to varying degrees or in diverse ways.

Relativism is a growing phenomenon in the contemporary world. It is a central tenet of the postmodern worldview. But is it compatible with Christianity--at least Christianity as it has been generally understood and believed for the last two thousand years? I think not.

"The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church," it has been said (by Terullian, who died around 220 A.D.). But if through the centuries Christians had embraced relativism, there would have been no (or at least very few) martyrs. People don't willingly die for relative truths. If they had been relativists, Stephen, Peter (if the legend about his crucifixion is basically true), Polycarp, and a multitude of other Christians through the centuries would not have become martyrs--and Christianity would likely not have survived. If Luther and the other Reformers of the sixteenth century had been relativists, there would have been no Protestant Reformation.

Of course, some might say that Christians were martyred because of the absolutism of those who killed them--and that is, no doubt, partially true. But the absolutism of the Roman Empire--or the Roman Catholic Church--was opposed by those who believed that they had apprehended the Truth and who were willing to die, if necessary, for the sake of that Truth. That’s something no thoroughgoing relativist would likely do.