Blogging Ottinger (tim)

I read a little piece at Yahoo Answers Faith Is Believing What You Know Ain’t So. It is probably the stupidest “best answer” I’ve ever seen. Faith as given is really nonsense. Sadly, there were a shortage of good accessible answers among confusing Bible quotes & rants. Admittedly, faith suffers from a lack of good supporters and a wealth of cheap detractors.

Faith is just trust.

When I was little, I didn’t worry whether I would have something to eat. I might have fretted about what it would be, and I may not have liked every meal, but I never really considered that I would starve. I had a pretty simple faith that my parents would come up with something. We had a big garden spot that my dad would tend, and my mom would invent something if there was not sufficient variety in the larder (a common experience in my younger days). They would tend garden, raise hogs, dad would work, mom would can veggies for the winter, and with meager means we all survived to adulthood without any serious maladies. It was faith.

Of course, my parents didn’t know for sure that we’d have a good year, or that Dad wouldn’t be laid off or on strike from the factory. We didn’t know we wouldn’t have flood or tornado or hail damage. We didn’t know for sure that things would “just work out.” My parents knew that things didn’t “just work out” on their own, and they were frugal and cautious. As a result, our meals were there.

In the morning the bus would pick us up. I always had transportation to school, and I trusted that it would pick me up and drop me off. It always did. There were people whose job it was to see to my safety and transportation for about 45 minutes each morning and each evening. A few times that safety was threatened. We had a few times that cars ran into the bus, and one time there was a plane wreck overhead and all kinds of things fell on the roof and hood of the bus as the driver scrambled to get us out of the area. But someone made sure that the bus was there and that the drivers took care of us.

I didn’t have faith because I knew there was no food, or that there was no bus driver, or no bus, or because I just knew nothing bad could happen. I had faith that the people who took care of me would do a good job at it. My faith was rewarded because they were trustworthy.

Mind you, faith has no power at all. Plenty of people have had their faith ground underfoot by people who misled and misused them. My faith was in reliable people, and I guess I was one of the lucky ones that way. Had I had ten times as much faith, it would not have made them better nor would it have made me more secure. Faith in the untrustworthy is worse than worthless, and makes one a victim. Clearly, it is best to have faith in the faithful only. Not believing in the unfaithful has been helpful and has saved me a lot of grief.

Likewise if I had great faith not that my parents would feed and clothe me, but that they would sprout wings and fly, then I would have faced disappointment. Believing it would give them no power to do so. While my parents were very faithful, they were not superheroes. Had I trusted them to do things that were entirely against their nature, like robbing a bank so they could buy me a sports car, that false faith would have fallen flat. They weren’t trying to give me anything I want at any cost, they were trying to raise me to be a good person. They had limits. They did what they could, and did not not do impossible or inappropriate things to take care of me.

When it comes to faith in God, it is not a matter of believing out of wishful thinking (that He will make everything I do work, or prevent me from having any difficulties) or out of certainty to the contrary. I have to trust only that he is who he says, and that His advice is trustworthy. A recent sermon brought to mind the declaration of three Hebrews who were threatened with an ugly death. They said “Our God is able to deliver us from your hands, but even if he does not we will still not bow.” This is faith.

We trust in what we believe is right, but we do not demand that we are served by God. We trust, within the limits of historic care and character. We could trust in stupid and naive ways, but it is best that we don’t trust in inventions and myths outside of God’s character. After all, he is not a genie. He is the friend of our soul, not of our prosperity or safety. Forgetting that is a mistake. My parents knew that getting the food on the table was their responsibility and didn’t just pray and expect the food to appear. They

And of course our faith in God has no power at all. It is merely affirmed when it is well-placed. If this God did not value the trust of his children or did not have reliable character, then this faith would turn to disappointment. It would not empower us in any way.

These guitars are really starting to grow on me. I have another guitar that I’d rather have for about 2.5x the cost, but I could see owning a goldtop P90 guitar. This is one I would consider. Maybe the brand name appeals to me a bit, too.

Yesterday I heard a friend say that he disliked evangelical religions including evangelical athiests. It struck me as an odd grammatical error.

Evangelical doesn’t mean “using in-your-face recruiting techniques” nor does it mean “incessantly proselyting”, as any real evangelical should understand quite well. Are you interested in knowing the real meaning?

The root of the word is evangel, which refers to the Christian gospel books (the gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John). The four primary gospel-tellers were referred to as the evangelists. The word “gospel”, by the way, means “good news” or “good story”, not “bad news that you’re a sinner worthy of death and hell”. To be an evangelist would be to have strong familiarity with this story and to share the story. Therefore, your minister and sunday school teacher and VBS helpers should be “evangelists” of the true sense. All Christians should be familiar and able to share this story. In fact, one should look forward to the opportunities that present themselves. It is not hurtful that some seek to create the opportunity.

Sadly, some have sought to force the story where there is no opportunity given at all. They’ve looked hard for the most controversial way to force a watered-down, cruelly-given, hurtfully memorable version of the story on poor people trying to make the most of the lives they’ve built for themselves. Christians have substituted some worldly values (”maximal exposure, maximal impact”) for compassion and kindness and have run roughshod over the very people they have wanted to reach. In my experience, most people who are strongly against Christianity are that way because of roughshod Christians they’ve known. No wonder so much of the world hates us.

The word “evangelical” in popular usage outside of church realms is something entirely different. It refers to those who passionately, zealously proselytize strangers and friends alike. It refers to forceful and often unwanted indoctrination. It smells more like a brutal mass-marketing campaign than a gift from a friend. In that sense, there could be “evangelical Athiests”, “evangelical Microsoft users”, “evangelical Mac enthusiasts”, and the like. Yet the term is mis-applied since these have no relationship with the evangel itself.

We need some other word to step in for zealous proselytizers. I suggest “butthead.”

We need to distance evangelism from that whole tradition. My fear is that mean-spirited, harsh, unwanted proselytizing does little good and in fact vaccinates good people against the true gospel, that we are forgiven for our sins and restored to eternal fellowship with a God who wishes us to know him better. That we can lose the life we built for ourselves and its consequences, and take on a life He has built for us with its rewards.

Let’s go back and look at that evangel. The Christ was very kind, open, and honest in all his dealings with those who were in their sins and outside of the life He offered. His passionate anger burned against those who were in the established church, whose teachings and works drove out the very people He came to save. He took the opportunities that opened to him at the wells where he drew water, in the streets, at weddings and funerals. He spoke to the crowds who formed around Him, even those who came to accuse and embarrass Him. He spoke in their churches, but hung out in the houses of common everyday people. He never tried to shame sinners, but taught the righteous to have some shame for the way they treated others. He wasn’t anti-semetic as some suppose, but was Jewish himself. It wasn’t their race or creed he opposed, but they mess they’d made of it at the time. The news there is very good for the common person.

When the church refers to itself as “evangelical,” we are referring to the desire to associate ourselves with this story, live it out, and share it. It has nothing to do with hard-sell recruiting techniques.

Does the world need this gospel? I think it does. Does it need preachers and other evangelists? Yes, I think it does. Does it need to go beyond the confines of our Sunday congregation? Yes, I think it does. Should we take the gospel to every place where there are receptive listeners? Again, I think so. Should we force people to hear it? Opinions vary, but I think not. The message is bigger and greater than we are, and responding to the true opportunities we are given should keep us more busy than we ever thought possible.