What Is Faith?
So many people use the word "faith" and they don't really understand it. They call their religion their faith; atheists accuse Christians of not using their heads and relying on faith only, etc.
Everybody has faith. Catholics believe what they believe by faith. Mormons believe what they believe by faith. Jehovah Witnesses believe what they believe by faith. Protestants believe what they believe by faith. Baptists believe what they believe by faith. Hindus believe what they believe by faith. Muslims believe what they believe by faith. Taoists believe what they believe by faith. And even atheists believe what they believe by faith.
So, what is faith?
As a Bible-believer, I get almost all my definitions of words straight from the Bible. I believe it is the best and most accurate dictionary in the world!
There is a chapter in the Bible that deals with faith. It is in the book of Hebrews, chapter 11. Let's see what it says (if you really want to know).
Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Right away, we see that faith is substance and evidence. It is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. Let me see if I can break this down easy for you.
What do you hope for? Do you hope God counts your good deeds more than He counts your bad deeds? If so, who told you that was important? Where did you read such a thing? So here we see right away that faith comes from what we have been told (substance) or what we have read (evidence). The actions we take because we believe what we have been told or have read is what the Bible (in Hebrews 11:1) calls faith.
Verse 2 teaches us this:
Hebrews 11:2 For by it the elders obtained a good report.
How did they obtain a good report? By faith.
Who are the elders? The people of the Old Testament listed in the rest of the chapter. God illustrates His definition of faith by telling us what the elders (certain Old Testaments saints) did to obtain a good report.
Let's take a look.
Hebrews 11:4 By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.
Why did Abel offer a more excellent sacrifice than his older brother, Cain? If you know the story (if not, read Genesis 4:1-7), you'll know that the brothers offered sacrifices because they were taught to do so by their parents, Adam and Eve.
What kind of sacrifice were they taught to offer? The same kind their parents offered whenever that "process of time" came around.
What kind of sacrifice did Adam and Eve offer? The same kind that God offered on their behalf.
Genesis 3:21 Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them.
You can't get an animal's skin unless you kill it, so here is the first sacrifice made in the Bible. I'm sure that God taught Adam and Eve about the sacrifice He would someday make for them and all of us - a spotless, innocent, male Lamb - His own Son.
So, Adam and Eve began to offer sacrifices, on a regular basis ("in the process of time"), for their sins, which became more frequent now that they had eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. They then taught their children of the plan of God to save them from their sins, and the God-ordained method of illustrating and showing God you believed in His plan became a regular observance.
So, Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain because he offered the kind of sacrifice that God (via his parents) told him would be acceptable; whereas Cain decided to offer what he thought (told himself in his own mind) should be acceptable.
Abel had faith in God, and the action of offering the proper sacrifice became evidence of his faith. Cain did not have faith in God. He had more faith in his own reasoning. Therefore, Abel obtained a good report, Cain did not; which is why Abel is mentioned in Hebrews 11 and Cain is not.
There should be no need to go through the whole chapter in this article, because one can easily apply the example of Abel to all the other "elders" mentioned in Hebrews 11. They all believed God! They believed what He said or what they read. (I don't have time to go into the fact that God had written the gospel and the history of the world, prophetically, in the stars via the constellations, and that was more readable to the folks in those days than now.)
Now we see that faith is believing what someone says so much that it moves you to action, and that action becomes evidence that you believed what you were told. That applies to all the people mentioned in Hebrews 11.
So, does everyone have faith? Yes. The Bible plainly declares that we all have faith.
Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.
So God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. What you do with that faith - where you invest it is your responsibility. And we will all have to answer to God for how we used our faith.
Romans 14:12 So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
Hebrews 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
Did Eve have faith when the devil (that old serpent) tempted her to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil? Yes. But she had more faith in the serpent than she had in God!
So, all people today have faith. Catholics have faith. It's just misplaced in a system that has been corrupted. Protestants have faith in their various creeds that have been corrupted in various ways. Mormons have faith in Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. Muslims have faith in Mohammed. Jehovah Witnesses have faith in their founder, Charles Taze Russell. New Agers have faith in their new-age gurus. Even Atheists have faith. They have faith in what other atheists have said or written, or their own opinions. Many of them have faith in Charles Darwin's infamous book.
Ultimately, it comes down to who you believe. As a Baptist, I just believe the Word of God (KJB). Mormons believe the Book of Mormon, Muslims believe the Koran, Hindus believe the Bhagavad Gita, etc.
Whatever you believe, you better make sure it is right. If it is wrong, your faith will lead you to destruction. People who wear labels, like Baptist, Catholic, Lutheran, Mormon, Methodist, Muslim, etc., without researching the documents on which their faith rests are not wise.
The Bible says to prove all things. So God does not want us to go through life blindly. You find any mention of blind faith. Faith is believing what someone says. So it is our responsibility to study the truths or falsehoods that come from other people, especially documents and books that claim or the authors claim to be of divine origin.
Below are a few examples (emphasis added) of why I do not believe the foundational documents on which some of the worlds major religions are based. You make up your own mind. I just hope my observations are a help to those who have not really studied what they were brought up believing, but have just gone along to get along, or have just plain been too busy to stop and think things through.
Book of Mormon
"3 Nephi 8:18 And behold the rocks were rent in twain; they were broken up upon the face of the whole earth, insomuch that they were found in broken fragments, and in seams and in cracks, upon all the face of the land."
It seems Joseph Smith does not know what "twain" means (it means "two"). A first-grader can understand the difference between "twain" and "fragments upon all the face of the land," but often people read and do not pay much attention to what a book actually says.
"3 Nephi 19:32-34 And tongue cannot speak the words which he prayed, neither can be written by man the words which he prayed.
33 And the multitude did hear and bear record; and their hearts were open and they did understand in their hearts the words which he prayed.
34 Nevertheless, so great and marvelous were the words which he prayed that they cannot be written, neither can they be uttered by man."
It seems Joseph Smith does not understand what a record is, or what bearing record means! What a contradiction! The real Word of God makes it clear. John bare record and what he bore record of got recorded and written down! (John 1:32-34, interesting the verse numbers are the same!) Or, more likely, the project of putting on such a deception was just too big for him to cover all hs mistakes. The difference between the 1830 and the 1950 edition is humongous! Both are copyrighted.
"Alma 7:10 And, behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem..."
What an astounding error! Supposedly speaking of the birth of Christ, Alma gets the location of His birth wrong. He was born in Bethlehem. This is a false prophecy. (Actually it's just a blatant error on the part of a plagiarist, in my opinion.)
Proverbs 10:19 In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin.
Joseph Smith tried too hard to make his book sound like the Bible. He often copied practically whole chapters from the book of Isaiah! That would be like Paul copying Old Testament books in His epistles! Unbelievable!
"2 Nephi 5:15-16 And I did teach my people to build buildings, and to work in all manner of wood, and of iron, and of copper, and of brass, and of steel, and of gold, and of silver, and of precious ores, which were in great abundance.
16. And I, Nephi, did build a temple; and I did construct it after the manner of the temple of Solomon save it were not built of so many precious things; for they were not to be found upon the land..."
So, he taught the people to build with precious things like gold, silver and precious ores, which were in abundance, but he couldn't do so because they were not to be found upon the land??? Wow! What a contradiction!! And in two adjoining verses!
One more example:
"Ether 3:19 And because of the knowledge of this man he could not be kept from beholding within the veil; and he saw the finger of Jesus, which, when he saw, he fell with fear; for he knew that it was the finger of the Lord; and he had faith no longer, for he knew, nothing doubting."
Joseph Smith did not understand what faith was. Faith doesn't stop because we can see. Faith is believing what someone says whether you can see them or not. The disciples of Christ saw Jesus regularly for three years, yet they had faith. Jesus said so, when He said, "O ye of little faith." (Matthew 6:30; 8:26) Little faith does not mean no faith!
I could give many more examples, but this is sufficient to show that there are real problems with the Book of Mormon. How can anyone have faith in what Joseph Smith said or wrote? I'm not even going to get into his numerous failed prophecies. The Mormon religion hinges on the trustworthiness of Joseph Smith. The above examples would seem to prohibit anyone with any common sense from believing that book or that religion. But, everyone has faith, and they have the freedom to put it in whomever or whatever they want. They just need to be told that they will have to answer to God someday if they put their God-given faith in something other than the Word of God.
Bhagavad Gita
Chapter 8 Verse 13 "Anyone uttering the indestructible mono syllable Om, the transcendental sound vibration of the Ultimate Truth, remembering Me continuously, thus relinquishing their body in this way achieves the supreme goal."
So, all you have to do is utter a mono syllable and you achieve the supreme goal - whatever that is? That makes no sense whatsoever. Rapists and mass murderers just have to utter the mono syllable, Om, and they get the supreme goal? Where is justice? Where is the payment for their sins? I can't trust in that document.
Everything I have read in the Bhagavad Gita is such slithering, twisting, tangled words that I can only trust that it came from the Serpent - Satan, and not God. But that's my opinion. You have the freedom to make your own decision.
Koran
(Quotes forthcoming, but I wanted to get this out because of the earlier parts and the conclusion.)
Faith is not blind; but blinded people can have faith and put it in the wrong thing or in a false god due to deception or laziness.
A good reminder for us:
Acts 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
You owe it to yourself and to God Who made you to be noble and search out the facts before you place your faith in anything. Be skeptical.
I will add more to this and show scripture after scripture that gives many reasons why I believe the Bible to be the perfect, inspired, preserved, Word of Almighty God.
Here are a few to whet your appetite:
Psalm 68:11 The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it.
Psalm 12:6-7 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
Psa 12:7 Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
2 Peter 1:20-21 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
I have faith in it because I believe God gave it to man and I believe what He said.
Everybody has faith. Catholics believe what they believe by faith. Mormons believe what they believe by faith. Jehovah Witnesses believe what they believe by faith. Protestants believe what they believe by faith. Baptists believe what they believe by faith. Hindus believe what they believe by faith. Muslims believe what they believe by faith. Taoists believe what they believe by faith. And even atheists believe what they believe by faith.
So, what is faith?
As a Bible-believer, I get almost all my definitions of words straight from the Bible. I believe it is the best and most accurate dictionary in the world!
There is a chapter in the Bible that deals with faith. It is in the book of Hebrews, chapter 11. Let's see what it says (if you really want to know).
Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Right away, we see that faith is substance and evidence. It is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. Let me see if I can break this down easy for you.
What do you hope for? Do you hope God counts your good deeds more than He counts your bad deeds? If so, who told you that was important? Where did you read such a thing? So here we see right away that faith comes from what we have been told (substance) or what we have read (evidence). The actions we take because we believe what we have been told or have read is what the Bible (in Hebrews 11:1) calls faith.
Verse 2 teaches us this:
Hebrews 11:2 For by it the elders obtained a good report.
How did they obtain a good report? By faith.
Who are the elders? The people of the Old Testament listed in the rest of the chapter. God illustrates His definition of faith by telling us what the elders (certain Old Testaments saints) did to obtain a good report.
Let's take a look.
Hebrews 11:4 By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.
Why did Abel offer a more excellent sacrifice than his older brother, Cain? If you know the story (if not, read Genesis 4:1-7), you'll know that the brothers offered sacrifices because they were taught to do so by their parents, Adam and Eve.
What kind of sacrifice were they taught to offer? The same kind their parents offered whenever that "process of time" came around.
What kind of sacrifice did Adam and Eve offer? The same kind that God offered on their behalf.
Genesis 3:21 Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them.
You can't get an animal's skin unless you kill it, so here is the first sacrifice made in the Bible. I'm sure that God taught Adam and Eve about the sacrifice He would someday make for them and all of us - a spotless, innocent, male Lamb - His own Son.
So, Adam and Eve began to offer sacrifices, on a regular basis ("in the process of time"), for their sins, which became more frequent now that they had eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. They then taught their children of the plan of God to save them from their sins, and the God-ordained method of illustrating and showing God you believed in His plan became a regular observance.
So, Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain because he offered the kind of sacrifice that God (via his parents) told him would be acceptable; whereas Cain decided to offer what he thought (told himself in his own mind) should be acceptable.
Abel had faith in God, and the action of offering the proper sacrifice became evidence of his faith. Cain did not have faith in God. He had more faith in his own reasoning. Therefore, Abel obtained a good report, Cain did not; which is why Abel is mentioned in Hebrews 11 and Cain is not.
There should be no need to go through the whole chapter in this article, because one can easily apply the example of Abel to all the other "elders" mentioned in Hebrews 11. They all believed God! They believed what He said or what they read. (I don't have time to go into the fact that God had written the gospel and the history of the world, prophetically, in the stars via the constellations, and that was more readable to the folks in those days than now.)
Now we see that faith is believing what someone says so much that it moves you to action, and that action becomes evidence that you believed what you were told. That applies to all the people mentioned in Hebrews 11.
So, does everyone have faith? Yes. The Bible plainly declares that we all have faith.
Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.
So God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. What you do with that faith - where you invest it is your responsibility. And we will all have to answer to God for how we used our faith.
Romans 14:12 So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
Hebrews 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
Did Eve have faith when the devil (that old serpent) tempted her to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil? Yes. But she had more faith in the serpent than she had in God!
So, all people today have faith. Catholics have faith. It's just misplaced in a system that has been corrupted. Protestants have faith in their various creeds that have been corrupted in various ways. Mormons have faith in Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. Muslims have faith in Mohammed. Jehovah Witnesses have faith in their founder, Charles Taze Russell. New Agers have faith in their new-age gurus. Even Atheists have faith. They have faith in what other atheists have said or written, or their own opinions. Many of them have faith in Charles Darwin's infamous book.
Ultimately, it comes down to who you believe. As a Baptist, I just believe the Word of God (KJB). Mormons believe the Book of Mormon, Muslims believe the Koran, Hindus believe the Bhagavad Gita, etc.
Whatever you believe, you better make sure it is right. If it is wrong, your faith will lead you to destruction. People who wear labels, like Baptist, Catholic, Lutheran, Mormon, Methodist, Muslim, etc., without researching the documents on which their faith rests are not wise.
The Bible says to prove all things. So God does not want us to go through life blindly. You find any mention of blind faith. Faith is believing what someone says. So it is our responsibility to study the truths or falsehoods that come from other people, especially documents and books that claim or the authors claim to be of divine origin.
Below are a few examples (emphasis added) of why I do not believe the foundational documents on which some of the worlds major religions are based. You make up your own mind. I just hope my observations are a help to those who have not really studied what they were brought up believing, but have just gone along to get along, or have just plain been too busy to stop and think things through.
Book of Mormon
"3 Nephi 8:18 And behold the rocks were rent in twain; they were broken up upon the face of the whole earth, insomuch that they were found in broken fragments, and in seams and in cracks, upon all the face of the land."
It seems Joseph Smith does not know what "twain" means (it means "two"). A first-grader can understand the difference between "twain" and "fragments upon all the face of the land," but often people read and do not pay much attention to what a book actually says.
"3 Nephi 19:32-34 And tongue cannot speak the words which he prayed, neither can be written by man the words which he prayed.
33 And the multitude did hear and bear record; and their hearts were open and they did understand in their hearts the words which he prayed.
34 Nevertheless, so great and marvelous were the words which he prayed that they cannot be written, neither can they be uttered by man."
It seems Joseph Smith does not understand what a record is, or what bearing record means! What a contradiction! The real Word of God makes it clear. John bare record and what he bore record of got recorded and written down! (John 1:32-34, interesting the verse numbers are the same!) Or, more likely, the project of putting on such a deception was just too big for him to cover all hs mistakes. The difference between the 1830 and the 1950 edition is humongous! Both are copyrighted.
"Alma 7:10 And, behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem..."
What an astounding error! Supposedly speaking of the birth of Christ, Alma gets the location of His birth wrong. He was born in Bethlehem. This is a false prophecy. (Actually it's just a blatant error on the part of a plagiarist, in my opinion.)
Proverbs 10:19 In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin.
Joseph Smith tried too hard to make his book sound like the Bible. He often copied practically whole chapters from the book of Isaiah! That would be like Paul copying Old Testament books in His epistles! Unbelievable!
"2 Nephi 5:15-16 And I did teach my people to build buildings, and to work in all manner of wood, and of iron, and of copper, and of brass, and of steel, and of gold, and of silver, and of precious ores, which were in great abundance.
16. And I, Nephi, did build a temple; and I did construct it after the manner of the temple of Solomon save it were not built of so many precious things; for they were not to be found upon the land..."
So, he taught the people to build with precious things like gold, silver and precious ores, which were in abundance, but he couldn't do so because they were not to be found upon the land??? Wow! What a contradiction!! And in two adjoining verses!
One more example:
"Ether 3:19 And because of the knowledge of this man he could not be kept from beholding within the veil; and he saw the finger of Jesus, which, when he saw, he fell with fear; for he knew that it was the finger of the Lord; and he had faith no longer, for he knew, nothing doubting."
Joseph Smith did not understand what faith was. Faith doesn't stop because we can see. Faith is believing what someone says whether you can see them or not. The disciples of Christ saw Jesus regularly for three years, yet they had faith. Jesus said so, when He said, "O ye of little faith." (Matthew 6:30; 8:26) Little faith does not mean no faith!
I could give many more examples, but this is sufficient to show that there are real problems with the Book of Mormon. How can anyone have faith in what Joseph Smith said or wrote? I'm not even going to get into his numerous failed prophecies. The Mormon religion hinges on the trustworthiness of Joseph Smith. The above examples would seem to prohibit anyone with any common sense from believing that book or that religion. But, everyone has faith, and they have the freedom to put it in whomever or whatever they want. They just need to be told that they will have to answer to God someday if they put their God-given faith in something other than the Word of God.
Bhagavad Gita
Chapter 8 Verse 13 "Anyone uttering the indestructible mono syllable Om, the transcendental sound vibration of the Ultimate Truth, remembering Me continuously, thus relinquishing their body in this way achieves the supreme goal."
So, all you have to do is utter a mono syllable and you achieve the supreme goal - whatever that is? That makes no sense whatsoever. Rapists and mass murderers just have to utter the mono syllable, Om, and they get the supreme goal? Where is justice? Where is the payment for their sins? I can't trust in that document.
Everything I have read in the Bhagavad Gita is such slithering, twisting, tangled words that I can only trust that it came from the Serpent - Satan, and not God. But that's my opinion. You have the freedom to make your own decision.
Koran
(Quotes forthcoming, but I wanted to get this out because of the earlier parts and the conclusion.)
Faith is not blind; but blinded people can have faith and put it in the wrong thing or in a false god due to deception or laziness.
A good reminder for us:
Acts 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
You owe it to yourself and to God Who made you to be noble and search out the facts before you place your faith in anything. Be skeptical.
I will add more to this and show scripture after scripture that gives many reasons why I believe the Bible to be the perfect, inspired, preserved, Word of Almighty God.
Here are a few to whet your appetite:
Psalm 68:11 The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it.
Psalm 12:6-7 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
Psa 12:7 Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
2 Peter 1:20-21 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
I have faith in it because I believe God gave it to man and I believe what He said.