Salvation by having the Correct Beliefs?

In an interview with Brian McLaren, Frank Schaeffer claimed that “salvation by correct ideas” was one thing that had turned him away from biblical Christianity. After all, thinking the right thoughts in order to be saved seems so removed from everything that we regard as meaningful – love, justice, goodness, and relationships. Also, damnation by having the wrong ideas or beliefs seems completely unfair, unjust, and beneath the dignity of God.

There is even some basis for Schaeffer’s indictment. The Bible claims that we are saved by grace operating through faith (Eph. 2:8-9). Faith, to some degree, entails embracing right ideas about Jesus. Doesn’t this mean that we are saved by having the right ideas? Besides, this would also mean that, to some extent, we are damned by having the wrong ideas, right?

Behind Schaeffer’s charge is the assumption that what we believe is arbitrary and therefore, should not carry any moral weight or guilt. Along with this, he asserted that, “Knowing doesn’t make you a better person.” Why then should anyone be penalized for not knowing, especially since knowing isn’t really possible, as Schaeffer claims.

But is there a moral dimension to knowing? Should we be held responsible for not knowing? Sometimes, not knowing is justly punishable. If a student fails to regurgitate the right answers on a test because he didn’t study, he is understandably penalized. However, does this principle also pertain to the Christian beliefs about Jesus? Should we know these facts? Are we accountable when we don’t have them?

What if there is a God who loves us and died for our sins, and what if these truths are knowable? Many say:

·       I am content to know that there is a higher power. I don’t need to know all the specifics. In fact, I don’t think that there is anything we can really know about God.

But what if God is knowable! He was certainly knowable during the ministry of Jesus. He had performed so many miracles that they are not denied even by His detractors and their Talmud. These miracles were so compelling that His adversaries wanted to put Him to death because of them. After Jesus brought forth Lazarus from the dead after four days, these adversaries reasoned that He had to be stopped:

·       Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. “What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him.” (John 11:45-48)

If miracles did not speak persuasively about Jesus’ divine identity, they would not have constituted a threat to the religious establishment. Nor would the people have believed. Instead the evidence would have to be extinguished.

Clearly, belief and non-belief represented two sides of a great moral divide. Belief loved the light and came to the light (John 3:19-21). Unbelief detested the light of the evidence – the truth - and wanted to eradicate it.

Unbelief is equated with a refusal to believe against the overwhelming evidence. The evidence was so compelling that Jesus stated:

·       “Do not believe me unless I do the works of my Father.  But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” (John 10:37-38)

Knowing was more than a possibility; it was a duty, a moral obligation to accept the truth. To reject the light of truth brought guilt, as Jesus affirmed:

·       “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin… If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’” (John 15:22-25)

To reject the evidence of Jesus’ miracles, was to hate Him “without reason,” and this carried moral culpability. However, many argue:

·       Well, I have no way of knowing whether or not these miracles really happened. I haven’t seen any, and so I can’t be held accountable for what I don’t know.

As Jesus indicated, ignorance is an adequate excuse, but are we really ignorant? The Apostle Paul argued that we are not:

·       The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. (Romans 1:18-20)

God is angry because we do know a lot about Him and yet reject Him. He has stocked our conscience, mind, and the creation with adequate evidences, and yet, we “suppress the truth by [our] wickedness.” In light of this, we are, in a sense, saved by correct thinking, but this correct thinking is available to all. Some will acquiesce to the truth, while others will reject it. Of course, many protest:

·       I don’t have this knowledge of God, and it is not right for you to indict me as if I do have this knowledge.

The Book of Proverbs also affirms that we have the truth but reject it. Wisdom surrounds us, but it tells us uncomfortable things about ourselves, and so we reject it:

·       “Then they will call to me [wisdom] but I will not answer; they will look for me but will not find me, since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord. Since they would not accept my advice and spurned my rebuke, they will eat the fruit of their ways and be filled with the fruit of their schemes. For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them.” (Proverbs. 1:28-31)

Wisdom is available but disdained. It’s painful and exposes the truth about us. It carries a “rebuke” that informs us that we are sinners who need the Savior. Therefore, we reject wisdom in favor of our own narrowly self-serving thoughts. We harden our heart against the truth. However, when we do this, we willfully blind ourselves and stumble to our own destruction:

·       They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. (Ephesians 4:18-19; 2 Thessalonians 2:9-11)

At the heart of sin is a refusal to believe what we already know. In fact, Scripture hints that, even in the next life, we will freely choose the place of darkness because we hate the painful scrutiny of the Light (John 3:17-20). How does this great tragedy occur? We cannot stand to face ourselves – our inadequacies, our moral failures, our guilt and shame. We therefore suppress the truth about ourselves in favor of comfortable fictions and self-justifications. We also suppress the knowledge of God along with His judgment of our sins.

You don’t have to be a Christian to recognize these things. So many psychological studies indicate that we are self-deluded. We hate the light of truth and will take extreme measures to avoid or suppress it. We then conveniently cloth ourselves with an exalted, self-serving set of beliefs about ourselves. Psychologist Roy Baumeister reports:

• There are now ample data on our population showing that, if anything, Americans tend to overrate and overvalue ourselves. In plain terms, the average American thinks he’s above average. Even the categories of people about whom our society is most concerned do not show any broad deficiency in self-esteem.

We do not want the truth if it interferes with our self-esteem. We would rather feel good than think rightly. However, when we reject truth, we also reject God and any correct thinking about Him.

I talk to hundreds of people, even thousands, about God. Although many will admit that the question of the existence and character of God is foundational to all other questions – questions of meaning, morality, behavior, relationships – they refuse to seek God. They protect themselves with excuses like, “No one can really know.”

However, such an excuse is actually a claim to great knowledge, the very kind of knowledge they claim that we can’t have. How do they know that “no one can really know?” Instead, this is a mere excuse, a culpable excuse. In reality, they do not want to know. They correctly sense that the truth might just be too demanding, too confining, or even too accusatory.

In a sense, we are saved by correct thinking and damned by our incorrect thinking. However, this thinking is not devoid of moral significance. Instead, it reflects the very depths of our being, our desires and choices – choices that will either draw us to God or separate us from Him.

DID THE BIBLICAL WRITERS HAVE A MORE DIMINISHED CONCERN FOR TRUTH THAN WE?

The skeptic finds many ways to dismiss the Biblical accounts. Either, they have been translated wrongly or they have been transmitted with many errors. Since these haven’t sufficed, they also allege that these accounts were never intended to be taken factually or historically accurate. Therefore, they cannot be trusted in all that they teach. For example, Brian McLaren claims that the writers of Scripture were far more concerned about the spiritual than the factual:

·       “I would argue writers of the Bible didn’t have the same modern sensibilities that we do. They were (interested) first and foremost about what those stories meant and how they affected how you live. I’ve seen enough things myself that don’t fit into any normal categories of explainability. So I’m open to all those sorts of things. But I don’t actually think those (details) are the main point of the story.”

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/living/religion/article161227883.html#storylink=cpy

McLaren believes that since the writers were “first and foremost” concerned about the spiritual element, they were less than concerned about the factual or historical. However, there is no evidence for this charge. Instead, we find that the writers themselves insist that they are writing factually and historically and not just in some vague spiritual way. For example, John wrote:

·       Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these [miraculous facts) are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. (John 20:30-31; ESV)

John had argued that the historicity and factuality of Jesus’ miracles constituted evidence of His Personhood and teachings. Elsewhere, John claimed that the evidences were highly concrete:

·       That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. (1 John 1:1-3)

John and the other Apostles never argued, “Just believe because it feels good spiritually,” but offered concrete evidences as would any witness in a court of law.

Jesus argued that He shouldn’t be believed in the absence of factual evidences, miracles:

·       If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” (John 10:37-38; 5:31-38)

Peter argued that his testimony should be accepted because it was factually based upon eyewitness accounts:

·       For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. (2 Peter 1:16-20)

Peter provided two lines of objective evidences – eyewitness testimonies and Scripture, which isn’t about mere subjective interpretations. Peter also appealed to other objective eyewitness evidences:

·       “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know.” (Acts 2:22)

For Peter, as also for us, eyewitness testimony constituted proof (Acts 1:3). From these instances alone, we are left to wonder how McLaren and others can make such a baseless charge that the writers didn’t really care about the facts.

In favor of the Resurrection, Paul had reminded his readers about the abundance of evidence:

·       Then he [Jesus] appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive [just in case you need confirmation], though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. (1 Corinthians 15:6-8)

Luke also seemed to place a lot of emphasis on the facts:

·       Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught. (Luke 1:1-4)

Luke was so careful about the facts and evidences that it prompted the New Testament scholar F.F.BRUCE to write:

·       “A man whose accuracy can be demonstrated in matters where we are able to test it is likely to be accurate even where means of testing aren’t available. Accuracy is a habit of mind…Luke’s record entitles him to be regarded as a writer of habitual accuracy.”

The Hebrew Scriptures are no less emphatic about the value and necessity of evidences (Deuteronomy 19:15). Moses argued that the Israelites were accountable because of the abundance of the evidence that they had seen:

·       “For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether such a great thing as this has ever happened or was ever heard of. Did any people ever hear the voice of a god speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and still live? Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, all of which the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? To you it was shown, that you might know that the LORD is God; there is no other besides him. Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you. And on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire. (Deuteronomy 4:32-36)

The extent of the Biblical evidence in favor of facts and historical accuracy is really overwhelming. Nevertheless, the facts seldom stop the enemies of the Gospel from making outlandish charges.

Is it Possible to be Theologically Certain?

Uncertainty has become a reigning virtue. Sandy Ikeda is a professor of economics at Purchase College, SUNY. Understandably, he is troubled by the religious and sectarian violence perpetrated by those who are certain that they are right:

• Today in the Ukraine, in Gaza and Israel, in Syria, in South Sudan, and in far too many other places around the world, deadly violence ruins lives and sickens the heart.

And the violence should sicken the heart. However, he identifies certainty as one of the contributing problems:

• For what it’s worth, in my religious tradition there’s a saying:  Nothing is what you think it is. Because of the narrowness and limits of our perceptions, there’s an inevitable disconnect between what we think we know about the world and the way things actually are, between what we see and what is actually the case. That, of course, causes problems. But it gets much worse if we refuse even to acknowledge that the disjunction exists, and if we cling to the belief that in at least some part of our belief system we are absolutely, unshakably right. The more certain we feel about what we know, and the more we think we’re certain about, the worse it gets. 

Certainly, certainty about things that don't warrant our certainty - certainty about falsehoods, for example - is a problem. However, we should not make the mistake of rejecting all forms of certainty because of the dangers of only some kinds of certainty. In fact, only by having certainty can we reject the dangerous varieties of certainty. (We must be certain to reject ISIS and “racial cleansing.”) For example, without the certainty about the goodness of truth, love, and justice, we cannot say that genocide is absolutely wrong. Nor will we be able to take meaningful action against it!

To lack any degree of certainty narrows and degrades our lives. It condemns our necessary decision-making to a matter of merely how we feel.

To illustrate this - if you are mugged, should you go to the police? It depends upon what you believe about justice and human culpability. If you do not known what to believe about justice and objective moral guilt, you will have no certainty about what action to take. Instead, your uncertainty will leave you in a confused state and your neighbors in a vulnerable condition with a mugger running free.

Of course, there are many areas of legitimate uncertainty - what will happen to me and how others will respond to me - but this shouldn't mean that the entirety of our lives must be buried in uncertainty!

Although I had been plagued for years by doubts about the existence of God and whether He really loved, I am glad that I never resigned myself to the belief that certainty about these questions was not possible. When we aren’t confident that we are loved by God, we crave the love and approval of others, even to the point of resenting them when we don’t receive their unqualified approval.

Instead, certainty about the Gospel of Christ is of the highest importance. In fact, this was the central issue of John's letter to the church:

• We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands. Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: (1 John 2:3-5)

One way that we can KNOW that we are in Him is by whether or not we endeavor to keep His commandments.

Meanwhile, many of the Emergent or Postmodern Church insist that certainty about God – theological certainty - is not possible. Pastor Brian McLaren reflects this skepticism He claims that, among other things, we cannot ever be certain about our interpretation of Scripture:

• How do “I” know the Bible is always right? And if “I” am sophisticated enough to realize that I know nothing of the Bible without my own involvement via interpretation, I’ll also ask how I know which school, method, or technique of biblical interpretation is right. What makes a “good” interpretation good? And if an appeal is made to a written standard (book, doctrinal statement, etc.) or to common sense or to “scholarly principles of interpretation,” the same pesky “I” who liberated us from the authority of the church will ask, “Who sets the standard? Whose common sense? Which scholars and why? Don’t all these appeals to authorities and principles outside the Bible actually undermine the claim of ultimate biblical authority? Aren’t they just the new pope^? 

McLaren inflates the problems of interpretation, claiming that he is certain that we can’t really interpret Scripture with any degree of certainty without first having a proven method of interpretation. (While he denies that we cannot be certain, his many books declare that he is certain about a number of things!)

However, a little common sense plus a handful of experience might shed some light on this “problem” of acquiring certainty.  We engage in easy-to-understand conversations all the time, without a proven system of interpretation. When I ask the attendant to pump me $20 of “regular,” he knows exactly what to do. No confusion; no need for a proven method of interpretation! Why should it be any different when interpreting the Bible?

When I read the “50 mph hour” speed limit sign on the highway, I’d like to believe that it means “65 mph.” However, I know what it means. In fact, this interpretation is further corroborated when the highway patrol tickets me for doing “65.” Interpretation doesn’t pose any significant problems, except for those who are trying to derive an interpretation which the text cannot support.

Likewise, we have numerous ways to corroborate our interpretation of Scripture. Any one verse has many corroborating verses. We call this “Scripture interpreting Scripture.” Of course, some passages can be difficult to understand (2 Peter 3:15), but this doesn’t mean that much of it isn’t quite plain. Besides, we have many aids – pastors, teachers, commentaries, concordances - to help us understand.

Scripture was also written to be understood. Therefore, Paul instructed that his epistles be taken to many churches to be read. Never did Paul insist that a Doctor of Theology be present to provide the definitive interpretation.

There was never any indication that any of the Apostles ever suggested that their listeners first required a proven system of interpretation before they could understand the teachings of the Apostles. Had McLaren instead written that much of Scripture presents us with interpretative difficulties, many of us would agree. However, he is skeptical about all interpretations of Scripture. If only he was equally skeptical about his own conclusions!

Today, it has become fashionable to believe that we cannot be sure of anything regarding the biblical faith, perhaps apart from the requirement to love. McLaren rhetorically asks, “How do ‘I’ know the Bible is always right?” suggesting that none of us can know. One noted theologian wrote:

• Any worldview—atheist, Islamic, Jewish, Christian or whatever—ultimately depends on assumptions that cannot be proved. Every house is built on foundations, and the foundations of worldviews are not ultimately capable of being proved in every respect. Everyone who believes anything significant or worthwhile about the meaning of life does so as a matter of faith. We’re all in the same boat.

However, such a stance is logically self-defeating. If it is true that we believe as we do simply based on blind and baseless faith, then this above statement is also a matter of blind faith, and therefore it disqualifies itself.

More importantly, the Bible disqualifies uncertainty! Many verses contend that the evidence serves as an incontestable basis for an assured faith:

• Then the LORD said to Moses: "How long will these people reject Me? And how long will they not believe Me, with all the signs which I have performed among them (Numbers 14:11)?

According to God, there was no excuse for Israel’s uncertainty and unbelief. He made certain truths, like the resurrection, abundantly certain:

• After his suffering, he presented himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. (Acts 1:3)

God does not tell His people to “just believe.” Instead He has provided many unassailable proofs for the faith. This doesn’t mean that we don’t struggle with doubts and uncertainties. Nor does it mean that these struggles are opposed to the faith and must be suppressed. Nor does it mean that God cannot bring great good out of such struggles. He certainty does!

However, the Emergent, Postmodern skeptical Church places too much emphasis on the journey and the search and minimal emphasis on the object or the goal of the search – certainty and assurance regarding biblical truths. Emergents normalize and idealize the journey at the expense of the cognitive rest and assurance at the end of the journey. They even claim that assurance is only possible for those who do not think deeply about things.

Faith had been such a struggle for me – someone weak in faith and rich in skepticism. It tormented me that I couldn’t find peace in believing, which others seemed to have found. I therefore would have welcomed the Emergent message that certainty isn’t possible. It would have given me a sense of peace in knowing that I was okay and not a “Christian” misfit. Fortunately, I found little encouragement that skepticism would be my ultimate resting place, the goal of my searching.

Instead, I learned that joyously living the Christian life is not possible without a high degree of certainty. I needed to know that God loved me with a love that transcended understanding (Eph. 3:16-19) and that He had forgiven and cleansed me from all of my sins. I needed the God-confidence often mentioned in Scripture:

• Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. (Hebrews 10:19-22) 

We require confidence in order to draw close to our Savior and to know that He has drawn close to us. As long as I doubted His love, I could not feel grateful towards Him. Instead, I felt contempt for Him, not knowing with certainty that He truly loved me.  And whenever I felt condemned by my feelings, I felt that God was also condemning me. I needed to know that He wasn’t condemning me and that my feelings were only that –feelings. And that is the very place where Scripture comforted me:

• Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:1)

I needed to be confident about this, since overwhelming feelings were telling me that I was under condemnation. I therefore can totally embrace Paul’s prayer for the church:

• I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (Eph. 3:17-19)

Having the knowledge of God and His love for us isn’t an option. Without this knowledge, we will not be “filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” Without this confidence, we will not be able to persevere:

• So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised. (Heb. 10:35-36; Jer. 7:7)

Without confidence in the promises of God, I wasn’t able to persevere. Even having this confidence, I struggle. However, without it, I couldn’t even begin to struggle.

Paul associated rejoicing with knowing:

• We also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance. (Rom. 5:3)

Without this knowledge - this confidence - we cannot glory in suffering. We can only glory in the midst of suffering because we are confident that God has a glorious purpose for it (Rom. 8:28). Lacking this confidence, I suffered additionally from obsessive and crippling ruminations.

Doubting Thomas would have told the skeptics something about certainty. He doubted that Jesus had risen from the dead until Jesus visited him and showed him the wounds in His hands and side John 20). Then, he worshipped Christ with all the certainty in the world.

This lesson is very simple - Our Lord can easily remove doubt and provide certainty. This lesson about the need for theological certainty is also vital to our lives. It was only with this certainty that Thomas was enabled to carry the Gospel to far-off India and to his eventual martyrdom.