Setting our minds on things unseen

“…we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor 5:7) 

Our Adamic nature is a true wonder. Through it we simultaneously straddle the material and unseen. As those with flesh and bone, we were born into the realm of space, matter and time, with established laws and patterns. God in Christ, having redeemed us by His blood has also “raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”[i] Our lives are therefore “hidden with Christ in God" [ii]. And so we find this apparent conflict that renders us concurrent dwellers of both the seen and the unseen realms.

To unite these seemingly irreconcilable realities, we are encouraged to look at things not seen or to live by faith. For the righteous shall live by faith [iii]. This injunction seems necessary in view of a natural propensity to give inordinate heed to the pull of things seen, heard and felt. Faith is defined as a “substance” as well as the “evidence” of things unseen [iv], terms usually reserved for the tangible. Accordingly, it yields concrete, steady and therefore reliable fruit. It is a doorway that leads to that hallowed province of realities existing in both the unseen present and the future, which is always unseen. Faith is thus a mechanism through which the unseen is translated into the material world. 

Beginning with realities of the unseen present. The immanent God in whom all live and move and have their being [v] is a God “who hides Himself” [vi]. He is so because He dwells in the realm of the unseen, without limitations, for with Him nothing is impossible [vii]. He is hidden to the extent that our view is obscured by things that are seen. In this regard we learn much from Elisha, a habitual seer of the unseen, who when faced with the threat of a multitudinous army, referring to angelic hosts, boldly and calmly proclaimed, “Those with us are more than those with them” [viii]. To appreciate this unapparent reality Elisha’s servant had to have his eyes “opened” to realise that indeed “the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha” [ix].

Commenting on faith as it relates to the unseen future. The Lord Jesus contended with the unbelieving Jews reminding them, “your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad”[x]. Because of his famous faith, the patriarch Abraham could see and rejoice in a distant future that was otherwise hidden. Hope always refers to a desired future outcome. Abraham gloried in the substance of things he hoped for, and therefore joined the ranks of those biblical heroes who “having not received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them…” [xi]. 

The human experience is not unfamiliar with toil, disappointment and a multitude of untold troubles, “for we know that the whole creation groans and labours with birth pangs together until now” [xii]. To those full of faith, the evidence of things not seen deposes the tyranny of present distresses. As with Moses who forsook Egypt defying the wrath of the king, seeing Him who is invisible [xiii], those of faith too are undeterred. With the substance of their triumphant end always before them, present obstacles are relegated into minor episodes in the unfolding triumphant story. All afflictions are therefore only “light” [xiv] in view of the awaited prize and “momentary” with the backdrop of life everlasting. For those with eyes trained to pierce the veil of the unseen, all present realities are seen from the privileged vantage point of the victorious, long before that fact is evident to the rest. 

[i] Ephesians 2:6
[ii] Colossians 3:3
[iii] Habakkuk 2:4
[iv] Hebrews 11:1
[v] Acts 17:18
[vi] Isaiah 45:15
[vii] Luke 1:37
[viii] 2 Kings 6:16
[ix] 2 Kings 6:17
[x] John 8:56
[xi] Hebrew 11:13
[xii] Romans 8:22
[xiii] Hebrews 11:27
[xiv] 2 Corinthians 4:17

Why I am a Christian

To be human is to hold beliefs that inform our understanding of reality, value system, moral code and finally, our conduct. Every human being has a worldview or Weltanschauung. To this rule there are no exceptions.

A further subdivision can be considered that distinguishes the nature of our view of reality into theism[1] and atheism[2]. More can be said about both.

The erroneous idea has been propagated, many times unchallenged, that the latter is consistent with greater intellectual sophistication than the former. Nothing could be further from the truth as intellectual deduction usually follows a prior visceral decision to belong to either of the two categories.

I will call this visceral decision faith. I must emphasize that faith is fundamental to both these views of reality as firm positions are embraced by both on the basis of incomplete empirical evidence. This cannot be a matter of merely belief versus unbelief but rather one of faith in “nothing”, otherwise known as the “evolutionary process”, versus faith in a personal God, as having created the Cosmos. I will leave it to the reader to decide which of the two is logical.

I do not only subscribe to the former but I believe that God, who created the world, sent His Son to die for the sins of the world in order to save it from both the power and consequences of sin. Mine is therefore a personal rather than an impersonal universe and it offers purpose, hope and meaning. I will explain further why I specifically subscribe to this belief.

Let me begin with the problems I have with Atheism. The first one is that it presupposes omniscience on the part of its proponents. To claim the non-existence of God is to assume knowledge about everything. This claim is hardly credible even when only the material world is considered. Considering how little is known about the earth, not to mention the universe and beyond, the boldness of the claim of atheism comes across as fraught with presumption. 

My second problem with Atheism is the inadequate job it does in dealing with the question of morality[3]. The existence of universal moral standards without a transcendent law-giver is difficult to justify. The honest will agree that regardless of the contents of supposed localised social norms, murder will always be heinous, as with other comparable evils. I’m yet to hear of rape being regarded as simply unethical. It is usually rightfully considered evil, wherever and whenever it occurs. Transcendent laws require a transcendent law-giver. 

The third problem I have is the unconvincing way in which Atheism explains the evident design in the cosmos. When one identifies design, it is ipso facto that a designer also exists. This is a logical and linguistic necessity. It follows that both the macro and micro intricacy of the design of the universe demand a designer of supernatural intelligence. If this is true in all other cases, it is true in this one too. The flight to abstract and often highly speculative explanations seems at times a desperate attempt to contrive theories, regardless how fanciful, that have less to do with science and more to do with pitiful attempts at justifying a predetermined worldview. This does not fool all of us.

Moving now to why, among other types of theism, Christianity is most compelling to me. If the existence of a universal moral code is assumed to exist, as I argue it must, no one can credibly claim not to be culpable under it. We all hate, lie and steal to say the very least. Further, if the longing for justice that all human beings instinctively share is to be meted out, none of us should expect to escape divine sanction because all of us are hopelessly guilty.

Our only hope is if God is merciful. A dilemma arises, however, because if God grants all of us divine amnesty, He cannot in the same breadth be considered just. Intuitively, that does not sit well because it would mean all the callous criminals in history who escaped the sanction of human justice would have gotten away with literal murder. The universal longing for justice would therefore remain lamentably unrequited.

All of this means that if God is just, as we intuitively imagine Him to be, He must judge all of us. The cross of Christ is unique among world religions in that it satisfies both the intuitive expectation of justice and the urgency of our need for mercy. 

At the cross, God punishes His Son, who is uniquely qualified by His sinlessness, for the sins of the whole world and thus satisfies the divine requirement for justice. All who believe in the Son are granted forgiveness for their sins on this basis, fulfilling the desperate need for mercy before the ominous threat of divine judgment that faces largely oblivious humanity. But this does not happen at the expense of justice.

As one who is woefully aware of the weightiness of the judgment that my sins require, I am not a little thankful that God would be merciful enough to pay the ultimate price to save me from what is really my lot. If this is all that He would do for me, it would be infinitely more than what is due to me. To this God, I owe nothing less than all my life. This is why Jesus the Messiah is my Lord.

[1] The belief in the existence of a transcendent God who created the material order
[2] The belief that reality consists purely of the material world. I will include agnosticism in this category as it bears no functional difference to atheism.
[3] I deal with this subject more completely in the blogpost entitled, “What is morality?”