Isn’t faith all in the mind?

People do speak about their faith in the way that it makes them feel – things like peace, assurance, calmness, strength. If that is all that there was, then indeed we might say one way is as good as another. But the Christian faith is first of all based on historical facts – that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in the reign of Herod; that He did miracles testified to by many eye-witnesses; that He died on a cross during the governorship of Pontius Pilate; and that He rose from the dead not with the same weaknesses of the old body, but a new body that will never die; and that there were a variety of eye-witnesses to this, including over 500 people at one time. (1 Corinthians 15:3-6).

The Christian faith then is not “blind faith” – it is trusting in what Jesus did. And faith is trusting that when God says it was for our sakes, we believe that to be a true word. It is because the Christian faith is based on something God has done, rather on what we feel, that we do have security, assurance and peace, even in the toughest times. If it was all in the mind, we would very definitely have times when we couldn’t even be sure of God’s love – but because we know our life and eternity rests on God’s past, finished action when Jesus died on the cross and rose again on the third day, we are always sure of God’s love and purpose for us.

Torry United Free Church of Scotland