Faith and Salvation Part II - History

2. Faith is a historical. There are some religions which do not claim to be historical. In order to understand this claim we need to discover what religion is. As a Christian I use the term to mean recognizing God as God and ordering my life in the light of that belief. What, then, do we do with those who claim they "have no God" does that mean they have no religion? Yes, they do. It is a part of man's makeup to honor the true God and live accordingly. When a person refuses to accept the God of the Universe he has to put something in place which can (in his mind) replace God. Then that something is used to order the person's life.

So it is possible to "replace" God with ideals, corporate man, reason, technology or any number of things which are not historically assessable and use that choice to build a framework with which to order one's life. The sticking point is that we must still deal with history and real life. And, in order to do that, it is necessary to deal with God's Laws. The most elaborate, modern alternative to God's religion (used in the sense defined above) is Evolution. To discuss this fully would take us way off topic but it is significant that there is nothing in classical Evolutionary theory to explain the historical record of the worldwide flood of Noah. This is in spite of its claim to rest its views on the "facts" of history and science.

Our faith as Christians, therefore, has reference to events that took place in particular places and at specific times. If Christ did not actually exist; had he not done the things it is claimed he did, then there is no basis for it. Our acceptance of Christianity rests on the truth of the events the Bible says took place in the real world. We are called Christians because we follow the teachings of a man, called Jesus the Christ, who lived, died and rose again in the first Century of this era. We believe he was an historical figure and that he did the things reported of him in the Bible. Unlike some religions (including some that claim to be Christian) if it were shown that Jesus Christ had never lived and the events of his life, extraordinary though they be, hadn't happened that way, true Christianity would cease to exist.

Yet, that he existed is insufficient to explain our faith in him. We not only believe about him, we believe him. We believe he was who he claimed to be and that he taught and did what we are told he did. We do so because we accept the Bible as the record of witnesses who saw and experienced what they wrote down for our understanding of the significance of Jesus' life, death and resurrection. Witnesses from among the most skeptical of the day. After all who is more skeptical than a fisherman or a tax-gatherer? The Bible informs our faith. It provides the historical data we need in order to know what we were taught "with certainty." The fact that the authors took the trouble to establish the truth of their record by eyewitnesses, confirms the claim that the founders of the faith considered history vital to our beliefs.

As a result of archaeology we can be certain of the events of that first Century of our present era, in spite of almost constant efforts to destroy or explain away the record. We actually have more historical evidence bearing on those events than on any other period in history. In fact it would be true to say we have more evidence for the life of Jesus Christ than we do for any other single person in history.

The same is true of the Bible. There are more manuscripts of both the Old and the New Testaments than for any other ancient book. By comparing the manuscripts we can be sure that what we have translated as the Bible in English is an accurate version of the original. The process of comparison has demonstrated many times over that, all the way from the first scrolls to the present, the book accepted as God's word has remained the same since the beginning.

Our faith is belief in a real historical person, the events of his life, his teaching and the significance placed on those things by those who were present. Though we believe we are saved by faith alone, that faith is not irrational, nor is it faith in something that cannot be tested. We have many witnesses who have testified, sometimes at the cost of their lives, that the Bible record is historically true. Our faith is grounded in reality.

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