Reasoning Faith

By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.”^{[Genesis 21:12]} Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
Hebrews 11:17-19

This passage is found in the famous “hall of faith” section of Hebrews chapter 11. This is where the writer of Hebrews recounts all the many acts of faith done by those in the old covenant. The phrase “by faith” is used 22 times in this chapter. And it all points to the reality that they acted by faith even though they didn’t see the completion or fullness of the promise given to them. How much more should we, who now know the fullness of the promise in the new covenant through Jesus, act in faith? Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that “without faith it is impossible to please God.”

Yet, what I find so striking about this passage is the combination of faith and reasoning that we see from Abraham in his decision to do something that seems crazy. Sometimes people of faith, and faith itself, get pitted against reasoning…as if you can either choose faith or reason but not both.

But what we find in Abraham is a different kind of reasoning that is empowered by faith. Abraham was asked by God to do something that seems crazy. But context is everything. First of all, the crazy thing he was asked to do wasn’t to sacrifice his son. In the pagan world, it was very common to offer children as sacrifices to the gods. This was sort of standard practice for pagans. This was culturally “normal” for Abraham’s day. And before we get too judgmental, we need to remember that even in all of our modern advancements we live in a society that has legalized the murder of babies in the womb by their own mother.

The crazy part was that all the promises that God had given Abraham all rested on Isaac. Not only was God asking Abraham to do something that felt more like a pagan practice, but he was asking Abraham to give up all the promises that God made in favor of obedience to God. God was asking Abraham to choose the Promise Maker over the actual promises themselves. God continues to ask this of us today.

But notice Abraham’s reasoning. This wasn’t haphazard fideism or irrationally blind faith. Just as Abraham’s faith was grounded in the nature of God, so was his reasoning. He reasoned that God can raise the dead. In other words, his reasoning factored in the miraculous power of God and the goodness of God. So his obedience was both an act of faith and an act of reasoning.

Is it irrational to give your life in order to spread the gospel in closed countries knowing that you might be killed? It might seem that way to some. But if your reasoning factors in a God who is good, a God who sacrificed everything for you, a God who is powerful and loving, a God who longs to see others come to know the truth of Jesus, then it’s reasonable to give your life for such a God.

When God is factored into our reasoning, suddenly the impossible looks possible, the irrational becomes rational. As we see from Abraham, a life of faith is not just having God factored into our beliefs but having God factored into our reasoning. This is the God who can raise the dead to life, give sight to the blind, and heal impossibly broken hearts.

Signs, Wonders and Plagues

This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.
Hebrews 2:3-4

The gospel was first announced by Jesus and confirmed by the early apostles. Then God testified to the truth of the gospel by demonstrating signs, wonders and miracles through the Church. God also testified to the truth of the gospel by distributing gifts of the Holy Spirit for the Church to use.

We still have the announcement of Jesus recorded in the Gospels. We still have the confirmation of the early apostles in the book of Acts and the letters of Paul, Peter, John and others. But if we reject signs, wonders, miracles and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, we miss out on half of the ways that God testifies to the truth of the gospel. Paul talks about how vital signs and wonders were in his ministry of delivering the gospel to the Gentiles:

I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me in leading the Gentiles to obey God by what I have said and done—by the power of signs and wonders, through the power of the Spirit of God. So from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum, I have fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ.
Romans 15:18-19

Signs and wonders have always been a primary way God reveals Himself to humanity. When God was creating for Himself a people by setting the Hebrews free from slavery in Egypt, God performed signs and wonders. Speaking about Pharaoh as God laid out His plan to Moses, God said:

…though I multiply my signs and wonders in Egypt, he will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment I will bring out my divisions, my people the Israelites.
Exodus 7:3-4

Before entering the Promised Land, God reminds the people of all that He did for them and gives them this instruction:

In the future, when your son asks you, “What is the meaning of the stipulations, decrees and laws the Lord our God has commanded you?” tell him: “We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. Before our eyes the Lord sent signs and wonders—great and terrible—on Egypt and Pharaoh and his whole household. But he brought us out from there to bring us in and give us the land he promised on oath to our ancestors. The Lord commanded us to obey all these decrees and to fear the Lord our God, so that we might always prosper and be kept alive, as is the case today.
Deuteronomy 6:20-24

My co-pastor reminded me in one of his sermons a few weeks ago that we often call what God did in Egypt “plagues.” But God did not call them that, nor did Israel. To God and His people they were not plagues but “signs and wonders.” Only to Egypt and Pharaoh were these miraculous events “plagues.”

And I have found the same dynamic to be true today. When God heals someone, performs a miracle, or delivers someone from a demon, there will be those who see these things as wonders–signs of God’s imminent Presence, love, compassion and power. Yet, there will also be some who will see the same miracle and react against it as if it was a plague.

The same thing happened with Jesus. Some, usually the downtrodden and poor, celebrated as Jesus healed people and cast out demons. Yet others, usually the religious elite, did not see the miracles as wonders but instead as plagues–moments where Jesus broke the law, moments that threatened their established system of power, moments of offense.

Every time we hear a testimony of a miracle, a healing, or a deliverance, we have that same choice. Are we going to side with Egypt and Pharaoh or God and His people? Are these stories of miracles plagues or wonders? I believe this is essentially the question Jesus was asking the Syro-Phoenician woman who asked Jesus to get rid of the demon who was tormenting her daughter.

(Jesus) answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
“Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Matthew 15:24-27

I believe Jesus was seeing if the woman would get offended at God’s decision to heal and deliver the Israelites first before the Gentiles. He even uses somewhat offensive language, referring to Gentiles as dogs, as a way to see if she would react with offended entitlement or humility.

And we also face this kind of test with each testimony of healing and deliverance. Will we get offended at what God is doing, as He heals someone else first? Will entitlement get the best of us? Will offense get the best of us? Will stories of healing become plagues to our hearts? Or, will we respond in hope and humility as this woman did? Will we celebrate miracles as signs and wonders of God’s goodness?

Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.”And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Matthew 15:28

Believing

” You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you?”(Galatians 3:1)

The word “bewitched” here means “to cast an evil spell” on someone, to use words to put someone under a spell causing them to no longer think clearly. There had been false teachers who infiltrated the church in Galatia and began to teach them that in order to be a true follower of Christ they had to follow certain parts of the Law, including circumcision. The apostle Paul sets about to dismantle this false teaching.

He asks them, “Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh?”(Galatians 3:2-3)

Isn’t this what we do so often? We start our Christian life knowing “it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast”(Ephesians 2:8-9). But no sooner do we take our first steps by faith does the temptation come to earn God’s love and prove our worth through religious activity.

Paul asks another question of the Galatians, “So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?”(Galatians 3:5)

This is interesting on so many levels. It is clear from this that the church in Galatia was experiencing the Holy Spirit do miracles through them. By this time in the early church, miracles had gone beyond the first apostles (Acts 5:12), beyond the first deacons (Acts 8:6-7), and even beyond Paul’s ministry (Acts 14:9-10). Miracles were now happening through men and women believers who had no title or position whatsoever. This is evidence of the fulfillment of Mark 16:17-18:

And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues…they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

So there are two qualifications for a miracle to happen through you: 1) Do you have the Holy Spirit by faith in Jesus Christ? and 2) Do you believe? In other words, are you a believing believer or a believer who is filled with unbelief? Strict adherence to the Law is not one of the qualifications. Having some elevated title or position in the church is not one of the qualifications. God is simply looking for surrendered sons and daughters who actually believe Him.

This is still God’s desire for the church today. God wants to give us His Spirit and work miracles among us because we are a church full of people who live by faith. He’s looking for a group of people who actually believe. And if we totally surrender ourselves to Him in faith, we will discover that these signs will accompany us: In Jesus’s name we will drive out demons, speak in new tongues, place our hands on sick people to pray for them and watch as they get well.