Defining “Belief”

Believe. We toss that word around all the time without giving it a second thought. So when I say “I believe that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior,” you and I both know where we’re at, right?

Maybe not as much as you might think. You see, “believe” can mean several quite different things.

Let me give you an example of one kind of “believe.” I live in Carlsbad, California, and I’m a big coffee drinker. So when I say “I believe that there’s a Starbucks in downtown Carlsbad near the corner of Carlsbad Blvd and Grand Ave,” that’s a statement with the weight of my own experiences backing it up: I’ve been there plenty of times and I pass by it frequently.

What about another variety of “believe”? “I believe that Bob will meet us at Starbucks at 11 AM.” I am quite sure that Bob will meet us there. He’s a punctual, reliable kind of guy. But it’s not quite the same level of confidence as my belief in the physical existence and location of Starbucks itself. After all, Starbucks isn’t going to vanish in a poof of cappuccino-scented smoke, but Bob might get stuck in traffic. (This is Southern California we’re talking about, after all.)

Then there’s a third, “wishful thinking” kind of belief: “I believe that if we all buy organic, shade-grown coffee, the quality of life of farmers around the globe will be enormously improved.” Don’t get me wrong – I think that buying shade-grown coffee is a really excellent thing to do. But that “I believe” statement isn’t a statement of known fact or even of probability based on my own experiences. It’s something I would like to be true; it’s something I have reason to think is at least partly true. But do I believe it in the same sense as I believe that Starbucks is where I say it is, or that Bob will actually meet us there (even if he’s a bit late)? Nope.

So, do we have three flavors of belief, each a little weaker than the next? Hold on – I’ve saved one for last.

There’s a fourth type of belief that is actually even more solid than the existence-of-Starbucks type that I started my example with. I wouldn’t stake my life on whether or not Starbucks was actually, at this very moment, where I think it is: there’s always the possibility that it’s closed up shop and I haven’t heard (maybe it was driven out of business by my favorite Carlsbad coffee shop, Vinaka’s – now there’s wishful thinking for you). Unlikely, but if I were put to the question, I’d admit that I don’t actually know that it’s there right now. However, when I say “I believe that it is wrong to kill an innocent person,” I believe that to be true in a deep, foundational way. I really would stake my life on it, because I know it’s true.

So here’s the real question. What kind of belief do you have in Christ?

Is it the wishful-thinking belief? “I believe in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior because it’ll be so much nicer for me after I die if that’s true.” Christianity as car insurance. If you do end up in a wreck, you’ll be glad you signed those insurance papers. Christianity as a door prize. Come to church, pray, and look what a nice prize you get: eternal life! (Yes, that’s sarcasm.)

Maybe you’re at the “reasonably sure” belief. It’s more solidly grounded than wishful thinking, but it’s not actually something that you know for sure. It’s more like what you learn in a lot of your college classes. You haven’t actually thought much about what your professors said in class (other than to ask if it will be on the test…) but you’re confident that they’re not lying to you. Maybe you blew off studying for the quizzes, but you have a nagging feeling that you ought to hit the books harder before the final exam. So along those same lines, your pastor says that Jesus is your Savior, and you go with that. OK. That’s a place to start.

It’s natural for there to be different kinds of belief within a single person’s faith, anyway. That’s part of what growth as a Christian is all about. For instance, it took me a while to actually believe in God’s forgiveness. Intellectually I understood that yes, He loves me and would forgive me for all my sins, but there was a part of my mind that suspected He would look closely at me and say “Eh, no forgiveness for you! What were you thinking?!?” Despite reading the Bible, despite discussing it with my priest, despite understanding the concept… I still didn’t “get it” in my heart. I didn’t give up on the idea, though, because one of the things I’d learned by then was to trust in God. (That was a lot tougher than it sounds, by the way.) I was committed to wrestling with this whole forgiveness thing under the premise that God would work with me here.

And He did. He gave me the understanding that forgiveness and grace are real.

Notice that I’ve shifted my choice of word from “believe” to “understand.” I don’t “believe” that five times five is twenty-five. I understand that it is. There was a time before I went to school that I didn’t understand it. The math was still real; I just didn’t know anything about it. Later, there was a time when I knew that there was this “math thing” to figure out, but I didn’t understand how to do it yet. Then, finally, I understood it, and I could proceed from there.

And so, with being a Christian.

There was a time – not too long ago – when I didn’t know that Jesus Christ was my Lord and Savior. (In fact, I didn’t know that God existed at all.) My lack of understanding didn’t change the reality, any more than my inability to do multiplication when I was a five-year-old affected the way my parents balanced their checkbook. I didn’t know God until very recently, but He was there (and knew me) all along.

Now that I am a Christian (and it’s a long story how I got here from there), I don’t “believe” because I like the idea and want it to be true. I don’t “believe” because I think Christianity makes sense intellectually (although that was a necessary foundation to my faith). In fact, I wouldn’t say that I “believe” in God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or that I “believe” I have a personal relationship with Him: I would say that I know these things to be true.

How do you move past “believe” to “know”? You look for truth, not convenience. You ask questions, and you don’t settle for easy, shallow answers. You grapple with ideas, and you don’t back down even when they challenge your worldview or habits.

The nice thing about reality is that it stands up to testing. The laws of physics don’t change no matter how often you drop rocks from heights. The way that faith works is sometimes complicated and subtle, but it’s no less real for all that. Asking questions won’t make Him go away: if you genuinely seek the truth, asking questions will, in fact, bring you closer to Him. After all, He is the way, the truth, and the life – whether you know Him or not, that’s who He is.

So ask questions – of yourself, of your pastor, of Him. Seek to know, not just “believe.” It’s a challenge, but the payoff is worth it. To be able to put “Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior” in the same category of knowledge as “five times five is twenty-five” is, to say the least, significant.

And life-changing. Because once we know, truly know that He is exactly who He says He is… then what can we do but follow?

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