Of Christmas and Faith in Miracles

The events associated with the birth of the Savior occurred in a miraculous time during an age of miracles.  It was also an era of grinding poverty, breathtaking opulence, and many gradations of wealth in between.  People were ignorant, well educated, parochial in vision, and metropolitan in view.  Religious beliefs involved spurious superstitions, animistic traditions, polytheistic practices, monotheistic faith, and sophisticated atheism.

That is to say that those times and ours have more in common than we might have supposed, which is the point of my writing this evening.  Perhaps we create too much distance between us and the birth of the Savior.  Measured in human lives, 2000 years is a long time.  In the eternal measures of God and heaven, it must be acknowledged as being brief, a matter of yesterday and common memory.

That being true, it would be odd to assume that God, whose miracles were on prominent display in Judea of long ago, would work by miracles yesterday and not do so today.  The lack of belief in either one logically undermines faith in the other, because it assumes limits on either God’s ability or His willingness to work by miracles, a possibility hard for the mind to accept.  The disbelief in either ancient or modern miracles inclines the mind to reject God’s miraculous interventions entirely. 

For some it can be much easier to believe in miracles of the past than to recognize modern ones.  Others may be willing to see God’s hand in their own lives but consider the ancient scriptural accounts as morality stories, the details of which should not be taken too literally.  We find examples of both among our contemporaries and throughout history.    

Of course, among the sophisticated set have always been those who doubted miracles of both past and present.  With no recognition of personal involvement in miracles, they reject the word of those who actually witnessed them.  They are quick to dismiss others’ experiences, with nice attitudes of condescension for the “lovely legends” and “faith traditions,” that must be taken figuratively if accepted at all.  When those who know assert the reality of the wonders, the sophisticates can be known to turn to anger and scorn.

And yet reality can be stubborn and defy rejection.  Angels delivering messages from God to priests in the Temple and to shepherds in the fields, God speaking to common men by dreams, signs from God to men in distant places motivating them to “traverse afar” to witness God’s works of salvation, and many other examples of heaven’s direct involvement in human affairs can be easier to dismiss if they only happened in hazy history.  When presented with facts of past and present miracles skeptics are hard put to know how to deal with them, other than to dismiss them out of hand and cast ignorant aspersions on those claiming any direct and tangible involvement with Divinity.  Nevertheless, the facts remain.

It works the other way, too.  Denying modern miracles makes it easier to deny their existence long ago and to convert them into lovely stories instead of real world evidences of the power and love of God and of His involvement in our lives.  If there are no miracles now, then they were unlikely to exist in the past.  The miracles attendant to the Savior’s birth are transformed into fabulous fabrications rather than marvelous signs of the reality of the birth of the Son of God.  The reality of modern miracles, however, attests to the reality of the miracles recorded in ancient scripture.

Admittedly, with rare exceptions, miracles are not for the edification of the faithless anyway.  The Lord usually provides room for disbelief for those who choose to disbelieve and for their own sake spares the doubtful from divine confirmation of what they doubt.  The Lord did not send angels to invite the leaders of society to the stable in Bethlehem, but instead He called out to those who readily accepted His invitation to witness the baby laid to rest in the cattle’s manger.  He did send signs, and through the signs a summons, to the believing wise men of the East who had faith that this child was to be the King of Kings.

Similarly, in modern times, to prepare the way for the approach of the Savior’s second coming, the Lord has reached out through angels, heavenly messengers, and by His own voice to the humble faithful who are ready to believe His word, confirming their belief with many and miraculous signs and wonders.

It is a lot easier to believe in the wonders of the Savior’s birth when we witness and receive their like in our own day.  Our unchangeable God works by similar methods with all of His children.  And the saints of all ages rejoice.

Of Belief and Choice

Belief in God is a choice, and with all choices worthy of the name, there are results directly related to that choice.  If you choose to believe, you receive the fruits of belief, and with belief strong enough to result in action you receive the fruits of faith.  If you choose not to believe in God, you receive the results and consequences of that choice, also.

It is important to understand that belief or disbelief in God does not change the reality of God’s existence or change Him in any way.  All it does is change your relationship to God.  A major purpose of this life, for each person who lives it, is to develop and test faith in God, so your choice of belief matters a lot to you and how you live and succeed in this very brief and temporary existence we call mortality.

The principles of belief and faith in general are recognized for being so closely tied to action that the maxim is oft repeated that whether you believe that you will fail or that you will succeed in something you are likely to be right, since your belief will govern your effort.  There is a similarity—but only a similarity—with regard to belief in God.  Whether you believe in God or not in this life, the events of life are likely to seem to confirm you in your belief.  Those who believe in God will, if they choose to persist in their belief, increasingly see His hand in everything.  Those who choose not to believe in God will find many ways to convince themselves of their choice.

Those with faith in God see evidence of Him in all things and are increasingly able to draw upon the powers of heaven.  The ancient American prophet Alma declared, “I have all things as a testimony” of God (Alma 30:41).  Jesus Christ, after His resurrection, declared to His disciples that “signs shall follow them that believe” (Mark 16:17).  In modern times the Savior declared again that “signs follow those that believe”, but He warned and added that signs come “not by the will of men, nor as they please, but by the will of God.” (Doctrine and Covenants 63:9, 10)  God is not a machine, responding to direction and command, but rather a loving parent who bestows His blessings on His children for our benefit as plentifully as we will receive.  Our belief enhances our ability to receive.

On the other hand, those who choose not to believe in God in this life can usually conjure up reasons not to believe and even to explain away what believers would consider strong evidences of the reality of God.  These words spoken nearly a hundred years before the birth of Christ, by one who chose not to believe, sound very fresh in the twenty-first century:

Behold, these things which ye call prophecies, which ye say are handed down by holy prophets, behold, they are foolish traditions of your fathers.

How do ye know of their surety?  Behold, ye cannot know of things which ye do not see; therefore ye cannot know that there shall be a Christ.

Ye look forward and say that ye see a remission of your sins.  But behold, it is the effect of a frenzied mind; and this derangement of your minds comes because of the traditions of your fathers, which lead you away into a belief of things which are not so.  (Alma 30:14-16)

It has been my observation that God usually leaves for those who choose not to believe plenty of room to apply their choice, to find an explanation that excludes God and His power.  He rarely provides knowledge founded on hard, convincing evidence until after a person has made his choice to believe and exercised faith.  Then the evidences come and with increasing clarity. 

The Lord wants the virtues that are associated with belief—humility, patience, perseverance, trust, courage, obedience, and many others including broadness of mind and soul—to be developed in us, which would be scarcely possible if He provided the evidence of conviction before the development and trial of our faith in Him.  As we grow in our faith, we grow in these other virtues.

Not only does the person who chooses not to believe fail to recognize the evidences of God before Him, but God intentionally withholds from him the greater evidences.  In effect, the Lord rewards believer and unbeliever with what they choose, confirmation of belief or the withholding of what the unbeliever would consider verification.  The unbeliever, as with the believer, has to come to the knowledge of God through faith. 

Part of the grace of God, available in this life, is that the choice of unbelief is not final while mortality lasts, and those who believe are commanded by God to employ their faith to help stir belief and faith in others.  “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” (Romans 10:17)  Believers are commanded to tell, to share their belief.  God is ready to begin to lead to faith and from faith to knowledge those who will begin to hear.  “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.” (Matthew 11:15)

Of Agnostics and Manmade Religions

Atheism is intellectually weak minded, if it is what its professors claim it to be, that is the assertion or affirmation that there is no God.  The adherents of that religious doctrine (atheism must be acknowledged a religious doctrine, an organized system of belief with regard to God and man’s relation to God) do not merely believe for themselves that there is no God but make an unjustifiable claim to knowledge and then affirm and advocate what they cannot possibly know.  Surely they can choose not to believe that there is a God, but how can they know that God does not exist anywhere and that no one has met God?  Adherents to the atheist doctrine demonstrate a good amount of blind belief in unproven theories. 
 

The most that they can possibly prove or know is that they personally have not found God yet and that this lack of discovery has caused them seriously to doubt.  Unless they can be everywhere at all times and understand all things (which would be nigh unto godhood itself) they cannot say with intellectual honesty that God does not exist.  They cannot get further down the road of atheism beyond the signpost of agnosticism.  I understand the challenge of proving a negative, and affirming a negative is even bolder, but atheists themselves claim to have met this challenge, a claim that they have never substantiated.

Agnosticism is another thing, if engaged in honestly.  Honestly, it is an admission—or even affirmation—that one does not know.  The agnostic can explain why he does not know, what avenues he has unsuccessfully explored to know.  What he cannot honestly do is claim to know all that can be known or what others know.  The agnostic strays into the same errors of the atheist if he claims that because he does not know God then no one else can.  How could he possibly know that?  How can his experience circumscribe the experience of others, including the experience of those he has never met?  He can espouse theories as to why he disbelieves the claims of knowledge of others and even why he believes that others could not know, or even why he has lost hope that others know, but he cannot prove his theory, again unless he can be everywhere and know all things.  The agnostic cannot honestly pretend to knowledge that he does not have about the knowledge or experience of others.  Not all agnostics do.

Agnostics do have a point viewing the global and historical variety of manmade religions, which present a deep well of disappointment to those seeking evidence of the Divine.  When Jesus Christ spoke directly in person to the young boy Joseph Smith in 1820 the Savior ratified to Joseph much of the factual assertions of the honest agnostic.  The Savior declared to Joseph that all the religions then on the earth were creations of men, not of God, that “they teach for doctrines the commandments of men” having little more than “a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof” (Joseph Smith-History, verse 19).  Many of the religions of 1820 exist today, while inventive men have been working diligently since to create many more.

There was much justification for the agnostic in 1820.  There is increasingly less today.  The fact that all of the religions 190 years ago were manmade does not mean that God Himself could not establish—or reestablish—His own church and religion on the earth.  In fact, 2,500 years ago God promised that He would do just that.  When the prophet Daniel interpreted the dream of the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar, he prophesied that in the last days God Himself would establish on earth His religion, symbolized in the dream as a stone “cut out of the mountain without hands” that would roll forward until it filled the whole earth (Daniel 2:28-45).   Daniel then prophetically declared to the king, “the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.” (Daniel 2:45)

Which means that to honest atheist and agnostic alike, the message is beware lest you stop looking too soon, for the good news is that aside from the religions of men God has done His own work and revealed Himself to His children, as He promised long ago.  These things can be known today, certain and sure.

Of Doubt and Faith

Doubt in the word of God has no place in the righteous life. It is the antithesis of faith. Spirituality and doubt cannot rest comfortably in the same heart, for spirituality—which reaches its highest degree in the gift of charity—“believeth all things” (Moroni 7:45). Doubt, on the other hand, denies things and challenges them to be proven. Doubt withholds belief until adequate proof is presented. Faith extends belief until it is superseded by knowledge.

That is, by the way, why genuine faith can only be placed in something that is true. As the ancient American prophet, Alma, taught, “if ye have faith, ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.” (Alma 32:21) Faith is a bridge of belief that carries the believer from one level of knowledge to an increased level of knowledge, therefore it has to reach something that is true.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is true. It is never on trial. Its very true nature places the individual on trial when he is exposed to truth. The individual is left to accept or reject the truth—to gain a knowledge of it through faith and then live it, or to doubt it or avoid it—but he cannot alter it, and the individual is blessed or condemned by what he does with regard to the truth.

The word of the Lord revealed through His messengers is true. Faith assumes the truth and leads the believer to act upon it, whether or not that truth is comprehended. Doubt takes the side of the devil and denies the truth until compelled to surrender pretense when recognition of truth is inescapable—and that recognition can be dexterously delayed for a long time.

The Lord continually urges us to gain knowledge, to search diligently, to prove all things (1 Thessalonians 5:21). You do not have to doubt something in order to prove it. Exercising faith in an unconfirmed truth converts faith into the vehicle for gaining knowledge, for verification, since by acting in accordance with a truth is a sure way by which the reality of a truth is revealed. It is belief in the accuracy of a map that allows one to probe the charted course, at the end of which lies confirmation and assurance. Doubt discourages one from ever setting out on the road, and until some faith is exercised to overcome the doubt the journey is never begun.

Indeed, doubt always leads away from knowledge. The doubting mind is only ever brought to knowledge when somewhere along the road doubt in some degree is overcome by faith that is exercised in some truth. Faith is the connecting link that leads us from knowledge to knowledge. Thus, part of the gospel plan includes inquiry, questioning, but it is a questioning illumined by faith, not shaded by doubt.

Of Faith and Repentance

I received an electronic message the other day from someone trying to persuade me that, in essence, repentance is not necessary as long as one has faith. Such a concept is nonsense and little worth commenting on, were it not so popular. There are several ways to address this absurdity. I will present a couple.

Perhaps the first is to ask, faith in what or whom? If one means faith in Christ, then I would ask how would one have faith in Christ without repenting of the sinful way of life and embracing the commandments that Christ has given us? Can you be said to have faith in Christ and yet reject the walk of life that He commanded us to follow? Following that way of life is repentance.

Second, advocating that faith is enough, without repentance, is to use the concept of faith to avoid repentance. It is using the concept of faith to avoid doing what Christ commanded us to do, to avoid living the way of life He set out for us. It is to invoke faith in order to doubt what He said. I do not remember the Savior or His prophets ever teaching that. It is a Satanic doctrine that destroys both repentance and faith--and dishonors the Christ who gave us His commandments.

Again, repentance means changing your lifestyle, turning away from following your own faulty and rebellious whims and following the way of abundant life that Christ has outlined in His commandments. The doctrine of faith without repentance ignores the commandments of Christ. Faith means that you believe Him and trust Him. Men's actions derive directly from their faith in what will bring them what they seek. That is why James declares, "I will shew thee my faith by my works." (James 2:18) Faith in Christ cannot mean disregard of His commandments. That would be faith in something or someone other than Christ.

I know of only one commandment of Christ repeated more often in the scriptures than the commandment to repent, namely the commandment to seek Christ. Jesus Christ has promised us that if we seek Him, we shall find Him. What do we do once we find Him? We believe Him and follow Him and embrace His way of living. That is faith in Christ. That is repentance, and that is life eternal. As Jesus said in prayer to the Father, the night before the crucifixion, "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent." (John 17:3)