Easy believism ignores and discounts the requirement of personal responsibility. It says, “I can just believe and be saved.”

“So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!”

Faith is the confluence of belief, trust, and expectation. These three working together produce fruit. In the context of salvation by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8-10), the fruit (or works) of faith is repentance from sins.

Without trust and expectation, there is no accessing the Works (salvation) of the One who says, I can, and I will do as I promise. Without trust and expectation mixed with belief, there is no basis to act in repentance from sins, which are non-refutable qualities of the gospel of the kingdom of God.

So, to button it up: Is Jesus key? Yes. Can we access the salvation that Jesus provided through is death, burial and resurrection without repentance? No.

Would you like to learn about the Five Stages of the Miracle Experience? If so, read on.

Just as with the Five Stages of Grief, encountering a genuine, unexpected miracle compels one to navigate through these five stages. Similarly, akin to the stages of grief, it is possible to become trapped in any phase and prematurely terminate the process without full resolution.

Surprise

The initial shock and amazement at witnessing the impossible.

Denial

This is where we first deny and attempt to shift responsibility for what has just occurred in our presence.

Uncertainty

This stage is predominantly occupied with the question of “Why,” and doubting our memory of the events surrounding the miracle. We explore plausible, alternate scenarios to explain the miraculous.

Reasoning

In our struggle to comprehend the nature or meaning of the event, we attempt to stabilize our psyche through understanding and comprehension. We seek or construct answers as we develop a framework about its meaning and significance.

Acceptance

We accept the miraculous event as literal and natural for our relationship with God; we find peace and awe in the experience. Most importantly, our faith grows as a result. In other words, our “God Box” gets bigger.

You can ask me how I know, but I’m not telling. When you do experience yours, those steps above are generally how it will play out for you. And like grief, we don’t progress through these stages one after the other but jump between them during the process.

The Unexpected

This quality is important: the unexpected nature of the event pushes us into this processing framework.

Many of us have experienced what we may have called a miracle. But because of faith or disinterest, we immediately had a framework in which the experience was quickly processed, categorized, and perhaps even discarded.

When a person gives their life to Jesus, that person will be changed, never wanting to go back to their old sinful ways.

I wish it were that easy and simple. It never was for me. I became aware of some things—literally overnight—and some behaviors changed immediately. But through no fault of my own, others hung around for a lifetime.

Being a good Baptist, I learned how to thrive on the condemnation routinely spewed like raw sewage from the pulpit. I doubted my salvation; I prayed the sinner’s prayer weekly, if not daily, and confessed the same sins over and over, but nothing changed. So, I embraced the sewage and self-condemnation, figuring this was what I needed to keep me straight.

At some point in my journey, I had begun to learn Father’s voice—thanks be to God because the Baptists I hung out with couldn’t teach that if their lives depended upon it—when during one of my groveling confession sessions, Father spoke so clearly that had it been any louder, I would have heard Him with my ears, bellowing in the room: “Never confess those sins to me again. Don’t bring it to me if you don’t remember when it happened or remember doing it.”

For you see, I knew—as aptly taught—that I was just a worm, a sinner saved by grace, so it didn’t really matter what sin I confessed because, at some point, I’d certainly done it in some fashion. Hence, repeat, ad nauseam.

After that encounter, I didn’t pray again for two weeks because I had nothing else to say or talk about.

That was probably the turning point in my learning who I am in Christ.

Look up Neil T. Anderson and get the book.

Warning: this will bake your noodle.

It has been suggested that the definition of faith is believing in something without proof or evidence to substantiate said thing: a typical Evangelical Christian definition based chiefly on a verse found somewhere in the book of Hebrews (chapter 11, verse 1, to be precise).

However, I would suggest that there’s not only archeological evidence but also other tangible evidence that God is and keeps His word—the Bible, right?

After all, some say that today, God only speaks to us through the Bible.

So then, how is the Bible used, and what does it have to do with blind faith?

We use it as a historical record illustrating that God is trustworthy and His nature is Good. By any definition of the word, the Bible becomes our record of evidence of His existence and nature. But therein is the rub.

Using their definition, that faith must be blind, that faith must not rely on tangible evidence, then believing in and trusting God solely based on what one has read in the Bible does not constitute an application of faith, because – according to them – the very essence of faith must transcend the need for empirical validation resting instead on a profound sense of trust and conviction that is literally based upon nothing:

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews+11%3A1&version=ESV

They Believe that Faith Must be Blind

What we see, then, is that these people try to define faith as empty and convince you that faith is blind. They take Hebrews 11:1 out of context and propose a new, seemingly better definition.

However, in adhering to their wishes and using their own definitions, we discover their blindness to the very nature of their origins.

What do they possess, then? Nothing more than a commitment to a logical conclusion drawn from historical evidence found in both the Bible and extrabiblical sources – because their faith must be blind and based upon no observable evidence at all.

Really Understanding Faith

While our reference to the text of the Book of Hebrews is correct, and the words found therein are true, we must move beyond blind, unsubstantiated faith. Perhaps a further reading of the text will bring elucidation:

For by it {faith} the people of old received their commendation. 

By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.

By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.

And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. 

By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews%2011&version=ESV

In all of the examples provided, each one is backed up by tangible evidence.

• The Word of God was spoken throughout history so that those from Adam and beyond knew from whence they came, this being the evidence of testimony.
• How did Able know what to bring as an offering? Not through the Bible, but by having a living conversation with God – trusting and believing His testimony.
• Enoch believed and trusted God that he would not see death but be taken up instead. He had reason to believe and trust God’s word.
• Noah acted on God’s tangible word after being warned and instructed.

A Better Understanding of Faith

In any court, testimony is considered evidence. Even so, without trust there can be no faith.

Suppose you want to hire Yardman to mow your grass, as you have an acre of grass to maintain. To that end, you interview a few people.

The first person arrives with scissors and promises to show up on time every week. He asserts that he will cut your grass with his scissors and be done in about an hour. The second person you interview arrives with useful lawn equipment that seems to be seldom used. Your neighbors have warned you that he’s unreliable and may not show up but only once a month, if that. The third person arrives looking tattered, hot, and with grass clippings stuck in his hair. He provides, like the others, a fair price for the job.

Which one do you hire, and why?

• You avoid Scissor Man because you don’t believe he can do the job.
• You avoid Seldom Man because you don’t trust him to do the job.
• You hire Tattered and Dirty Man because you believe he can do the job and trust that he will keep his word.

So, you hired the Tattered and Diry Man, because why? Because of the faith generated by the evidence provided.

The Scientific Method

Whether supernatural or natural, faith is always based on the evidence provided. It is generated and grows by believing the evidence and trusting its Maker. As such, the Scientific Method is the best example of our generation of natural faith.

Something is observed, and a curiosity is formed along with an idea of why the thing is. Tests are devised and investigated for their applicability and trustworthiness. The tests are performed, and the results are evaluated as conforming to the qualifications previously devised. Once the results are confirmed, we let someone else run the same experiments. The more times they’re run, the more times they show the same results, the more our belief in the original hypothesis and theories increase, along with the trust in the validity of the devised tests. All because of trust placed into the original systems of belief and the qualities of trustworthiness of the tests performed.

We have faith because we know the One who speaks, and we believe because we have found Him to be Trustworthy.

Thus, faith is never blind, regardless of how often someone removes Hebrews 11:1 from its context.

So, the next time someone tells you that faith is blind, ask them if they believe the Bible provides evidence of a Creator, Moral Giver, and Judge. If they assert that as true, then remind them they have simply believed a logical construct, seeing that their faith must, by their definition, be blind.

The apostolic period extends from the day of Pentecost to the death of St. John, and covers about seventy years, from 30 A.D. to 100 A.D. The field of action is Palestine, and gradually extends over Syria, Asia Minor, Greece and Italy. The most prominent centers are Jerusalem, Antioch and Rome, which represent respectively the mother churches of Jewish, Gentile and united catholic Christianity.

https://gracenotes.info/documents/topics_doc/apostolicage.pdf

The first problem is the suggestion that there was an apostolic age that began and then ended. But given that we can, with well-indoctrinated cognitive dissonance, suggest this Scripture is both the word of God and is not, it doesn’t surprise me one bit that some have defined an apostolic age:

"... And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, and various kinds of tongues."

In other words, Scripture clearly says one thing, and Man says another. Therefore, one either adheres to cessationism or continuationism. There is no middle road.

What is the Word of God?

But to have this conversion, we must define what is the word of God? Is the Bible the word of God, or does it contain the word of God?

I’ll answer that question with another question: was King David’s rape of Bathsheba and the murder of her husband God’s idea, or was it David’s? Let’s assume it was David’s idea, but not God’s. That makes David’s actions, not the word of God – not God’s idea.

So then, we’re left with suggesting how the story is told, and the fact that the story is in the Bible is God’s idea – making it the word of God because it’s His STORY, but not His IDEA. Hence, the Bible both contains the Word of God and is the Word of God.

If we bring that logic forward, we’re left with this question: at what point did parts of Acts, 1 Corinthians, and Ephesians stop being “God’s IDEA” (aka, His WORD) and become just His STORY that He wanted to tell to make some here-to-now unknown point? And which other parts of the New Testament are just His “story bits” that we should now ignore, presuming them to not be God’s idea?

Finally, who is in charge of discerning and promulgating what should be sliced and diced out as authoritative?