My cmnt: Please see another of my posts on Science vs Faith here by the world renowned physicist Paul Davies.

Faith is a greatly misunderstood concept. Because of its use and importance to Biblical understanding and conversion I thought I would add some of my own (and others) thoughts to this subject.

Most of the heathen establishment in America (you know who they are) misuses the word all the time and generally on purpose. They pose the question as some kind of stark contrast usually between faith and “science”. So the writers on the Young Sheldon sitcom have the 8 year old Sheldon challenge his mother’s pastor Jeff by confidently stating that he does not believe in God because he is a man of science.

The Leftist establishment (1) believes that it operates without faith. That is they think of themselves as pure, rational, reasonable, fact-based, pursuers of science and knowledge. Faith is for children, the timid, the uninformed and religious nuts.

This materialist worldview, like Sergeant Joe Friday, claims that it, “Only wants the facts, ma’am.” But what the Left really wants is control of the narrative regardless of the facts. Like the Ferangi Quark in Star Trek Deep Space Nine they say publicly, “Always obey the rules” while privately they tell their disciples, “Just remember rules are always subject to interpretation.”

The Bible says, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.” (Heb 11:6 NKJV) There are several variations on this translation which all pretty much say the same thing. This is a difficult verse to parse. You can look it up for yourself on Biblehub.com if you’re interested.

The Presbyterian theologian Charles Hodge defined faith as “Trust in an authority.” This is certainly a good and sound definition of faith. Determining who is an authority is more difficult.

I have used this question as an aid to understanding the fact of faith. “Have you ever driven through a GREEN light?” You have to think about that for a moment. We all know what will happen if we run a RED light at a busy intersection. There will most likely be a horrific crash. However we all assume that it’s safe to drive through an intersection, even with heavy traffic, on a green light because we believe that the crossing traffic will stop. The operative words here are “assume” and “believe”. We do not KNOW that the opposing traffic will stop we simply have faith that they will. If we did not have faith we would have to stop at our green light and make sure that everyone else is stopped on their red. Traffic flow would grind to a halt.

As a point of fact ALL of Western civilization is built on faith. We don’t know if our doctor knows what he’s talking about when diagnosing our ailment. We don’t know if the pharmacist actually gave us the drugs called for on the prescription. We don’t know what really happens to the money we deposit in the bank or even if the money is worth the paper it’s printed on. We don’t know if the talking head on the alphabet news cast is telling us the truth. We don’t know if our vote was actually counted after we leave the polling place. We don’t know if the judge at the trial is partisan, biased or even honest. We don’t know if our food and water are safe and clean or tainted with a deadly bacteria. We don’t know if what we were taught in school reflects reality or was simply propaganda. We don’t know if anything we’re taught in history actually happened or if man has ever really stepped foot on the moon. We take almost everything that makes our wonderful, free and prosperous civilization work on faith.

More than that, everything we hold most dear: Beauty, goodness and truth. Faith, hope and charity – are intangibles. They cannot be held, weighed, counted or measured. They are nearly impossible to define in any precise, legal manner. Yet without them all of life becomes a meaningless struggle for survival. Life indeed becomes pointless.

There are at present only two faith-based propositions at large in the modern world. They are fundamental and foundational to both sides fighting for the hearts and minds of men. The first is: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The other is: In the beginning were the eternal particles.

The first produced all the wealth and freedoms everyone in the world covets and votes with their feet to attain in the West. The second has produced only poverty, suffering and bondage.

Our worldview could be called Christian Theism or more broadly Theistic Realism. It falls under the concept of supernaturalism. Whereas the dominant worldview of the Left falls under the concept of naturalism or materialism.

The first view could be thought of as observational rationalism. I believe what my eyes tell me. The second could be thought of as functional materialism. Who you gonna believe, me or your own lying eyes? Theistic realists observe the natural order and see immediately and also after much thought and inquiry that it had to come from a very powerful, creative genius who must exist outside of time and space. We call this Creator – God.

The second view could be thought of as secular materialism or simply naturalism. It holds that the universe (or some unknowable multiverse) has existed forever and, in Carl Sagan’s words, is all there is, all there was, and all there ever will be. A closed system governed by physical laws and chance.

Each of these worldviews has a creation story mostly beyond proof and accepted on faith. Whoever gets to tell us our creation story gets to declare to us what is real and what is not. If supernaturalism dominates the natural order in many often deeply buried and profoundly complicated ways then one type of life for man logically follows. If naturalism dominates the created order and something like Darwinism produced man out of chance and necessity then another type of life for man logically follows.

All of our institutions everywhere are subject to the faith we place in them. Our very government is founded on a faith-based proposition: We hold these truths to be self evident… while Pontius Pilate asked of Christ, “What is truth?”

Our much vaunted and glorified science and the so-called scientific method only arose in the entire history of mankind in the Christianized West even as the Materialistic Left seeks to overthrow it.

And now for a little historical irony from Nebraska’s Loren Eiseley.  Eiseley was a naturalist, a consummate observer and a science historian.  Writing in Darwin’s Century he tells us that science is not natural to mankind but that it is ‘an invented cultural institution, an institution not present in all societies, and not one that may be counted upon to arise from human instinct … (it) demands some kind of unique soil in which to flourish.’  Eiseley continues, ‘In one of those strange permutations in which history yields occasional rare examples it is the Christian world which finally gave birth in a clear, articulate fashion to the experimental method of science itself.’

“Science has always said that it may not know everything now but it will know, eventually. But now we see that isn’t true. It is an idle boast. As foolish, and as misguided, as the child who jumps off a building because he believes he can fly.” Michael Crichton, Jurassic Park

We are in a car which is in a tree.  A strange place to be.  We tell ourselves that cars do not belong in trees and we need to get out.

If science cannot arbitrate these things for us, who will?  Well, we’re out of the tree but back in the car again.

(1) (i.e., the universities, public school administrators, the democrat-media industrial complex, Hollywood, television, the entertainment industry, the democrat party leadership, communist countries, the mainstream press, all large democrat-run cities, etc.)