"BELIEVE WHAT? WHOM?"

Believe God is - this first, then faith will become operative in assuring one of what follows from that. The first responsibility of any person is to believe in God, that is, be faithful to God - faith, by definition, is believing what is true; if what one believes is not true, one is unfaithful. To not believe God is will mar anything else a person may believe: "without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him" (Hebrews 11:6).

Belief functions in humans before reason does. This priority of belief is a matter of maturity - "when I was a child, I reasoned as a child ...." What is childish reasoning like? It is thinking one's beliefs rightly describes reality as it appears to be. Reason accepts the possibility that what is apparent may be other than what is real. This is what I like about the philosophical approach of phenomenology - it takes seriously the appearance of things but is willing to put that appearance to question.

There is no such person as a "non-believer." Every person believes something. A reasonable person will desire to believe what is true - to believe otherwise is not reasonable. Grace and truth are realized through Jesus Christ. I believe that God graciously ta kes responsibility for revealing the truth He wants us to know. We must pattern what we believe after that which God has revealed - God is perfectly revealed in Christ Jesus. Born in sin, our belief system begins out of whack. We begin our lives capable of believing only one thing properly (this is how I understand what Romans 12:3 describes as each person's "measure of faith" ) - that we need God to reveal how we ought to believe. Responsible belief is continually on the lookout for whatever God reveals. Humans are born ready to respond to what God reveals - sin works to distort that revelation and alter our response. It is the grace of God the works against the distorting influence of sin; by grace we are able to respond rightly to God's revelation, if we are willing, that is, if we believe. Belief is what we are willing to do.

Belief always takes place in the context of relationship. That is why witnessing is more that mere reasoned presentation of the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ - it is a reasoning together: this often involves a challenge to beliefs, iron sharpening iron, as it were. Let this conversation take place in love, grace and truth in action. When one of the persons reasoning together is God Himself, the other discovers a cleansing transformation taking place - sin, that source of bad belief, no longer separates oneself from God. God is right there to be worshipped - confession, repentance, praise, intercessory prayer, proclamation of his mighty works, and on and on.

All praise be to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,

who has opened the way for us,

through the power of the Holy Spirit,

to faithfully believe what pleases our Father in Heaven,

the LORD God Almighty,

maker of heaven and earth.