Faith and The “Unreasonable” Reason

The Sanctuary Downtown / Relentless Love

“Grow up or die.” That’s how Bill Maher ends his documentary titled “Religulous.” He seems to equate faith with religion and then attempts to make the point that faith is unreasonable. Ancient Greek philosophers taught that reason is the fabric of the universe and that there is a “logos spermatikos,” a seed of reason, in every human being which connects them to reality and the people around them. Words are vibrations in the atmosphere coded with reason which connect us in such a way that we no longer remain alone. “It’s not good that the adam should be alone,” said God. “Reason is the Way, the Truth, and the Life... the Light that enlightens all men (adam).” That statement may bother you, for people like Bill Maher, high school teachers, and perhaps even your pastor have told you that faith is unreasonable, and so reason is the enemy of faith. One night in high school, I locked myself in the bathroom and dropped to my knees, by the side of the tub, shaking. I was plagued by the idea that I could no longer believe in God. I felt chaos and the void. Then, without thinking, I prayed, “Jesus, I don’t think I can believe in you anymore.” Years later, I realized that I was speaking to the One that I said that I didn’t believe in, and ironically, I now consider that night to be the night of my conversion — the night that I truly began to seek because I earnestly wanted to find. Perhaps Bill Maher is confusing that which is reasonable with that which can be verified by the scientific method. Science is the study of what usually happens in a temporal string of cause and effect (It’s extremely useful; it’s how we nail things down.) But if you only believe what can be proved by the scientific method, you must necessarily NOT believe the scientific method, for the scientific method cannot be proved by the scientific method. People argue that there is no reason for faith, and thus it is unreasonable. And yet there are all sorts of things for which we can find no reason, especially not with the scientific method. They’re all around us. Here are a few: 1. Love... At least not real love or the logic of love: self-sacrifice.2. Beauty, what the Bible calls “the Good” or the “Glorious.” You can’t reason your way to Beauty.3. Light. For light, there can be no temporal reason, but perhaps it is the reason for temporality.4. Life. Darwin did not explain life, but death. Life is a communion of self-sacrifice.5. Persons, Consciousness, Spirit. Even physicists will tell you that matter doesn’t matter, but you, the observer, do. That’s the “I” that observes “me.”6. Existence. Not things in existence, but existence. Philosophers refer to God as the Uncaused Cause or Necessary Beingness (“ousias” in Greek). Yahweh’s name is “I Am that I Am.”7. Reason. There is no reason for Reason. How could there be? You can’t reason your way to reason; you can only arrive by faith — Faith in reason. People like Bill Maher have to have faith in reason just to argue that faith is unreasonable. I think the problem is not that they don’t have any faith but that it appears to be dead and only the size of a seed — something that would fit in their own head. I think Bill Maher has faith in his own ability to reason. In 1793, the French worshipped “reason”; and we now refer to that period as the “reign of terror.” But Bill Maher is right: It’s not just the religion of atheism in places like the Soviet Union that can be blamed for all the bloodshed in this world; it’s also the so-called “Christian” religion.” Maybe religion isn’t actually faith but a lack of faith or a small dead faith — faith in our own ability to reason our own way to The Reason. The Gospel of John wasn’t written in English but Greek, and the Greek word used by Greek philosophers to describe the concept of “reason” was “logos.” John 1:1, 8, “In the beginning was the Word [Logos: Reason] and the Logos was with God and the Logos was God... He was in the world and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.” “If you want to know what water is, don’t ask a fish . . .” unless that fish was caught by a fisherman and then thrown back into the sea. For then that fish would not only know about water, that fish would be madly in love with water. It would preach, “Everything is water! I love water!” Maybe we actually do swim in God, but in this world, we’re allowed to experience “not God.” Not love is alone. Not good is evil. Not light is dark. Not life is death. Not consciousness is unconsciousness. Not existence is the void. Not reason is chaos and insanity. Maybe Bill Maher isn’t an atheist (He’s not insane.) He believes in God, but he’s angry at God, for he feels forsaken by God: Love, Goodness, Light, Life, Spirit, I Am, and the Logos. I get that (“My God, my God, why . . . “), and so does God. What would keep us from experiencing God? Perhaps it’s the utterly irrational belief that each of us is our own creator. Jesus saves me from my sin, and my sin is thinking that I can take fruit from the tree and make myself “me.” It’s the religion of “me”…which can metastasize into the religion of “we.”Bill Maher isn’t the only one who worships his own reason. And it wasn’t “atheists” that crucified Jesus — it was the politicians and pastors. We can’t reason our way to Reason. But maybe Reason can plant Himself in each one of us and reason us all the way home. John 1:12, “But to all who took him (like fruit on a tree), he gave exousia (ek, “out of” and ousia “being,” a portion of being) to become children of God, those believing in his name (“God is Salvation”) who were born not of the will of the flesh nor the will of man, but of the will of God.” “The will of God” must be the Logos of Love, The Unreasonable Reason, somehow implanted in us like a seed (logos spermatikos). In the beginning, we each took fruit from the tree, and everything died. But there was Seed in that fruit, and the Seed does not stay dead. When we come back to the tree, we see that what we have taken has always been given; it’s the Logic of Love; it’s Grace. And so, we preach, “Everything is Grace; I love Grace, Relentless-Love, my Father.” Perhaps your Father doesn’t want to be known as the answer to your math problems. Perhaps He wants to be known as the deepest desire of your heart and, then, an ocean of Love. I read about an orphan boy who lived with his grandmother. One night the house caught fire. She died, but he lived, for an unknown man heard his cries from the second-floor window, climbed an iron drainpipe, put the little boy on his shoulders, and climbed back down that burning hot pipe. Weeks later, a public hearing was held to decide custody for the boy. A teacher stood up and said, “I’d like to adopt him; I can give him knowledge, friends, and adventures.” A banker also stood up. He said, “I’ve always wanted a son and don’t have one. I could give him more money than anyone in this town.” In the back of the room, without saying a word, a man stood up, walked to the front, slowly pulled his hands from his pockets, and showed them to the boy. People gasped when they saw the wounds, but the boy leapt into the man’s arms. He was home. When Jesus rose from the dead, He showed them His hands, and they believed (John 20:28). That’s not unreasonable; that’s faith — the “unreasonable reason” planted in each one of us and calling us home To sum up, to nail it down, I gathered posters of the seven unreasonable things as we reread our text (we had posted them all around the room). “In the beginning was the Word (#7) and the Word was with God (#6), and the Word was God. He (#5) was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life (#4), and the life was the light (#3) of men. The light shines (#2) in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it... But to all who took, He gave exousia to become children of God, those believing in His name, born not of the will of the flesh nor the will of man, but the will of God (#1: the Logic of Love) ...and the Word became flesh...” And we nailed Him to a tree. But before we took His life on the tree at the end of that day, He gave His life at supper, the beginning of that day — the day that we are made in the image of God. The life is in the blood, and we ingest the bread like a seed. It’s how each one of us grows up. God is all around you, but right now He’s showing you His hands.