Trust in Christ
The natural world is made up of patterns and laws, which make all of the sciences possible. There is intelligibility and consistency written into the very fabric of creation. This is why we can plan trips to the moon, and even to Mars, and why it is not unreasonable to fly in an airplane.
Even common life depends on our being able to trust civil laws and principles. This is what enables us to go on green and to take Tylenol without having to give some to a rat first. It is reasonable to trust certain things.
These natural laws and patterns and principles are like little promises that give us a certain level of confidence that life, while neither programmed nor random, is not without some inherent order, even a sense of both origin and direction.
But what about our spiritual life? Can we trust God in the same way? Has God ever promised us anything? Of course, He has. And those promises give birth to our hope. They are its foundation. The virtue of Hope, after all, may be defined as “looking forward to the fulfillment of a promise.”
Consider how God’s covenants with us are like promises. First, with man, God made our hearts to desire “forever.” It is the first installment of a kind of promise. Then with Noah, never again to destroy the earth by water. To Abraham, the promise of becoming a blessing to the nations. To Moses, that his people would become a nation in a land literally called, “Promised.” To David, an everlasting kingdom. And then to mankind again, this time through Jesus, a New and Eternal Covenant.
He was welcomed into the world by the one who was promised, “The Holy Spirit will overshadow you,” and who rejoiced before her cousin Elizabeth with the words, “God has remembered His promise of mercy! The promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children forever!” Even the child in Elizabeth’s womb would grow up to announce Him by another promise, “One is coming after me Who will baptize you with the Holy Spirit!” Promise after promise, all down the years.
And Jesus brought still more promises! Some were fulfilled during His ministry. “Go, your servant will be well,” and, “Open the mouth of the first fish you pull up; you will find a shekel,” which was like His, “Go into the village; you will find a donkey. Untie it and bring it here.” And some were fulfilled shortly after His ministry, like, “I will make you fishers of men,” and “The Father will send you the Holy Spirit.”
But the promises He makes that are yet to be fulfilled, these are “the stuff” of our Hope. “Whoever eats this bread will live forever,” and “Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God,” and “I will be with you always, even until the end of time.” We still need to trust Him, but my point here is that it is no more irrational to trust Christ’s promises than it is to proceed through an intersection when the light turns green. +