Reason, Faith and Pizza

Some say, “what’s true for you is not true for me.” This statement might work in the area of liking pizza. It is true that I might like pizza while my neighbor does not like pizza, but the pizza still exists none the less whether I like it or not. I can choose a thing but choosing against a thing does not make the thing disappear.

As I was taking my morning walk outside the other day, I began to think about the Christian worldview in relation to other worldviews. A true worldview should not have contradictions in daily life application, and should not have contradictions in the course of history regardless of custom and social changes.

Everyone has a worldview and at some point in life we all have to answer the questions about meaning, purpose, morality and truth. We have to ask ourselves, does my worldview give the answers to these questions or do I get contradictions?

Yes, Christianity is logical and rational and it answers all these questions clearly. I won’t go into answering those questions in this post, but if you are unclear about whether or not your worldview passes the test, by all means don’t put it off and push it away. It will never go away.

Have you ever had an experience where you heard something that you knew was true deep down but you really didn’t want it to be true or you rebelled against it because at the time you didn’t want to hear it? I have had several of these experiences in my life, and the times that I didn’t want to hear the truth was when I was on the defense, when I wanted to be right and I knew I was wrong. Grrrrrrrrrrr!! That really made me uncomfortable. Fighting the truth only made me feel worse, but when I accepted the truth, at first it was hard to make that first step, but then there was relief and peace when I finally accepted what I knew to be true. The fight was over.

While Christianity is logical and rational and we should test any belief system, we also aren’t meant to know every detail. We can’t stay in the testing phase. We have to get in the doing phase. We put our faith into things everyday. I don’t check out my car before I drive it every time, nor do I understand all that make it function. I just trust it will get me from point A to point B. Every time I sit in a chair, I don’t check out if it can hold me, I just sit in it. There are a million things we do every day without understanding and knowing every single detail and while I could try to find out all the details if I wanted to, I would be so focused on details that I would miss out on the big picture. I would miss life.  So it is with the things of God, I can’t completely break down every detail or understand every circumstance. God didn’t mean for us to know what we can’t know, but he does mean for us to know what we do know and what we do know we can either deny or accept. We can get so focused on all the little details even in the case of right doctrine that we miss God completely. I know what I need to know to trust my savior. Why don’t we just jump in the car, and let Jesus take the wheel. He will get us from point A to point B, no doubt, even if there might be some bumps and boulders, and there will be. We will be living life abundant every step of the way, whether we are ministering to someone, telling someone about God’s great love, cleaning house, going through a rough season or simply enjoying a pizza. We are meant to enjoy Him forever and what a joy it is when we accept the truth and start to trust!

Romans 1:19-20

since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.