Even By Study, And Also By Faith

In my daily meditation about life and meaning, as I have prayed for greater understanding about what is True, I have felt strongly that approaching Truth is always a process of building knowledge on a foundation of faith.  I have also felt that one of the dangers to learning Truth is attempting to build faith on a foundation of perceived knowledge (to need to KNOW before I believe).  This is dangerous for at least three reasons:

1)      I learn to trust myself rather than God assuming my eyes are more honest than His Spirit.

2)      What I “know” is relative based on my prior experience and how I apply what I have learned. 

3)      My truth is based on current knowledge, which means anything new I learn will necessarily rock my faith. 

Taking these separately and in more detail, faith by definition is a belief in things that are not seen but are True; faith is “evidence” of Truth (Hebrews 11:1).  I know a Truth by a spiritual witness rather than a physical one so that I am required to act by spiritual witness rather than physical knowledge—this is how I learn to trust God.  Most memorable stories in the Bible outline situations where the physical knowledge makes the spiritual test seem impossible for this very reason.  So faith precedes True knowledge by design.   

Second, building my faith on knowledge would only be possible if that knowledge was in fact Truth.  Unfortunately, the relativity inherent in the application of temporal learning makes it “my truth”, which by definition is different than “your truth” and therefore cannot be universal Truth.  This means my knowledge can never be the foundation for real faith since perfect knowledge, at this stage of my existence, belongs only to God (Ephesians 4:13; Job 37:16).  

Finally, it is too often that I hear someone say they “no longer believe” in the Restored Gospel or even in God because they learned “this thing” or “that thing”, which was in some way contrary to what the individual thought they “knew”.  Since "knowledge" changes and expands even in the process of normal spiritual learning, there is no way for perceived knowledge to serve as a firm foundation.  Instead, knowledge must be based on faith in Him who has “no variableness, neither shadow of changing” (James 1:17).  Truly God’s Truth will never stand up to our own (Isaiah 55:9). 

When I understand that knowledge is a process, built on faith, that is gained “precept upon precept; line upon line…here a little, and there a little” (Isaiah 28:10), I begin to participate in the process of True learning.  I can then learn Truth through the witness of the Spirit, which is the true litmus test of Godliness.  In this way I have a foundation that will never move and will never fail.  I am grateful therefore, to know little and believe much through the light of faith.