How do we believe in Jesus?

In the gospel of John, chapter 7, the issue of belief in Jesus appears three times. The first is in reference to Jesus’ brothers, who think he needs to do some serious self-promotion:

So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples also may see the works you are doing; for no one who wants to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” (For not even his brothers believed in him.) (7:3-5)

The second refers to the crowds who concluded that Jesus must be the Messiah, regardless of the religious leaders’ antagonism toward him:

Yet many in the crowd believed in him and were saying, “When the Messiah comes, will he do more signs than this man has done?” (7:31)

The last comment about belief comes directly from Jesus, who stands up and makes an impassioned plea to the crowds on the final day of the festival:

“Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink.” (7:37b-38)

When we speak of belief in Jesus today, we are usually talking about belief in the historicity of Jesus, his virgin birth, the atonement, the resurrection, and so on. We can wrap our beliefs in various creeds and theologies, and pledge allegiance to them and say that we are Christians.

But what was it that the people in John 7 were expected to believe in? It doesn’t appear that the virgin birth was a point of discussion, and there was not yet a death, resurrection, or ascension to believe in. There were no New Testament texts of Scripture to claim as authoritative and the creeds were yet to be written. They weren’t asked to believe in Jesus as though he was Casper the Friendly Ghost, because he was right there in the flesh. So, what did belief look like for those people?

Somewhere in his writings I seem to remember N. T. Wright talking about what it might have meant in the first century CE to believe in someone. He cites a document written by Josephus who asks that people believe in him—that is, to believe that what he was saying was true and must be heeded.

That makes sense for the people of John 7, since Jesus was standing right there among them, speaking and acting. But I wonder if his call for people to believe in him goes even a bit further than just embracing the veracity of his words.

In the New Testament, the Greek word that is typically translated as belief is pistis, a word that is a sort of noun-verb mixture and able to convey a whole assortment of ideas, including faith, loyalty, fidelity, and—very importantly, I think—trust. With our western brains we seem to be most comfortable with the translation belief because we like to keep ideas and concepts confined to our brains where they belong. But those early witnesses to Jesus would not suffer such limitations. For them to believe in Jesus was not to have a grasp of an orthodox Christian belief system. It was to trust in a real person, to trust that his words were true, that his miraculous works came from the hand of God and were signs of God’s kingdom that was on its way.

This is, I think, an important distinction. Belief has the ability to remain abstract and propositional. Trust, however, is relational. Trust comes from a shared experience of reliability and faithfulness. For those ancient people to believe in Jesus was to trust in him as a person, someone real they could touch and experience just as real people do. They would have to trust in him before there would be the benefit (or, in some cases, the distraction) of theological interpretation and creedal affirmations.

There are some folks wandering around who still think that believing in Jesus is to trust him as one who is still present and at work in the world. Sure, we get fuzzy at times about how in the world this whole idea of the Trinity works out—whether it is the Father, the Spirit, or the Son at work—but these people care less about that kind of theological clarity and more about the real presence of the real Jesus.

I think we all have something to learn from those folks. I’ve been with people who will fight to the death over a point of theology, and even break relationship over such disagreements (it’s a core Protestant value, it seems. Luther and Zwingli parted company over the nature of the Eucharist even though they agreed on most everything else). But what would we do if we were standing near Jesus when he healed the sick, or raised the dead, or cast out a mob of demons? If he then turned to us and claimed that the kingdom of God was at hand, would we trust that he was being truthful with us?

Would we trust him?

Certainty is Overrated

We who follow Jesus believe we have come to know some things about God. We have ancient creeds, like the Apostles’ Creed (my personal favorite), that we recite over and over, reminding us what we have come to believe and affirm about God. The declarations in that creed are derived from scripture, and we trust the witness of those texts to be true and right.

Some of our perceived certainties, however, can be detrimental to us. It’s too easy for us to grasp our beliefs in things (religious, political, economic, and so on) and lock ourselves into ideologies that we crash ourselves and others against. Sure, we come to believe particular things and then orient our lives around those beliefs (I believe in the authority and veracity of scripture, so I take it seriously; I believe in the pursuit of physical health, so I avoid junk food, except for potato chips; I believe in the power of gravity, so I avoid high places with no guard rail).

But when it comes to God, we have to think through our certainties.

I believe that God created the heavens and the earth, but I didn’t see him do it.

I believe in the real, historic person of Jesus, but I’ve never seen him with my own eyes.

I believe that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, that he suffered, died, and rose from death, and that he ascended to the Father. But I didn’t witness any of that taking place.

I can’t claim certainty about any of these declarations in the way that I can be certain about things I saw happen yesterday. In some ways, when it comes to historic Christian faith, certainty—in terms of quantifiable, measurable, verifiable evidence—eludes us.

But we have confidence.

The claim to certainty can be a dangerous thing when it comes to God. Once I have my certainties nailed down and the walls of defense securely erected, I can come to the conclusion that I now have all that I need as a person of faith. Once I’ve got my certainties about the way that scripture is authoritative, how the Atonement is explained, how the Reformation is as infallible as the Pope, and so on, then I might believe that I have become religiously self-sufficient. Once my certainties are locked down, I might not even need God.

Certainties can be abstract and propositional. Certainties make dangerous idols.

Confidence, on the other hand, is related to trust. Once we trust God, we find ourselves mysteriously connected to him. We find that something changes within us, as though our eyes are opened for the first time to what is real. We come to see Jesus as the very image of God, and we trust the witness of scripture, the faithfulness of the church (with all its wrinkles), and the experience within ourselves that God is present to us.

Certainty runs the risk of creating a concretized religion.

Confidence is grounded in trust, and trust in God is relational.

Confidence trumps certainty.

Of this I am certain.

A Lenten Reflection for March 19, 2013

The man answered, “Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.” They answered him, “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?” And they drove him out.

Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” He answered, “And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.” Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.” He said, “Lord, I believe.” And he worshiped him. (John 9:30-38)


It’s fun to read the story of the man born blind. After Jesus heals him, the Pharisees are enraged and want an accounting. The man gives them the facts, but they’re not satisfied.

So he lectures them. And they hate it.

After all, they’re the smart, holy guys and he’s the man who was, probably to them, an uneducated object of God’s wrath. That’s why he was born blind. He was afflicted because of some past generational shenanigan and God decided that someone—how about a newborn baby?—had to pay. How awesome.

I love it that the tables got turned on the Pharisees, but there’s something tragic to the story as well. The man has been, for his entire life, living at the margins of society. Now that he can see for the first time, he has to adjust to a sighted life and find a way to integrate in his context. He’ll need to develop some skills so that he can work. He’ll need to learn how to socialize like his neighbors. And he’ll need to learn how to worship with his community.

Except now, the Pharisees have driven him out. They’ve cut up his synagogue membership card.

How troubling this would be for the man. He could only believe that God had a hand in his healing, a healing that came through that wandering street preacher named Jesus. Having been restored to full humanity by the God he thought had forgotten him, he is now banished by the local religious elite. It doesn’t make sense.

But after the expulsion, Jesus took him in. He invited him into the embrace of faith and the man fell into Jesus’ arms. The Pharisees showed the man the face of the God they preferred—a God to which they felt they had aspired, one that kept his circle of acceptance tight and bounded. Jesus, however, showed the man the real face of God—it was a generous face of love, of healing, of initiated trust.

The man may have been born blind, but he seemed to recognize the real thing when he saw it.

A Lenten Reflection for February 25, 2013

Be gracious to me, O God, for people trample on me; all day long foes oppress me;
my enemies trample on me all day long, for many fight against me. O Most High,
when I am afraid, I put my trust in you.
In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I am not afraid; what can flesh do to me? (Psalm 56:1-4)


Fear is a powerful force. It can cause a person to seek protection, to react in anger, or to run screaming in terror. Fear is not a neutral emotion—it seeks resolution.

So, when I am afraid, I can put my trust in any number of places:

I can trust my political party to defeat all others and preserve what I hold dear.

I can trust my preferred legislators so that the things I own for the sake of protection will never be ripped from my hands (unless they are cold and dead).

I can trust my religious leaders to identify my doctrinal enemies and remind me that heresy is defined as suggesting an idea that I don’t already know.

I can trust my belief system and nail it to my door so that I can measure myself against my enemies of the faith.

I can trust my employer to care for me from the cradle to the grave.

I can trust my government to do the same.

I can trust my army to overpower all others.

I can trust my wise investment strategies to preserve the life to which I am accustomed, even when the enemies of finance rape and pillage the economy.

And then, in the midst of attackers brandishing swords, spears, and arrows, the Psalmist shatters my ill-placed trusts and calls me to a place that is vulnerable and yet free from fear:

In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I am not afraid; what can flesh do to me?