FAITH AND REASON
By
D. M. PANTON, B.A.
Faith is a far-sighted calculation based on a Divine utterance.
Faith is opposed to sight,
faith is not opposed to reason: faith is reason based on the invisible as
vouched for by God. Faith sacrifices
visible evil, to win invisible good: it acts on concrete realities in the
unseen - just as actual, though not always so gross, as the things around us - which,
if really there, change the whole world-outlook, and revolutionise life. “Faith is the ASSURANCE [R.V.] of things hoped for, the CONVICTION [Govett]
of things not seen” (Heb.
11: 1). Full faith (the faith of
Hebrews Eleven) loads all its goods on one raft; it lodges its entire fortune
in a single bank; it stakes its all on one throw - because, in the mirror of
what God has said, it sees an empty Tomb backward, and the lightnings of a
descending Christ forward, and it shapes all life on these invisible, concrete,
overmastering realities. Faith barters
the infinitely little for the infinitely great. Faith is the highest reason functioning on
actual realities which it has never seen.*
[* It is obvious that if there be no actual, tangible,
reliable information from God on the unseen, no specific break in the eternal
silence, faith (as the infidel has always said) is a self-created illusion
which builds on a void, and ends in an abyss.
“Faith cometh by hearing,” not seeing, “and
hearing by the word of God” (Rom.
10: 17).]
REFUSING
Now in all the marvellous galaxy of
Hebrews Eleven none more sharply defines and enforces this reasoning element in
faith - this wise, deliberate, far-sighted decision - than Moses; and it opens
with probably the greatest renunciation recorded in the history of the world. For renunciation is measured by the value of
what a man renounces; and “by faith” - a whole-hearted
decision reposing on invisible facts – “Moses refused to
be called the son of Pharoah’s daughter” (Heb. 11: 24). Moses, if not heir to the Egyptian throne - as
Jewish tradition, embodied in Josephus,
says that he was - stood upon its steps, the throne of the wealthiest and most
powerful monarchy on the globe. He had
to renounce for his children also, who lost a palace, and perhaps a throne. Why then a renunciation so vast? Because evil is transitory, and righteousness
is permanent. To Pharoah,
dying, the pomp of the world was a dream: to Moses, it was a dream all his
life. For God is good, and goodness is the
foundation of the universe, the imperishable substance of immortality:
therefore the renunciation of evil is the highest reason; and therefore Moses
deliberately, and as a mature calculation - his full age is therefore noted - abandons
the prosperous and the wicked, and casts in his lot with the suffering and the
holy. He lived for the future, for the
future is sure, while the present is a vapour, a vanity, and can be a most
dangerous deception.
CHOOSING
The choice over against the refusal is also without precedent,
the scales on the other side being loaded with all from which the heart most
shrinks. “Choosing”
- deliberately selecting with wide-eyed choice – “rather
to be afflicted with the people of God” - that is, he cast in his lot
with Israel, not because they were blood-relations, but because they were God’s
people – “than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a
season.”
ACCOUNTING
A volume of instruction is packed away into the next logic of
Moses' balanced judgment. “Accounting”
- judging, as the word is elsewhere translated: coming to a conclusion on
mature consideration – “the reproach of Christ greater
riches than the treasures of
LOOKING
So now we reach
the intensity of Moses’ forward gaze. “He looked” - gazing off into the God-revealed future –
“unto the recompense” - the exactly adjusted
compensation for all righteous suffering, which God has made a law of the
universe – “of reward.” Moses
gave up a crown for a crown; but the throne of an
ENDURING
Finally, the [Holy] Spirit is careful to record that Moses’ choice by
faith proved the backbone, the skeleton of steel, of his life. “For he endured” - the word means strength, power,
courage; he remained resolute, immovable, undaunted – “as
seeing him who is invisible.” All
life thus becomes a steady waiting for a certain glory. For it is not stupidity, or obstinacy, or
pigheadedness, or illusion: it is a vision of God based on the Scriptures of
God. It is the philosophy of all
martyrdom: as, in the hand of the statue to Gaspard de Coligny, in Paris, lies an open
Bible, and on the page exposed are the words- “He
endured as seeing Him who is invisible.” An identical principle ruled our Lord. “I have set the Lord
always before me: because he is at my right hand” - God holding me, God
teaching me, God loving me, God bracing me – “I shall not
be moved” (Ps. 16: 8). It is a constant Godward gaze which creates
immobility of character. Moses looked through Egypt, and he saw Hell: he looked through the palace, and he saw the “crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous judge,
will give in that day”: he
looked through the
Wilderness, and he saw the Mount of Transfiguration: he looked through life and death, and he saw a Great
White Throne, from which the earth and the heavens flee away. So faith can be infinite in its reach and
power, for its eyes can be full of God; and thus refusing, choosing,
accounting, looking, enduring, seeing, Moses alights, fifteen centuries later,
on the Transfigured Mount.
-------