The “Facts” about Faith

What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of Life—   1 John 1:1  NASB

Heard/ seen/ touched – Don’t you just love John?  He’s so down to earth.  None of that mystical gibberish that we find in Paul (so confusing).  John’s just straight up, here’s the deal, first-hand witness stuff.  What we heard, what we saw, what we touched—just the sensory evidence, please.  He would have been great on the witness stand.  “I saw this, I heard that, I touched it.”  Oh, there’s that first phrase—“what was from the beginning”—a kind of mystical something, but it’s quickly forgotten when John goes forward with the touchy-feely stuff.  Hard to say what he had in mind there, especially with the closer, ”Word of Life.”  But, hey, he might have just been carried away a bit with all the Jewish mysticism swirling around in the first century.  What we know for sure is that he has the facts.  He heard it, he saw it, he touched it.  Or rather “him.”  John knows the Messiah is real because he was in his company for a long time.  What’s amazing, centuries later, is how unimportant this empirical evidence seems to be.  Consider the insight of Harold Brown:

While Buddhism and Islam are based primarily on the teaching of the Buddha and Mohammed, respectively, Christianity is based primarily on the person of Christ.  Christianity is not belief in the teachings of Jesus, but what is taught about him . . .  The appeal . . . to believe as Jesus believed, rather than to believe in Jesus, is a dramatic transformation of the fundamental nature of Christianity.[1]

 Keagan Chandler comments:

The incredible truth [that the affirmation of the Trinity is fundamental to salvation] is that this is only possible because popular Christianity is acutely disinterested in the words of Jesus.  Trinitarian sources have comfortably acknowledged the fact that, despite hailing him as the central figure and founder of the faith, developed Christianity ‘centers not in the teaching of Jesus’ but in other’s words about him.  The Christian religion stands alone in this strange practice:[2]

Maybe that’s why most Christians think the “good news” begins with the gospel of John.  They want that great mystical magic at the beginning, you know, “the Word was with God” stuff, but then they quickly leave all that to the theologians and run to all the stories about Jesus.  That’s what’s comforting.  All I really need to believe is that he lived and died and rose from the dead.  Just give me “Evidence that Demands a Verdict” and that’s enough for me.  How does the creed go?  Oh, yes, “I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.  I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary” etc.  To believe in.  To believe the facts about the existence of God and His Son.  That’s enough.  Not like the Jews who somehow accept the teachings of Moses and are far less concerned with the existence of Moses.  It’s so much easier to just put a check mark by the statement, “Do you believe in Jesus Christ who died on the cross to save you?”  And since Christianity discarded Torah along the way, exactly how the belief in the existence of “His Son” affects living is sort of left up to you.  Perhaps that’s why Christianity is so accommodating while Judaism isn’t.  Anyway, let’s not talk about that.  It’s too upsetting.  Just let me put a check mark in the box and get to heaven.

Topical Index: facts, believe in, Harold Brown, Kegan Chandler, 1 John 1:1

[1] Kegan A. Chandler, The God of Jesus in light of Christian Dogma, pp. 248-249, citing Harold Brown, Heresies, p. 13.

[2] Kegan A. Chandler, The God of Jesus in light of Christian Dogma, pp. 248-249.