I Believe in Order to Understand

St. Augustine, the Bishop of Hippo, said, “I believe in order to understand” (credo ut intelligam) and centuries later, St. Anselm of Canterbury, echoed his statement in similar fashion: “I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand.” These great Christian thinkers understood the proper use of reason must be preceded by faith in the proper object.  Not faith in ourselves or science, but faith in God, specifically in His revelation of Himself in His Son Jesus Christ.

Their statements echo the words of the writer of Hebrews when he said “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” (Hebrews 11:3 – NIV)

Our understanding of the world is driven to a large degree on how we understand ourselves.  If we believe we are the accidental result of a blind and uncaring natural process, then we will view the world through those lenses.  If, on the other hand, we believe that we were purposefully created by a Greater Power, then the lenses we look through become significantly different as does our view of the world.

As Christians, we believe this Greater Power is the God of the Bible who created us in His own image.  We also believe that we can come to understand both ourselves and Him through His revelation of Himself in His Son.  In Jesus, the transcendent God intersected with humanity in a way that gives us an understanding of who God is and how we were made to be.  In other words, in Jesus we see both God and man and by believing, we are given the ability to understand as much as our finite minds and rebellious souls can handle.

Not everyone can accept this.  Many modern skeptics see the Christian faith as a fool’s errand.  Oddly enough, while many say they do not believe in God strictly because there is no evidence of His existence, they operate on the same “believe to understand” principle.  They simply place their faith in their own ability to reason instead of in a loving God.  They place their faith in Charles Darwin and we place ours in Jesus Christ.

Steve Jernigan