The private sphere of faith...

A statement, and the pages leading up to and beyond it in Surprised by Hope by N. T. Wright, challenged me this morning. The statement is "... many people still today assume that faith lives in a private sphere, shutting itself off from history lest history make unwelcome inroads." (page 69 in the hardcover edition)

Previous to this statement, Wright is making a point that the resurrection cannot be explained within our framework of conventional wisdom. Our right (rational) brains don't process this concept because it has never happened before, it isn't something anything we even remotely expect, and we can't repeat it in a laboratory. By examples and words, Wright makes the case that believing the resurrection, this totally unscientific event, changes our entire worldview.

That's the point that caught my attention and challenged me this morning. How can we keep our faith in a private sphere if our entire worldview has been changed?

Our faith changes us absolutely, even if we don't admit to others that we're believers. We are never the same again. We can't be.

Having faith (belief) that Jesus "died, was buried, ... rose from the dead, ... ascended into heaven" means we can no longer say, for example, that we are moral because that's the right thing to be. We are now (or attempt to be) moral because there's an important (permanent) witness to all we say, do, or think. We believe in "God, the father almighty, maker of heaven and earth...," and that God knows all and holds us accountable. (Some might say we're not accountable because we're "redeemed," but if you think about it, the fact that we need redemption means that we've been held accountable -- and guilty.)

During the last several elections, there has been much talk about faith and whether the candidates are "people of faith." I remember being outraged 4 years ago when participants on a 60-Minutes segment made what I believed was an unhealthy, un-Christian comparison between members of the two major political parties.

All that aside, though, the lesson for me this morning is simply this:

• The way I choose to live my life is fundamentally based on what I believe. I don't know if I'd want to be ethical or moral if I didn't believe in a supreme being who is named, who is all seeing, knowing, and powerful, and who holds me accountable.
• I believe Jesus and all he taught. I believe he was man and at the same time God, and all he said and did showed me how God wants me to live and to think.
• Even if I want to keep my faith in a private sphere, I don't know that it's possible. To think that my faith is private is just fooling myself.
• Therefore, I might as well admit it. Why do I ...? (Fill in the blank.) The answer is: Because I believe.

There is nothing truly private. Our very lives are telling. Others can read us much more than we think they can. For those of us who are believers, we can only pray that the message we're sending with our lives is the one we want to send, the one we believe God wants us to send.