THE GREATEST OBSTACLE TO FAITH

 Hebrews 11:6

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

                 I have been reading Tim Keller’s book, Making Sense of God. It is a masterful response to the prevailing attitude in our society that belief in God is irrelevant. As I have been reading, I was struck with the reality that many people today have bought into the idea that they have the right to determine their own course in life. We have raised the autonomy of the individual to the highest level. Each person has the right to determine for themselves what is right and wrong. Each person has the right to set their own standards for how they conduct their life. No one has the right to tell another person what to do or how they should live. As a society, we have drunk deeply of the cup of selfishness and self-centeredness. We call it self-esteem, and guard it tenaciously.

                In light of this overwhelming acceptance of our autonomy, many people have outright rejected the idea of God. God can only get in the way of a person’s freedom to live life as they wish. So, instead of dealing with the idea that there might be an authority greater than ourselves, we jettison the idea of God as uninformed, prosaic, and outdated. People in ancient times may have needed the idea of a god to give them purpose and direction in life, but we have progressed beyond that. We are better informed about our world and better equipped to face life on our own. We have the right to stand on our own two feet and determine the course of our lives for ourselves.

                This “new” autonomy is the greatest obstacle to faith. I put “new” in quotes because it isn’t really new at all. The sin of Adam and Eve in the garden was the sin of striving for autonomy. If they ate of the tree of good and evil, then they would be like God and would not need Him anymore. I don’t think they really understood that that was what they were seeking, but that was the outcome. They didn’t realize what they were sacrificing to “stand on their own two feet.” The consequences of their decision were no at all what they desired.

                People today are still seeking autonomy; the right to be the master of their ship. They don’t want anyone else telling them what they can and cannot do. At first, this approach to life does seem freeing, but the consequences are almost always not what the person was looking for.

                Several years ago, I read a biography of Ty Cobb, one of the greatest baseball players of all time. When he was a young man, his father told him that he would not amount to anything. He spent his entire life trying to prove his father wrong. As a baseball player and as a person he was ruthless, striving, and unrelenting. He accomplished greatness as a baseball player, although his father didn’t live long enough to see it. He gained financial success. But his life was empty. Near the end of his life, he was asked what he would do differently if he could go back and start again. His response was telling. “I would have friends.” He was the master of his ship. He set his own course in life. And in the end, he came up very short of his goal. Instead of being fulfilled, he was empty.

                We all face the challenge of wanting to be autonomous. We all desire to set our own course and make our own decisions. Within boundaries, this is not bad, but if we stray beyond the boundaries that God has set for us, the consequences will be less than satisfying. Our desire of autonomy is the greatest obstacle to genuine faith. As long as we insist on sitting on the throne of our life, we will struggle with our faith in God.

                The first step to genuine faith is giving up our autonomy. Jesus made it very clear.

Luke 9:23-25

Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?

                 But rather than losing our freedom, we gain a more fulfilling kind of freedom; a freedom without regrets. Jesus didn’t come to make our life difficult and a drudgery. He came to fulfill our life; to give is the abundant life. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. (John 10:10) When we acknowledge God, through faith in Jesus Christ, we enter into a whole new life; a life that lasts for an eternity.

                As Tim Keller points out, all freedom has boundaries. When we live within those boundaries, we experience the joy and delight of our freedom. When we move beyond those boundaries, we actually forfeit our freedom. God has set the ultimate boundaries for life. If we will submit to those boundaries, we will discover amazing joy. If we refuse to submit to those boundaries, we may experience some temporary pleasure, but we will also face some unpleasant consequences.

John 3:16-19

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.”