Faith From the Very Beginning

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” – Genesis 1:1

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From its very outset, the Bible requires faith from anyone who would seriously interact with it. The creation event is beyond science; it cannot be duplicated, studied, or observed. It cannot be reenacted. The very first statement of the Word of God is one which every person must either take on faith or ultimately reject.

God told His people through the prophet Habakkuk that “the righteous shall live by faith,” (Habakkuk 2:4). That exact statement would later be quoted in the New Testament to Christian audiences in Europe (Romans 1:17), Asia (Galatians 3:11) and, ostensibly, Israel (Hebrews 10:38). Without faith, we are told, it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6).

Faith is both the prerequisite for Christian belief as well as its sustaining force. We walk by faith, not by sight (II Corinthians 5:7), fixing our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen (II Corinthians 4:18).

God may graciously provide evidence (and certainly has) of His existence, but it will never come in a way that negates the necessity for faith in the life of His children. Faith is the active, deliberate placing of one’s trust in the hands of God – it is the drawing of a line and the refusal to cross back over it, the conscious conformity of one’s entire purpose and meaning in life to something you cannot conclusively prove.

You cannot prove the existence of God, but your faith in Him absolutely proves that you love and believe Him.

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