What you want is an unpractical man.   That is what people always want in the last resort and the worst conditions. 

                                           — G. K. Chesterton, The Poet and the Lunatics

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Does “faith” have practical benefits?

We’ve all heard this claim many times before.  In the past, it emanated primarily from the “religious” community, where it appeared under the guise of “positive thinking,” “possibility thinking,” and “the health and wealth gospel.”  More recently it’s been championed in less likely quarters:  among sociologists, psychologists, and even medical doctors.

“Results from several studies,” reports the University of Maryland Medical Center, “indicate that people with strong religious and spiritual beliefs heal faster from surgery, are less anxious and depressed, have lower blood pressure, and cope better with chronic illnesses such as arthritis, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and spinal cord injury.”[i]

Jonathan Ewald, writing in Life + Health, assures us that “faith” has a far-reaching, deep impact upon more than our spiritual condition:  “It also affects our physical, mental, and social well-being.”  Ewald even goes so far as to say that “being part of a faith-based community is an important piece of the longevity puzzle.”  The moral of the story?  “If you have never done so before, consider submitting your life to God.  By exercising faith, our lives can be more fulfilled, balanced, and peaceful than before.”[ii]

This is not the Pilgrim perspective.

The Pilgrim is not accustomed to speak in terms of possessing “a faith.”  He is not interested in becoming part of a “faith-based community” as a way of securing prosperity or longevity, nor does he submit his life to God with an eye to what he can get out of it.  For him, “faith” is simply a question of total allegiance to a Person.  It’s all about attaching himself to and following the Master of his soul.  And this, he knows, is often an extremely impractical thing to do.  As history clearly demonstrates, this kind of “faith” does not always bring balance, peace, wealth, or temporal fulfillment.  Sometimes it leads to misunderstanding, rejection, defeat, and death.  In the eyes of the practical men of this world, it can look very much like an unforgiveable piece of pure folly.

There are several different words in the Old Testament that get translated into modern English as “faith,” “confidence,” or “hope.”  One of them is chislah, a noun is derived from a verbal root that means “to be foolish.”  In Psalm 78:7, the Hebrew poet wants the Children of Israel to “set their hope (chislah) in God;” but a few Psalms later (85:8 – verse 9 in the Hebrew text), the same word is used to express the idea that the Lord will “not let His people turn back to folly.”  Similarly, in Job 4:6, Eliphaz the Temanite accuses Job of placing false confidence (chislah) in his own integrity.

What’s the connection here?  Simply this:  there is a fine line – or perhaps no line at all – between faith and folly.  Indeed, in the eyes of the kosmos the two are frequently indistinguishable.  To pick up one’s cross and follow the Lord of Pilgrims wherever He may lead is not necessarily the best way to “get things done,” to “come out on top,” or to “make America great again.”  Just ask those heroes of “the faith” who were mocked, scorned, tortured, imprisoned, stoned, sawn in half, and slain with the sword for their troubles.

All this is just another way of saying that the Pilgrim life can be extremely impractical.  It’s not about doing what works (a good definition of politics).  On the contrary, it’s about doing what’s good and right – even if it doesn’t turn out so well for you in the end.

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[i] “Spirituality,” University of Maryland Medical Center.

[ii] Jonathan Ewald, “The Important Relationship Between Faith and Longevity,” Life + Health, December 6, 2012.

              “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”  

         — Variously attributed to Alexander Hamilton, Peter Marshall,                                       Gordon A. Eadie, et al.

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For reasons that desperately need to be explained at greater length, cynics and skeptics have been given a bad name in the church and most “religious” circles.  This is a great tragedy.

Our word skepticism is derived from the Greek skeptomai, “to look at, check out, put to the test.”  The skeptic is a person who doesn’t take things at face value.  He subjects everything to a rigorous examination, searching for the substance that lies beneath the surface.  He adheres to the highest possible standards of good and bad, real and unreal, and he accepts only those assumptions and assertions that are solid enough to pass the test.

The true Pilgrim is an indefatigable skeptic – perhaps the only real skeptic left in the modern world.  He knows that gullibility is no asset to those who travel the road beyond the Wicket Gate, for it is a road lined on either side with persuasive counterfeits and attractive shams.  He remembers the word of warning given to all who dare set foot upon this path –

                                               Upon a world vain, toylsom, foul

                                                A journey now ye enter;

                                               The welfare of your living soul

                                                Ye dangerously adventure

 – and, accordingly, he arms himself with the shield of suspended belief.  This is just another way of saying that he equips himself with genuine faith.

Nathanael, one of the first followers of the Original Pilgrim, was a skeptic to the core.  When his friend Philip came to him and said, “We’ve found the Messiah, and he comes from Nazareth,” Nathanael responded by asking, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”  Nowadays he’d be labeled a “downer,” a “defeatist,” a “rotter,” or a “negative thinker.”  His sarcasm would be condemned as hurtful, insensitive, and “bigoted.”  But Christ called him “an Israelite in whom is no deceit.”  Nathanael was honest and transparent, but he was something else as well:  he was intent upon finding the Real Thing and determined to settle for nothing less.

True skeptics are an endangered species.  That’s because you can’t have real skepticism where no one cares about Truth.  Under such conditions, all you get is a lot of pretentious, mushy, and insincere “tolerance” for “beliefs” that don’t mean anything to anybody anyway because everyone assumes that they’re all equally imaginary and irrelevant.  People who are convinced that the Real Thing doesn’t exist have no need to defend themselves against counterfeits.  They’re as happy as clams with or without them.  The skeptic, on the other hand, is on a quest, and he can never be satisfied until it is achieved.  If he ever gets to the place where truth-claims no longer matter, he will find himself out of a job.

The Pilgrim, then, is a genuine skeptic for the simple reason that he still believes in Truth.  It’s precisely because he cherishes the Real Thing so deeply and intently that he remains so resistant, critical, iconoclastic, and “intolerant” in his response to all substitutes, replacements, impostors and phonies.  Like Peter, when asked if he is on the verge of turning away from his Master, he can only say, “Lord, where else can I go?  You alone have the words of eternal life.”  Having seen the glory of the One and Only, he cannot and will not brook the claims of any other.