craig ferguson, in his opening banter on his show, did a bit starting with pat robertson’s prediction of a terrorist attack in 2007, but moved on to other funny commentary on christianity, including a fascinating (at least i think), passionate few seconds of opinionating about faith and certainty not being able to co-exist.
(ht to bob carlton)
marko – i think that’s a bad link and that video sounds interesting
I didn’t get see link to work either…
But I did see Craig’s bit last night. “If you have certainty you don’t need faith. If you have faith, you don’t need certainty.”
Amazing to me how many folks seem to need certainty to have faith…
sorry – i’ll try to fix the link later today. i’m about to get on a plane, and don’t have access to it right now.
try this:
http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/2007/01/lake_of_fire.html
that was the best sermon i’ve heard in a long time!
first try did not work
my handy dictionary defines thus:
certain: fixed; agreed upon; settled
Origin: 1250–1300 *cert?nus, equiv. to L cert(us) sure, settled
faith: belief that is not based on proof
Origin: 1200–50 feid, feit of fidés trust, akin to f?dere to trust.
My own experience of following Jesus is unsettled & far from sure – but trust – ah, that is it.
Martin Luther described faith as, ” Faith is a living, bold trust in God’s grace, so certain of God’s favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it.”
Wikipedia.com describes faith as, “Faith is commonly known as a belief, trust or confidence often based on a transpersonal relationship with God, a higher power, elements of nature and/or a perception of the human race as a whole.”
What is remarkable about both of these definitions that it seems that faith requires or at the very least produces a certainty about someone or something.
One of my friends always talks about a holy dance that happens between law and grace. Perhaps we need to see this discussion of certainty, arrogance, faith, etc as more a theological dance than a doctrinal stance.
If you can’t see the video, it’s probably because you don’t have QuickTime loaded on your computer (Apple’s video player). Go here to download free (from the left column):
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/win.html