Article June 5, 2017 Issue

Faith, love, and radical reliance

Edwina Aubin

The Bible is full of instances where individuals, in the face of seemingly impossible odds, have stood firm in their faith in God and been delivered. Chapter 11 of Hebrews provides a list of many Old Testament examples. These luminaries placed their complete reliance on God, rather than believing whatever problem confronting them was supreme and had power to overcome them. They relied on something unseen by the material senses; it was a faith founded on an understanding that God is Spirit and that true substance is spiritual, not material.

Hebrews 11:1 describes faith as “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” The “substance” and “evidence” referred to surely must relate to and be of God, Spirit. The evidence of Spirit is not seen by the material senses, but it is seen by spiritual sense. Faith therefore must be grounded in a deep conviction that life is spiritual, not material. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy writes: “Faith, if it be mere belief, is as a pendulum swinging between nothing and something, having no fixity. Faith, advanced to spiritual understanding, is the evidence gained from Spirit, which rebukes sin of every kind and establishes the claims of God” (p. 23).

Loving God supremely means placing no trust in anything other than the one God.