Gravity is absorption, expansion, swelling, acquisition; it is emptiness seeking to be filled. This is the natural course of things, in the spiritual world as in the physical. In our human nature, we seek to pull toward ourselves all that we can—possessions, food, praise or recognition, other people. And we are in competition to gather the most mass, always gauging our progress by the size of those around us.

Some will collect as much of one type of thing as they can, such as wealth or experiences, while others will try for a little of everything in the name of being well-rounded. And there are a number of curious cases, as one with an eating disorder may push away food, but only to make room for the love that she believes she will get from being thin. All gravity.

But grace is the exception to all of this. It is an unnatural force: one from fairy tales, which would have us clinging to the grass as a ceiling or to a tree as a chandelier, in order to keep from tumbling upward, and from being pulled away from this world and its unfulfilling way of living.

Gravity is “I”, or self. Grace is “you”. It’s the force that causes me to push away from myself for the good of others. To shrink in size against the inclination to accumulate; to decrease, in order that He may increase. To humble myself, to quietly withdraw my name as a contender in the game played by the world, which is won or lost depending on so many worthless accomplishments.

The core of the earth is molten. Every action of mine which resists gravity contributes to this: ascending stairs or jumping, of course—but even standing, sitting, or really, doing anything else but falling. The energy from the resistance is transferred to the center of the earth, where it becomes heat, and the earth rages inwardly for my defiance of it.

So it is with spiritual gravity. Grace is a willful vacuum, and nature abhors it for that reason. It’s easier to give in and play the game, but we’ll set our minds on things above, where our sights will be higher and our goals loftier. May the earth burn up for our resistance to its gravity, and may we build our foundations solidly so that they will survive when that day comes.

If I doubted my faith, it wouldn’t be due to scientific evidence or philosophical reasoning. The most compelling arguments against my faith are the practical ones, the arguments based on things that can be observed rather than those that can be reasoned.

Christianity is a last resort for desperate people. Most high-profile conversions, like Brian Welch from Korn a few years ago, are due to a person reaching the end of his rope. Alcoholics Anonymous uses a belief in God as a starting point for overcoming an addiction. And many who are terminally ill will turn to religion for the few months they have left. People use the idea of God as a psychological crutch because they are weak and they need something to help them cope with the darker side of life.

Christianity is not rational. It is an unnecessary cure for a fabricated disease. Sin can easily be explained in purely natural terms as our survival instinct. Animals are greedy, promiscuous and even murderous, and we don’t call it sin. We don’t really need to be “saved” from anything – we just need to abandon the concept of sin and quit feeling bad about what we do.

The Bible isn’t very distinctive from a literary standpoint. In the Old Testament, the poetry is often dull, the prophecies incoherent, and the narrative awkward. Parts of it are wonderful, but maybe 75% of it is skippable. If God wrote a book, couldn’t he have done a better job?

The Christian view of the world is too narrow. Christians set up camp on a hill overlooking a valley; the intellectual elite—scholars, leaders and artists—are always climbing higher up the mountain, and from that vantage point they can see that there is much more to the world than that valley. To them, the Christian worldview is something to be passed through, not stopped at. In other words: those who are inside the box of religion are afraid to go outside, but those who make it outside never want to go back in.

How do I answer these objections? The poem in Philippians 2 is the key to everything:

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
    taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    and became obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

If our faith isn’t always rational, consider that it wasn’t rational for the Creator of the universe to die for his creations.

If our faith is especially attractive to the lowly and weak, consider that when the God of the universe became a baby, he could not even hold his head up on his own.

If the Bible is not distinctive, consider that Jesus was born to poor parents in a filthy stable in an unimportant town in an oppressed nation.

If our faith is not taken seriously by the rich, the powerful, and the intellectuals, consider that Jesus’ birth was announced only to a group of shepherds.

For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,
    ”I WILL DESTROY THE WISDOM OF THE WISE,
    AND THE CLEVERNESS OF THE CLEVER I WILL SET ASIDE.”

Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For indeed Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that, just as it is written, “LET HIM WHO BOASTS, BOAST IN THE LORD.”

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

The word kenosis comes from the Greek word for “emptiness”, and it refers to the idea that Jesus emptied himself of his divine glory and dignity in order to be incarnated as a human. He gave it all up so that he could become what he wanted to save. Even apart from his words and actions, the very nature of Jesus Christ’s incarnation shows us how we should conduct ourselves as Christians.

We follow a foolish faith. We are fools for believing it. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise! His wisdom is above all others, but it is not merely an enhanced version of our own; it is altogether different.

And God, in his wisdom, engineered a world in which faith and trust are valued above all else. He will never allow his existence to be proven; he’s given enough evidence to satisfy those who already believe, but not enough to convince those that do not, so that it is impossible to reach him without faith.

If you require proof in order to believe, you will never find it, but if you believe first, you will find that you have all the proof you need. And this is foolishness.

At the last Grab a Brew, someone asked a question: “Would you rather be right with no evidence to back you up, or wrong, but with good evidence for it?”

I had never heard or considered this question before. My own answer was immediately obvious, but as he continued, it became clear that this is not only another area in which our beliefs differ, but that it is actually the source of our differences. It is the question at the root of all other questions.

I did some research the next day to get some background information. I found that the idea was first proposed in 1877 by William Kingdon Clifford in his essay called “The Ethics of Belief”, and came to be called Clifford’s Principle. Quoting Clifford:

The question of right or wrong has to do with the origin of his belief, not the matter of it; not what it was, but how he got it; not whether it turned out to be true or false, but whether he had a right to believe on such evidence as was before him. … It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.

In his essay, Clifford argues that it is morally wrong for someone to believe in something he cannot prove, regardless of the outcome. In a purely rationalistic worldview, it is true that we can only make progress if we build on a foundation of that which can be proven. It follows that if I believe something that I can’t prove is worth believing, then it is not worth believing. This is why Grab a Brew always comes back to the same three topics. We believe a lot of unverifiable things about the universe and the nature of reality. They see this as a moral travesty.

But what is truth? Is it that which can be proven, or is it that which corresponds to reality? This is our disagreement, and in the end, it reduces down to the question of whether or not God exists. If he doesn’t, the universe must be purely rational, and truth can only be that which is proven. However, if God does exist, who is to say truth is rational?

How much is truth worth? If a man says, “I’ll only look for my lost object in the well-lit corners of the house”, and further still, “If my lost object is not in the well-lit corners of the house, then I don’t want to find it!”, it’s clear that he does not place much value on the lost object. But when he determines to find what is lost, even if it means tearing apart the house panel by panel—then we can be assured that he values the lost object more than anything.

As I turned the page, my pupils began to expand in adjustment to the gradual dimming of the room. They must have overcompensated, though, because they began to contract, and then expanded again, as though they were trying to find their balance but kept falling forward or backward. After about the third round of this I finally noticed what was going on.

For a good two minutes I watched—is that even the right word?—as my pupils wavered back and forth indecisively. It was a miracle. It occurred to me that my pupils’ muscles tighten and relax thousands of times in a day, but I only ever notice it when someone points a flashlight in my eyes.

My sense of wonder withers away when all of my experiences fit inside the constructs of what I’m used to. At four months old I wondered that I could move my hand in front of my face, and at six years old I wondered that I could catch a fish from a pond with a worm on a hook. These are each legitimate miracles, but they’ve become ordinary to me.

It’s only when I become aware of these constructs that I can again experience wonder at the common things of life. In these moments I realize, with a clarity that comes so rarely and leaves so soon, that life is full of miracles and that all the ordinariness comes from me. How much of it do I miss?

How can I say I believe in absolute truth, and yet feel so free to change my mind? If my idea of absolute truth is always changing, doesn’t it become relative?

The only conclusion I can draw is that this is not the point.

Jesus told a story about a man who entrusted his servants with a sum of money while he went away. Each of them was given an amount in accordance with his ability and was expected to manage it well. The first two servants were given different sums of money, but managed them equally well and were commended equally by the man. The third servant was given the least, but he buried it in the ground to keep it safe, and was reprimanded when he had nothing to show at his master’s return. In the end, it wasn’t about the total amount of money the servants earned for their master, but what they did with what they were given.

In the same way, the Holy Spirit entrusts each of us with the things of God, and we are expected to be faithful with what we are given. This includes our beliefs. Would you deny that the Spirit reveals different things to different people? Haven’t you met someone whom you know has a very deep and authentic relationship with Jesus, yet who holds beliefs that are contrary to your own? Does this mean that one of you has ignored the Spirit’s convictions of truth? Two people who truly know God can believe very different things about Him.

It is our diverse beliefs which allow us to do diverse work for the Kingdom. Yet our diverse beliefs also cause tension and arguments amongst ourselves. One person says he can’t accept that humans do not have free will, and another says that he can’t accept that God is not in complete control of every moment of our lives. They will argue passionately with one another because each of them is horrified at the thought of what it would mean for him if he had to accept the other person’s belief. But that horrified reaction is the very reason that he was not entrusted with that belief. The Spirit gives us beliefs according to our ability, and according to what will enable us to do His work most effectively.

As we grow in our relationship with Jesus, the Spirit will develop our beliefs, chiseling away at them like a sculptor. If we are listening to the Spirit, then to change a belief is to submit to His chisel. And it is of far more importance what we do with what we are given: we are not rewarded for being right, but we are given a crown for being faithful.

Even then, it is not for us to say that only one person can be right. We are right if we listen to the Holy Spirit and are faithful with the beliefs that have been entrusted to us. I am not at all advocating a relativistic view of truth—we should always strive for a true understanding of God—but I have a feeling that when all of this is over with, we’ll find that God is much bigger than we could have ever imagined, and such small questions as free will or determinism will evaporate in His radiance.

It is so dynamic that a single spoken sentence of forgiveness can put an end to a decade of hurt, and so dangerous that the belief of one can lead to the death of millions if it is strong enough. Belief may be the most powerful force on the planet.

We live our entire lives believing certain things about the world. At its foundation, any belief held by anyone is going to be either true or false, and its truth is independent of the intensity of the belief. On the other side of the world, a great many people believe in karma, which is an equalizing spiritual force ensuring that good is repaid with good and evil with evil. But either karma is real or it is confirmation bias, and if billions of people believe in it very strongly, that does not have any bearing on whether it is true or not. Very large groups of people have turned out to be very mistaken about some very big ideas throughout history.

Likewise, I (and a few billion other people) believe in prayer, which is direct communication with the God of the universe. But no matter how real it feels to me, no matter how much I see its effects in my own life, it is still either true or it’s not. I am either talking to God or talking to myself. Either God is intervening in my life, or I am empowered through my belief to achieve my own potential.

All tension in the world is caused by the collision of differing beliefs. In the 19th century, Britain believed its culture was best, and this led to many other cultures being destroyed under its far-reaching imperialism. Today, America believes capitalism and democracy are the hope of the world, so we spread that hope out of benevolence, through war if necessary. But these are all only beliefs. They may be true and they may not, but we are not more right because this is what we now believe. The next world power after us will believe the same of their new ideals and will say we were wrong, and we won’t be around to appeal.

Belief is more powerful than truth because belief controls our actions. But belief can still be guided by truth. This is why it is of utmost importance that we pursue not what is comfortable, not what is easy, but what is real.

When the FDA mandated in 1994 that nutritional information be printed on all packaged foods, it did very little to improve American health. That’s because they just printed the facts. We were still free to believe whatever we wanted about those facts. For instance, I thought for many years that a person could only gain weight by eating fat. If I ate a candy bar with 12 grams of fat, I would gain 12 grams unless I worked it off by running a few extra laps in P.E. class. Since gummy worms and soda were “fat free”, I could have as much of that as I wanted. It might cause cavities, but it wouldn’t make me fat.

Then I got fat.

It wasn’t until high school that I learned that calories are actually the cause of weight gain. Fat is bad, yes, but only because it contains over twice as many calories per gram as carbohydrates or protein. It’s the total calorie count that matters. I realized that sugary food was just as bad as fatty food, and ended up losing 45 pounds between my sophomore and senior year of high school.

I had convinced myself that something was true of nutrition, and even though it wasn’t, it still had a very real impact on my life. Because of a belief, I felt physically unhealthy when I ate greasy food, but not when I drank two cans of Coke. And because my belief changed, I now have a hard time even finishing one non-diet can of soda.

Have you ever avoided looking at the nutrition facts on a label because you didn’t want to know how unhealthy the food was? We spend most of our lives inside the comfort of our understanding, not wanting to know the truth so we can continue believing as we always have. To search for truth is to risk finding it, and to find truth is to risk it destroying the comfortable lives we have built. Life then becomes more about brain management than truth: if we are happy when we die, we have managed our brains successfully.

But the food is still bad for you whether you read the label or not.

Two of my favorite word-weavers are G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis. Every time I am tempted to think I’ve written something good, I will read a book by one of them and realize that he has already said what I tried to say, only he said it fifty or a hundred years before I did, and used half the words.

Chesterton’s writing is characterized by his wit, while Lewis is more prone to wisdom, though this is not to say Chesterton is not wise nor Lewis witty. What they share in common is the ability to present a compelling argument for anything they believe. Their ideas make so much sense that it is difficult to argue with them.

But good writing can be subversive: There is a tendency on the part of the reader to believe something is true because it is expressed well. We become enamored with the words, and acceptance of the belief comes passively.

Truth is not created by the interrelationship between words. When I go back through and revise this entry for clarity, I don’t make it more true. And if I am unable to express myself clearly or accurately, it does not mean that what I have to say is not true. Truth is independent of words. It’s even independent of our ability to convince others of it.

I have heard it said that the Bible is the greatest literary masterpiece ever written. As a native English speaker who knows no Greek or Hebrew, it is hard for me to understand this when I read the Bible in my own language. Many times I have considered how it might benefit from a good editor: someone to go through and omit the repetition, remove all the content that doesn’t directly foreshadow Jesus, and make the important points a bit clearer so we won’t miss them.

It may be a literary masterpiece for its time, but because its writing does not stand up to modern works like Crime and Punishment or To Kill a Mockingbird, is its truth diminished? Absolutely not. Truth is independent of words.

I don’t think God intended for the Bible to be a literary masterpiece. If it were, many more people would undoubtedly believe it, but for the wrong reasons. God has not set out to convince the world through proficient prose and compelling arguments to trick us into accepting it. He set out to convince the world through grace and truth. And the Bible is full of those. It is not a masterpiece, but a true story about a masterpiece.

Good writing is beautiful for the way in which it communicates ideas. The Bible is beautiful because it is undecorated truth. Enjoy each for what it is.

(More to come.)