fick·le
adjective
-
changing frequently, especially as regards one’s loyalties, interests, or affection.
Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen. (Hebrews 11:1)
In this post-modern era of human history, the idea and substance of faith seem ever-changing. Everything that is new is cool while everything old is being canceled. Traditions and truths held to be “self evident” for thousands of years are being thrown out of our contemporary institutions of learning and reason like there is no tomorrow. At some point, there will be no tomorrow for those who replace truth with lies. Our world could quickly be coming to the end of reason and truth. If this happens, it is my opinion that the cause will be the fickleness of most people’s faith.
Today we live in an age where any faith is good as long as you have some. “Faith” is supposed to be the great unifier of mankind where we all overcome the unknowns by grasping on to the latest feel-good message or theory of benevolence, “love”, or mystical spirituality. Spiritism is now promoted as a “new-age” thing for the highly intellectual or educated person to claim FOR THEMSELVES. Everyone is right “in their own way” and it is deemed improper or aggressive to question someone on their beliefs. Instead of pursuing THE righteous and proven God of history, it is more fashionable today to bring God down to our level of human existence, and make demands on God and His followers to think and behave based on human standards…not supernatural ones that might humble humanity in the light of His creation and plan for it.
Faith is obviously fickle just by observing the variety of different religions in this shrinking world. As we take a quick peek at the top religions of the world, we see these four largest belief systems are held by over 86% of today’s global inhabitants:
| Religion | Adherents | Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Christianity | 2.382 billion | 31.11% |
| Islam | 1.907 billion | 24.9% |
| Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist | 1.193 billion | 15.58% |
| Hinduism | 1.161 billion | 15.16% |
Within each of these faith categories, we see huge variances in how people practice their religions. Each major religion has its own “holy book” as a basis for its adherence. I would argue that the top three holy books in the world… the Talmud, Bible, and Quran… contain 80-85% of the same content. They all contain the “10 Commandments” in one form or another. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all believe that humans have an immortal soul, separate from the physical body. So, how is it we have so much diversity and very little unity, even within the individual faiths?
Just to focus on the “Christian” faith, how is it that out of 2.3 Billion people professing Christianity that there are over 45,000 different denominations? One can easily argue that Christianity has not been unified since the beginning over 2000 years ago. The Christian Bible reveals to us that even in the early church there were divisions and conflicts over who to follow within the new faith. As the Gospel of Jesus quickly spread from Israel to all parts of the Roman Empire, various leaders and doctrines sprang into action in attempts to organize and control the masses who were coming to faith in Christ. Even the original disciples and Apostles (those who saw/knew Jesus in person) were often in conflict and competition for followers and their own doctrines.
The Jewish Christian converts still believed in circumcision, not eating certain meats and foods, and wanted to hold on to the thousands of laws that came from their Old Testament traditions. Gentile converts meanwhile had no desire or understanding of Jewish traditions and were not interested in limiting their cultural freedoms regarding what they ate, drank, or the more liberal lifestyles of their times or culture. It was actually very confusing for early believers to be sure of their beliefs because the words and teachings of Jesus were not available to them in writing for decades. Most of the faith’s traditions were delivered verbally and passed on in letters from the Apostles (which eventually became canonized in the Christian Bible) upon which believers could unify their beliefs around.
To a major extent, their faith was based on experiential signs and wonders. People were healed or delivered of evil spirits of the day. Believers followed based on the simple witness of these Apostles, most of whom were killed for what they saw, believed, and proclaimed. Finally, decades later, the Bible was canonized to provide the testimony of Jesus for the centuries to come. This book is still the only true guide we have to God’s revelation for our times. Truth and duplicity cannot co-exist.
Interestingly, now we arguably have ONE Bible (many versions) that the 45,000 differing denominations cannot agree on interpretationally. We still have the great divide between Catholics and Protestants leftover from the times of the Crusades, and within those two structures, we have conservative, liberal, and even “humanist” versions of each label. Whole countries are still divided over those labels such as Northern and Southern Ireland.
The Bible is full of examples of fickle believers:
- We have Peter as the “cornerstone” that Jesus would build His church on who denied Jesus three times during the crucifixion of His Lord.
- We have “doubting” Thomas who after seeing years of Jesus’ miracles and multiple times telling His followers that He would be killed and then be raised from the dead…still not believing Jesus rose from the grave “unless he was able to see the wounds of His hands and side”.
- King David was a man after God’s own heart, yet he committed atrocious sins that he paid the price for in this world of cause and effect.
- God’s chosen people, the Jews, saw miracle after miracle from crossing the Red Sea to manna falling from heaven to feed them. Yet, theirs is a story of how quickly these fickle people of God forget His commandments and become absorbed in the worship of self. The price Israel has paid and will continue to pay for their unbelief is astounding. Their Messiah came and they didn’t recognize Him, just as it had been foretold hundreds of years before the life of Jesus.
In the last 200 years, we have the additional “revelations” contained in the Mormon Bible and the Jehovah Witnesses have the “New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures” that are purported as “new revelations” related to Christ. There is such a hodgepodge of new leaders and their “revelations”, it seems quite impossible to agree anymore on a simple basic standard by which we define a “Christian”. What does it mean any more to “follow Christ”? How can believers protect themselves from the fickle finger of faulty leaders who seem to be the reality of religion in these times? Is it any surprise that the fastest-growing “faith” in America is secular humanism? (Yes, it takes faith to believe in that also).
As my wife and I have unified in our pursuit of Jesus separate from our varied religious backgrounds and labels, we are discovering the meaning of real Christianity. Christ is now revealed to us as one faith and one baptism all based on the traditional Bible, even with its many translations. The core of the truth is there to be examined, accepted, and acted upon. Faith without works is dead the Bible tells us, but works without the spiritual transformation that comes from the Biblical processes of salvation, justification, and sanctification are without significant meaning. As Paul put it so succinctly in 1 Corinthians 13, “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” As our pastor puts it, “if faith has not changed you, it has not saved you”.
Our simple faith and hope are found in the sacrificial love of God, who gave His Son to die in our place for the sinful nature of mankind. God didn’t wait for man to change or turn to Him because He’d still be waiting. “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us”. The true Gospel of Christ advises us we can never be “good enough” to deserve salvation or eternal life with God. Salvation is a free gift from God, but His call to follow in the footsteps of Jesus is not free at all. That simple call of discipleship is fulfilled in showing unconditional love to all just as God has loved us. It is in love that unity abounds and our lives have meaning.
We cannot escape the fickleness of faith by good works or identifying with one manmade church or another. The “church” of the Bible is the “bride of Christ”. All who sincerely believe in the simple yet life-changing Gospel of Christ are part of Him. Our nationality, race, financial condition, political or religious affiliations mean nothing to God. In these times it is pertinent for believers to focus on one book, one faith, and one baptism that identifies us with the historical Jesus. All else just perpetuates the fickle faith that has hounded civilization for millenniums and confuses humanity over what it means to be a Christian.
“Fickle” means changing constantly. While our emotions, physicality, and senses change continuously, God and His Spirit do not. True faith does not change or waver with time. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His Word is the only absolute truth. True science does not contradict God’s truths. Our fickle translations of God’s nature don’t change anything. God’s spirit is moving and changing people and the world around us, and there are no contradictions to the millenniums of truth contained in the Bible. God doesn’t move or change. We must.
In this age of fickle faith and “all-inclusiveness”…I am free from the bondage of my emotions and the darkness of spiritual blindness. He who the Spirit sets free is free indeed. My hope today is that all of us would build our hope and faith on the “solid rock” which is Christ and His righteousness. We have no rights or righteousness on our own. It is pure folly to think we are right and everyone else is wrong. Most of us have some fickleness in our faith. Some days we believe God, other days we doubt. Some days we feel like doing good for others while other days we could care less about anyone but ourselves.
We all experience these ups and downs in our lives. We get easily sidelined by our frustrations and cares of this world. We identify with Paul when he wrote:
So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:21-25)
When we realize that we cannot be good enough to earn God’s forgiveness and that we are justified in our faith only by the sacrifice of Jesus as He voluntarily hung on a cross in our place…then we can begin to overcome our fickleness. When we realize that every honest believer is imperfectly pursuing the same Christ that we are and we stop comparing ourselves to them, we can begin to overcome our fickleness. When we arrive at the point where our love for God and each other is not based on our feelings, works, or our “great” intellects…we will begin to understand the steadfastness of the God who delivers us from our fickleness. Thank God it is not about me or you anymore. It is purely the imparted faith and unique relationship each of us can have with our creator that helps us fully overcome the fickleness of faith.