PRACTICES of Faith, not just Beliefs

Many of us are increasingly convinced that it is important for the church to emphasize practices of faith and not just what we believe.  Please don't get me wrong -- what we believe is fundamentally important.  Our beliefs about God, humanity, the world, and reality in general play a crucial role in how we think, how we act, and how we relate to God, to ourselves, and to others.

But if we only emphasize or talk about what Christians believe, it can lead to the mistaken impression that the Christian faith is a matter of the head.  The fact is that the Christian faith is located in our entire lives, not just in our heads.

Christians are not only people who hold particular beliefs (e.g., God's incarnation in Jesus, Jesus is Lord and Savior, sovereignty of God, etc.); Christians are people who are led to live in particular, recognizable ways because of what they believe.  There is a recognizable shape to the Christian life.  The Christian life can be seen in things like: spending time in prayer; loving your enemies; forgiving those who have done wrong to you; sharing your resources with others, especially the poor; protecting the weak and the vulnerable.

We may notice that these are things which may be done by people who do not profess Christian beliefs.  If we see non-Christians doing these kinds of things, we should always celebrate!  And if we see Christians not doing these kinds of things, we should be concerned, puzzled, and grieved.

We need to be clear that we do not engage in these sorts of practices in order to earn some kind of reward or in order to earn God's love.  God's love cannot be earned.  (That's why it's called "grace.")  These are just the kinds of things that happen when we live out the implications of our beliefs in the radically free grace of God.

These "practices of faith" -- things like forgiveness, generosity, loving one's enemy, speaking up for the defenseless, spending time in quiet prayer -- are not encouraged by our wider culture.  These practices are "counter-cultural."  That means that we may encounter resistance - both external and internal resistance - as we engage in them.  So we may ponder the question, "What can the church do to encourage and support people in their practices of forgiveness, enemy-compassion, generosity, justice, and prayer?"