Ground Your Faith in Reality

“Would it be all right if we brought one of our members? He’s also the bishop of the ward.” I’d been expecting this text from the LDS missionaries I’d been meeting with.

I love meeting with Latter-day Saints, especially the young men and women who are serving on their mission. I often invite them to my house to discuss their beliefs and ask questions about what Joseph Smith taught.

After a few meetings, they usually ask if they can bring their bishop along with them to help answer some of my questions. I always say yes. Bringing their bishop into the conversation is a great way to show them that their church’s best answers fall short and can even be illogical. Here’s an example.

Once when I was meeting with some missionaries and their bishop, I asked the bishop what he did for a living (LDS clergy are volunteers and have secular jobs). He said he was a lawyer. This gave me an opportunity to bring up a logical problem with the Mormon faith. I asked him if he believed that Moroni 10:4–5 was true. Here’s what it says:

And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost. And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things.

The bishop said he believed that this passage from the Book of Mormon was true.

I then asked if this passage was an example of circular reasoning. It claims that in order to know if the Book of Mormon is true, you first need to trust the truth of the test the book gives. Basically, you have to trust the Book of Mormon first in order to know that it’s trustworthy.

“Yes, it is circular reasoning,” he admitted.

“Would this type of reasoning hold up in a court of law?”

“No, it would not.”

“Why do you believe it’s true, then?”

“Because that’s what faith is,” he answered.

For this Mormon—and for many Mormons—faith is trusting in something without good reasons or evidence. It’s a blind faith that doesn’t even need to be logical.

In Christianity, though, faith is trusting in something you’re convinced is true. It’s not blind; it’s not without reason or logic.

Biblically, evidence is a crucial component of faith. Consider Peter’s words about the interplay of belief and knowledge in John 6:69 : “We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.”

Jesus encouraged people to believe in him based on the evidence of his miracles (John 14:11 ), especially the sign of Jonah, which was his resurrection from the dead (Matt. 12:38–40 ). When John the Baptist sent his disciples to ask if Jesus was truly the Messiah, Jesus offered the evidence of his miracles as validation of his messiahship (Matt. 11:2–6 ).

Some push back at the idea that faith is based on evidence because of what Jesus said to Thomas in John 20:29 : “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.”

Is Jesus endorsing blind faith? No. Thomas wouldn’t believe the eyewitness testimony of his fellow disciples. He wanted to physically see and touch Jesus before he would believe. Eyewitness testimony is great evidence for historical events. Most Christians throughout history haven’t physically seen the resurrected Jesus but still have reliable evidence he rose from the dead.

Jesus is not endorsing blind faith in this passage. He is claiming that even those who haven’t seen him physically still have enough evidence to believe he rose from the dead.

Note also the very next verse:

Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name. (John 20:30–31 )

John says that the miracles recorded in his Gospel are enough evidence for people to put their faith in Jesus.

God is good. He wants us to have a well-informed faith that’s based on more than wishful thinking. We have a reasonable faith, a faith that invites investigation, a faith grounded in reality.