Shabbat shalom kol beit Yisra'el and Mishpachah and welcome to this the final part of a trilogy on 'doubt and faith' which also concludes the last sabbath of this the eleventh month of the year.

Last week we looked at the life of the late evangelist Charles Templeton, to illustrate how powerfully-anointed believers can fall away, and why. Of course, a Calvinist would insist that Templeton was never saved in the first place, having as they do a very unbiblical view of free agency which maintains that salvation is not a choice at all, but predetermined (like damnation) and that 'once saved, always saved'. For such, I'm afraid, what I have to say will be meaningless since my goal today is to lead us to a revelation of what free will actually is, and how it explains why the universe is set up the way it is, and how all he suffering and injustice that so troubled Templeton has resulted.

If we are looking for a model of emunah (faith), apart from Yah'shua (Jesus) Himself, then we are bound to zoom in on Abraham who is known colloquially amongst all believers as the 'father of faith'. What made him that was that he never gave up on his will to follow Yahweh. For emunah (faith) to save it has to be consistent. This doesn't mean that the saved-by-faith don't entertain doubts from time-to-time, or don't go through dark patches, for Abraham surely did, but one thing the saved do not do is stop trusting. They hang on. As Lee Strobel said, "it's the decision to follow the best light you have and not give up" [1].

Now last week I made a point of insisting that emunah (faith) is not by sight, because that's what Paul taught:

"We live by emunah (faith), not by sight" (2 Cor.5:7, NIV).

That doesn't mean, of course, that emunah (faith) has nothing to do with physical reality. When it comes to emunah (faith) in the historical Besorah (Gospel) itself, it must be, and is, highly objective, even if we ourselves weren't actual witnesses to it like the original apostles and first believers, who saw, heard and touched for themselves.

The object of every true believer's emunah (faith) is Yah'shua (Jesus), and first and foremost the fact that He was an historical figure who physically lived, died and was resurrected. That fact, which is powerfully supported by the evidence of history, archaeology, and literature, is where every faith journey must begin. We are dealing with something - someone - very tangible indeed.

Once we have been saved by emunah (faith), our threefold task is to then:

• 1. Go where emunah (faith) is (where there are other believers, for fellowship, mutual edification and corporate worship, where we must learn what corporate salvation is too);
• 2. Consume faith-building materials; and
• 3. Clarify the object of our emunah (faith).

You can't just 'believe' and then 'walk away' and hope that you are heaven-bound no matter what you choose thereafter to do. Whilst the emunah (faith) that leads to a choice to believe, repent, trust in, obey and adhere to, the Messiah by an act of will - whilst this emunah (faith) is rightly viewed as an event, it is only the beginning of an emunah (faith)-journey requiring many, many other steps of emunah (faith).

There's a reason Yah'shua (Jesus) referred to Himsef as "the Derech (Way)" (Jn.214:6) - ways or roads were made to be walked or traveled on, and in this metaphor the Saviour is informing us that we have a long journey ahead of us that will last us the rest of our lives.

Emunah (faith) isn't just an act - it's also an experiment which we have to try out. Every talmid (disciple) is required to do what emunah (faith) would have you do. Authentic emunah (faith) requires action. Indeed, if it produces none, then it isn't authentic. Neither is it authentic if it produces wrong action which is another way of saying that it leads to sinning. Any 'faith' that leads you to sin is faith in the wrong thing, concept or person. It's just idolatry by any other name.

"If ye continue ('abide' - NKJV) in My Davar (Word) ('hold to My teaching' - NIV), then are ye My talmidim (disciples) indeed; And ye shall know the emet (truth), and the emet (truth) shall make you free" (John 8:31-32, KJV).

We remain Yah'shua's (Jesus') talmidim (disciples) only if we continue doing what Yah'shua (Jesus) says ... obeying His Torah (Law). There is no 'once saved, always saved' idea here. You can't stop being a talmid (disciple) and expect to continue being saved. We are what Lynn Anderson called "following learners", and only by becoming following-learners can we come to know the emet (truth) and be set free by it.

Moreover, the kind of knowledge that is learned by these 'following-learners' isn't just theology - it's not mere 'head-knowledge'. It's not just a gathering of information, it's not what some messianics think consists of stringing factoids together into a necklace and then wearing that necklace as a badge of authority. It's experiential knowledge, the knowledge that comes from living it out amongst other people.

The biblical concept of 'knowing' comes from the Hebrew word, yada, which was the kind of 'knowing' that Adam and Eve 'did' when they made babies. In other words, it was a knowledge rooted in intimacy with Elohim (God). That is what a genuine 'faith-walk' produces. In other words, do what Yah'shua (Jesus) did and experience the vitality of it - it's a living thing! It's climbing a mountain - not watching a YouTube video or reading a book about doing it. Get climbing! And keep in practice.

Doubt is always going to try and intrude on faith throughout our life and there are certainly times when we must tackle doubt head-on. However, sitting and brooding over faith and doubt will never make a believer out of anyone. Brooding about whether to work or not does not produce work. Faith is the same. We have to make a choice and get on with it. Debating Yah'shua's (Jesus') teaching that it is "more blessed to give than to receive" (Ac.20:35, NKJV) will not produce the result He promises - only doing it will. It's like that with every principle of the Besorah (Gospel). The proof of the pudding is always in the eating. Then, when you have done it, and proved it, it doesn't matter how much a doubter tries to rationalise that you are wrong because you will know the emet (truth) of the matter. In exercising emunah (faith) in the principle and reaping the reward, your emunah (faith) has become real knowledge. It is proven.

As one might expect, then, emunah (faith) in the Gospel of John is never a noun but always a verb - it is an action, a doing. It is never just a mental concept. You cannot exercise emunah (faith) with your head alone. That is why physical mortality is so important because only down here, in a realm where you can make choices, can the kind of emunah (faith) that risks life and death actually be exercised. That kind of emunah (faith) could never be exercised in the spirit world. Yes, we could make some choices in the premortal spiritual world but only things pertaining to the future, for in the unembodied state there is a much wider and clearer perception of spiritual things...obviously, since everything is spiritual there. Physical matter obscures most of this perception of spiritual reality. That makes earth-life both pregnant with possibility not available in any other state but also highly dangerous.

When we start doing emunah (faith), Yahweh always validates it. It's incredibly precious. It's powerful and it can only be exercised in its fullness down here. And the more we 'do' emunah (faith), and the more Yahweh validates it, the more true we know it to be. That is how we grow. No exercise of emunah (faith) means no spiritual growth - stagnation.

Of course, experience isn't the only avenue of evidence. You can get involved in false religion and experience benefits too. I knew people involved in Transcendental Meditation (TM) when I lived in Oxford who swore it reduced their stress levels. I never had any reason to doubt them, but they did pay a price in other areas, and it still left them unsaved. Existential benefits in another religion doesn't prove it to be true. Even atheism works for some things. Obviously, false religion and atheism must have something in them that is true for them to be believable. I have known people who abandoned religion to become non-believers who felt a huge burden lifted off their shoulders. Of course. When you walk away from responsibility and accountability, that's bound to bring about a sense of 'freedom'. But it doesn't last. There are negative consequences to abandoning emet (truth) - always. A huge hole is left which has to be filled by something else. Emotional highs of all sorts, both clean and unclean, never last, because the name of the game is spirit, not psyche.

As your emunah (faith) grows, so also will your shalom (peace) and confidence, so that when you enter life's squalls and tempests you will be better able to weather them and emerge on the other side the better for your experience. Now notice I am not saying that doubt will vanish entirely as you get stronger. As I mentioned last week, there will always be some things you will never get answers to, which if you try to figure out will simply distress you unnecessarily. I still get shocked by all the genocide around and the apparent waste of human life caused by senseless killing, disease and natural disasters. Yet in struggling with such things, the fact that we have already put emunah (faith) into action and reaped a certain knowledge about principles we have tested, we are not defeated and we are not without tiqveh (hope) because we know enough about Elohim (God) to know that He is good and that He loves us. Once we know that we can navigate life without being overwhelmed by its tragedies.

There is so much going on at the the same time in the life of someone who chooses to believe rather than doubt. As we begin to get glimpses of the spiritual reality, that Yahweh has control over those areas of our life when before we could not see it, so we will grow in spiritually measurable ways, one of which is to understand that we don't need to control others or various outcomes in life in order to feel safe. Why would you when you know Yahweh has control based on your experience of His control in other matters? The more we see He is in control through the exercise of active emunah (faith), the less we will fret about what others do and about those circumstances in our life which seem out of control.

The other day I was talking with a couple of my sons about the autonomic nervous system which is that part of your nervous system which causes your body to run on 'auto-pilot'. Imagine how insane you would go if you had to control digestion, knowing what enzymes to secrete when, monitoring pH and dozens of other things. Imagine if you had to consciously regulate your heart-beat to ensure blood flow was right under all circumstances. You would go mad worrying whether you had secreted enough proteases or hycrochloric acid in your stomach to ensure a proper digestion. As far as these processes are concerned, we live by emunah (faith) in the mechanisms devised and programmed into our DNA by the Creator who has thought of everything. Some things we are in control of, like the final phase of excretion, but most of our body we have no control over, like cell multiplication, making sure the blood clots right when we cut ourselves, and so on. We can relax in the confidence that the Designer has taken care of these things so long as we don't push our bodies to do things they weren't designed for.

I remmber when I was a young believer wanting to become the best apologist there was. As a preacher and writer I like to think that I have considered all the angles of objections or doubt so that I can have a ready answer for everything. That's good as far as it goes until I discover brilliant sceptics who have found objections I had not previously considered. If I am not careful I can get really stressed up over that and not relax until I have answered the objections comprehensively. But really there is no need to stress at all. I think part of the problem has been my fear that I might be responsible for not preventing a sceptic from going to hell because my apologetics either weren't done well enough or fast enough. Now I have learned to be content, more or less, when nothing comes or if it is coming slowly because I am trusting Yahweh to produce on time and with sufficient quality what is needed and when. I needn't kill myself over it.

You don't need to have all the answers to every sceptic's questions in order to help him. You just need to be trusting in Yah'shua (Jesus) and in His power to move hearts. Often, as I have pointed out before, the intellectual objections are just smokescreens and what sceptics deep down are looking for is a spiritual encounter rather than a complete set of theological facts. For one thing, we'll never ever acquire all the facts, and if we did, then what place would be left for emunah (faith)? Our personal encounter with Elohim (God) is infinitely more important than any empirical evidence. We can then say, with Wordsworth:

"Let Truth, stern arbitron of all,
Interpret that Original,
And for presumptuous wrongs alone; -
Authentic words be given, or none!" [2]

Toward the end of his life, a famous person is interviewed. The first question is asked: "You've lived a full life. What would you like to tell everyone watching and listening tonight?" The audience leans forward, waiting for a profound response, some helpful words that could make their lives as successful as this person's. "Life is meaningless!" the famous person blurts out. "Utterly meaningless!"

For the first time in his life, the interviewer is speechless. The audience is stunned. Is this all there is to life? You see, the person being asked this question and giving such a shocking answer was none other than King Solomon himself, only he's interviewing himself in what has been left to us as a tract: the Book of Ecclesiastes. This was the most famous and successful person of his day! "How would I portray life to others?" he asks himself. "Meaningless!" is his reply. "Empty, hollow, without significance."

What makes Solomon's words even more surprising and perplexing is that he is known as the wisest man who ever lived and also possibly the richest, at least until the coming of Messiah. He had it all. He accomplished so much, and yet he was empty. It is not actually until the end of the book that we realise that he started his book this way to get our attention. Solomon did have it all - he just didn't realise it until his closing days, after he had made a real mess of his life sowing the seeds of idolatry, selfishness, and discontent in his nation, family, friendships and business relationships. Before we make any more of a mess with our lives, Solomon is trying to show us the futility of life without Elohim (God).

Solomon looked at life as one grand experiment, and in the end he concluded that the experiment had failed. The relationships he developed apart from Yahweh were disappointing; the business ventures he explored apart from Yahweh brought no real simcha (joy) or satisfaction. The music, the gardens, the architecture, the arts - what was the point if they could not be seen as a gift from the eternal Elohim (God) who loves us?

All of this dawned on Solomon, but almost too late. Everything he tried apart from Elohim (God) was either disasterous or meaningless. He couldn't take another dead-end. Now, having tried virtually everything his heart desired, he returned to the one true desire of his heart - a relationship with Yahweh Himself. He finally realised that Yahweh is the only hope for meaning and an eternal future. If only he had realised this sooner. If only he could prevent this heartache in others.

You young ones are about to embark on your lives and one day, like us older folks, you will come to the end of your life and look back, the more so as your own children and friends ask this same question: "You've lived a full life. What would you like to tell everyone watching and listening tonight?" And I hope your answer will be: "Life is meaningless apart from Yahweh".

Now most of us will never have the opportunity to live as full lives as Solomon did because most of us will not be given the same kind of opportunity of power and weath. But opportunity we will most definitely be given if we choose to seize it for Kingdom service. Moreover, you will encounter, both directly and indirectly, many of the same things that Solomon did, because they cross the paths of all men and women in all generations. One reason that Ecclesiastes achieves, depressing though it can be at times, a resonance is because it is raw reality. For instance, Solomon says:

"What does the worker gain from his toil? I have seen the burden Elohim (God) has laid on men. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what Elohim (God) has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil - this is the gift of Elohim (God). I know that everything Elohim (God) does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. Elohim (God) does it so that men will revere Him.

Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and Elohim (God) will call the past to account.

"And I saw something else under the sun:

In the place of judgment - wickedness was there,
in the place of justice - wickedness was there.

"I thought in my heart,

'Elohim (God) will bring to judgment
both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
a time for every deed.'

I also thought, 'As for men, Elohim (God) tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. Man's fate is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; man has no advantage over the animal. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. Who knows if the spirit of man rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?'

"So I saw that there is nothing better for a man than to enjoy his work, because that is his lot. For who can bring him to see what will happen after him?

"Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun:

I saw the tears of the oppressed -
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors -
and they have no comforter.
And I declared that the dead,
who had already died,
are happier than the living,
who are still alive.
But better than both
is he who has not yet been,
who has not seen the evil
that is done under the sun.

"And I saw that all labour and all achievement spring from man's envy of his neighbour. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" (Eccl.3:9-4:4, NIV).

Solomon, you see, found the answer to the question that Charles Templeton, and others like him, should have asked, which, because he did not ask it, led him to doubt and fall away. Solomon understood, as I and almost everyone else who gets to my age understands, that there is no justice in this life, that there is horror and meaninglessness BUT only if you decide to believe there is no Elohim (God) because you have decided that a loving Elohim (God) would never permit injustice and horror and meaningless to exist in a universe where He is not to be found.

You cannot answer the question about all the terrible things in life without first coming to know that Yahweh is Elohim (God), that He exists, that He loves you and that He cares about you. Without that, everying will indeed appear vain and pointless, and all the projects you engage in are likewise pointless. Where are Solomon's grand buildings and gardens today? Nothing he accomplished has survived except his wise words given him by the inspiration of the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit)! NOTHING! All the injustices, poverty, oppressions, sweat and toil that afflicted particular men and women has gone because those men and women have gone.

The world does not change because it cannot change, and it cannot change so long as men and women refuse to exercise the emunah (faith) required to accept and obey Yahweh. So long as they reject Him and insist on sinning, nothing will change in this world. Generation after generation will sin, oppress, hurt, make afraid, and kill until Messiah personally intervenes and brings it to an end.

Which brings us, finally, to the 'biggie' - the 'big question' I mentioned last week. Why did Yahweh set the earth up this way? Why not enable us to see all emet (truth), without the need for any emunah (faith)? Why not create within us an irresistable attraction for truth, beauty, love and goodness? Why force us to go through this apparently meaningless horror story that for most people in this world is what we call 'life'? Most of the older folk here have experienced injustice, trauma, suffering and pain that never totally goes away. Everybody has a story of some suffering or unpleasantness they have experienced. Some people are wracked with physical pain, some are trapped in disfigured or incapacitated bodies. Some are tortured, raped, imprisoned, starved or are rendered shadows of themselves through awful diseases like Templeton's Alzheimer's or Fry's parasitic worm boring through the eyes of a living child.

Here is the reason it has to be done this way. Love cannot be experienced or embraced without the 'terrible' gift of free choice. Yes, you can have a childish love but not an adult, responsible love. Couldn't love have been invented by Yahweh without the hatred and wickedness? No, because you cannot know true love without having a glimpse or taste of its opposite. And the only way for hate and evil to come into being is if men and angels are given the free choice to reject love and try something else. We must all have the free choice to obey or disobey the Creator. Every child in every family has that choice, and every adult in every society has that choice. The alternative is a slave society, a totally controlled society like the one the forces of evil in our world are trying to set up right now.

To have that freedom to choose love or hate means we have to first be partially blind and ignorant. We cannot learn trust without first learning dependeny on some one. And that trust can lead to either joy or pain, depending who or what you choose to put your trust in. We must freely have both options - a real choice between Elohim (God) and Satan. And that we do. The results are all around us.

Finally, perhaps an even bigger question: did we have a choice to enter into this arrangement? Could we have said 'no' to mortality, to the set-up down here? The Bible does not answer that one but I have myself most definitely arrived at an answer. Love and reason both tell me the answer to that question is 'yes', we did have a choice, before we were born, in the premoral world of spirit. Those who said 'no' became malakim (angels) and those who said 'yes' became human beings. Malakim (angels), unlike us, operate in a knowledge that we do not possess right now, since we must, in order to be here, be partially 'blinded' that we might learn to walk in emunah (faith). That is not to say that malakim (angels) are never tempted, for they are, and were. The difference is there is no forgiveness for them if they choose rebellion, as indeed a third of them did, and became demons. Therefore one supposes, there is no forgiveness for Satan and his host, or at least nothing comparible to the fogiveness afforded human beings who repent and trust in Yah'shua (Jesus) or, if they do not, receive remission from their sentence to hell at the end of the Cosmic Jubilee.

As I have intimated already, I have struggled in great agony of soul over such questions as have been raised in this three-part series of sermons, only finding resolution in accepting the things I have shared with you. We are promised justice, but not necessarily in this life. We are promised explanations as to why we had to go through what we did, and why others had to go through what they did, but not in this life. And yes, the justice and ahavah (love) of Elohim (God) is such that everyone who has suffered at the hands of the wicked, or been cut off as unborn babies, as babies, as infants, as youth and as young men and women, will be satisfied with the outcome and be more than compensated. There is absolutely purpose, there is absolutely fairness and justice, because "Elohim (God) is ahavah (love)" (1 Jn.4:8,16). Your choice is whether you believe that or not. If you won't, then Templeton's outcome, or worse, is what you can expect.

Moreover, Elohim (God) wants you to know that ahavah (love) and to know it now. Without it, life will be vain, futile and meaningless after your are past all the novelty of the new and exciting experiences that earth life offers, as it offered them to Solomon. The central message of the Bible, and indeed of the purpose of life itself, cannot be understood without becoming intimately acquainted with this ahavah (love). It's why Yah'shua (Jesus) died on the cross for us. This 'love' is not confined to sexuality or even primarily a feeling, even if it most certainly includes the latter. It is far, far bigger.

To know the ahavah (love) of Elohim (God) is to know in your essential being that Elohim (God) has extended Himself for your and my well-being, even to the point of death. Yah'shua (Jesus) became the perfect demonstration of Elohim's (God's) unconditional ahavah (love) for us in the work of the cross. What is Yahweh's grand intent, His primary motivation toward us? He has said to us:

"I will make you My [allegorical] wife forever, showing you righteousness and justice, unfailing chesed (love, unfailing kindness) and compassion" (Hos.2:19, NLT).

And in so saying, He is making nine hugely important promises to us which He asks us to choose to believe and trust:

• 1. He pursues us with His love (Ps.23:6; Is.46:4);
• 2. His love for us never fails (Ps.103:8);
• 3. He strengthens us when we are afraid (Is.41:10);
• 4. He brings good out of bad circumstances (Rom.8:28);
• 5. Nothing can separate us from His love (Rom.8:39);
• 6. He is doing far more for us than we could ever imagine (1 Cor.2:9);
• 7. He will never leave us or fail us (Heb.13:5);
• 8. Give your worries to Him because He cares about you (1 Pet.5:7); and
• 9. He longs to have fellowship with you (Rev.3:20).

Will you trust Him on those promises? And on the basis of them, will you humbly and like a small child, open your heart to Him and allow Him to come in? If you will, then you will possess that which is infinitely precious, that turns the apparently meaningless into the meaningful, bringing to pass hope where there was despair, and giving you a compass for your life that will never fail you. If you will do this, you will never have to make the disasterous mistakes of a Solomon or a Templeton. Amen.

Endnotes