1. Faith Must Be Given Precedence over Reason.
Let us see what it will mean to give precedence to faith over reason when we are working in the realm of spiritual truth.
It will mean that believing will precede reasoning in our approach to the Word of God, and this defines the vital distinction between the true Christian and the rationalist.
a. The Method of the Rationalist.
Faith and rationalism are mutually exclusive in the spiritual realm. Rationalizing and doubting are first cousins when the Word of God is involved.
Satan was the first rationalist on earth, and Eve fell when she accepted his reasonings about the Word of God in the place of simple faith in that Word. For Satan raised a question about the Word,—"Yea, hath God said?"—and thereby opened the way for incipient doubt, and then he reasoned Eve into accepting a "common sense" interpretation of what God had said, which proved to be an outright denial of His Word. And look at the consequences—indescribably terrible—of rationalizing about God's Word instead of believing it!
But rationalism did not stop there, for ever since that day all men without exception have been natural-born rationalists. For it is perfectly natural to all men to rationalize about God's Word, but it takes a miracle of Divine power to make any one willing to believe it.
These two attitudes toward Scripture are forever irreconcilable. In the nature of things, they can never be harmonized. The believer in the Word and the rationalist take two utterly divergent paths that cannot possibly reach the same goal.
