Quiz: About the meaning of life

One often hears: "I hesitate, I doubt. But if I saw Christ here in front of me, I would certainly believe"! A mistake! "No one has ever seen God, but the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has revealed Himself," writes the evangelist John(John 1:18). The faith of the righteous of the Old Testament was based on a different vision of God than in evangelical times, but this did not prevent them from being faithful to Him to the end.

The incarnated and humanised Son of God communicated with numerous people. They saw Him with their physical eyes (not just the "eyes of faith"), but most of them did not benefit. Even the obvious signs, which could not be denied, could not convince the persistent Pharisees (what Christ did and said contradicted their "concept" of the Messiah, and they said that He worked miracles by the power of Beelzebub (an evil spirit)!

Man will always find an excuse for his unbelief, because free choice is also a divine gift, but it can be used in different ways. Even the closest disciples did not believe the Saviour fully (= they did not trust His words - this is the basic meaning of the biblical concept of "faith"), and therefore they ran away from the night garden in fear, and Peter denied Him three times. God intends a free faith and does not want to "pin us down". "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed!", - He didn't just say to His disciple... but to all of us(Jn.20:29). This means that we are more blessed than many who have seen and doubted Him!

Yuri Ruban