The basic atheism is not intellectual rejection of belief in God’s existence. If one cares enough to question about God, there is far more hope for him than if he is indifferent. … The basic atheism is unwillingness to commit our lives to God’s keeping, callousness to God’s demands, the ordering of life as if God did not exist. This is the “sin of unbelief,” a lack of faith so widespread in our time that society has been honeycombed by it and engulfed in a world-wide destruction. To have faith in God is not merely to assert that God exists (which few people dispute) but to do the much harder thing of putting our trust in God and his way as the basis for individual and social living.
This suggests a second meaning [of faith], that of courageous adventure. Indeed courage is presupposed in faith as trust and commitment, for while there are some things to which to commit ourselves without incurring risk, this is not true of many things of importance. To get married, or choose a vocation, or give oneself to a cause is to act on faith—not blindly, but with full awareness that difficulties as well as delights are in store. We must count the cost and be willing to pay it before we can go ahead. To “walk by faith and not by sight” does not mean to stumble around in the dark, but with many of the details hidden to go forward boldly by the light we have. – Georgia E. Harkness, Understanding the Christian Faith (Abingdon Press, 1947), 19-20
Forum Letter, Volume 48, Number 1, January 2019