Proper Confidence: Faith, Doubt, and Certainty in Christian Discipleship

by Lesslie Newbigin

A guide to the problems and conflicts caused by faith and doubt. The author offers a middle ground on which all Christians can firmly stand and commend their faith in a way that is neither arrogant nor timid, but confident.

Genres: Theology, Philosophy, Christianity, Christian, Religion, Nonfiction, Faith

111 pages, Paperback

First published March 30, 1995

About the author

Bishop James Edward Lesslie Newbigin was a British theologian, missiologist, missionary and author. Though originally ordained within the Church of Scotland, Newbigin spent much of his career serving as a missionary in India and became affiliated with the Church of South India and the United Reformed Church, becoming one of the Church of South India's first bishops. A prolific author who wrote on a wide range of theological topics, Newbigin is best known for his contributions to missiology and ecclesiology. He is also known for his involvement in both the dialogue regarding ecumenism and the Gospel and Our Culture movement. Many scholars also believe his work laid the foundations for the contemporary missional church movement, and it is said his stature and range is comparable to the "Fathers of the Church".

Reviews

[Steph Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

At the risk of sounding fanatical, I will begin by saying I wish more Christians would read Newbigin! He is such a *deep* thinker, and has really helped me sort through my uneasiness about the fundamentalist focus on "certainty." He traces this back to Descartes and the West's resulting dependence on dualistic thinking, particularly where it comes to the objective vs. the subjective. I love how he so eloquently brought Michael Polanyi into the conversation, with an emphasis on his concept of "personal knowledge."

This book was recommended to me by a wonderful speaker, Jeff Adams, who lectured on this subject - certainty (among others), at a recent L'Abri conference. I was so encouraged to hear Christians recognizing and discussing this misguided notion of certainty, upon which the church has become so dependent. Adams' use of the alternative phrase "assurance" really captured Newbigin's concept (aided by Polanyi's ideas) of the personal relationship we have with the living word of God, the person of Jesus Christ. This is in stark contrast to the impersonal knowledge of "objective" facts. It is my prayer that Christians would cease to claim that they have an objective, factual certainty and would instead embrace their faith in the person of Jesus Christ as he reveals himself to us. We have "assurance in a person" not "certainty in facts." Heed the wise words from an old hymn: "Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine!"

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

This text was recommended by an IV staff member to a friend who at the time was struggling with, amongst other things, how we could know Christianity to be true, and how we could be sure that we were not just making a huge mistake. The friend and I bought the book to read together. In short, from what I understand, Newbigin’s answer is that we can’t, but that it is deeply wrong to think that only what is indubitable can be true. God has revealed himself to us not through incontrovertible evidence, but in the form of a person, Jesus, whom knowing, if we were to know him, would have to involve some personal relation—the way we can understand inert things through impersonal observation, but know another human being only by being with them, trusting on some level what they are saying, giving and receiving, opening ourselves up to being changed by them.

I’m usually skeptical of apologetics because of the tendency to try to argue for Christianity in a watertight and logical manner (as much as I love you, I’m looking at you, C.S. Lewis). A quote from one from my favorite writers: “Nothing true can be said about God from a posture of defense” (Gilead). It is precisely this obligation in apologetics to justify faith by “objective” means that Newbigin is trying to take away. His main argument, from Michael Polanyi, is that there is no knowledge of reality, not even in science, which does not rest on some personal commitment of faith. Descartes’s insistence on separating thought from action is an error that still haunts us, since it shields us from the fact that truth cannot be discovered apart from actions and decisions on our part. The first half of the book was intensely and unnecessarily esoteric, but the overall line of argument was surprisingly compelling, in addition to being something I had not heard before. From his argument, Newbigin explains why knowing God is less a matter of belief than a matter of doing, and addresses the impasse between fundamentalist and liberal Christianity by mentioning what he thinks each has to learn from the other. Rather than embarking on the feeble quest to justify Christianity within the standards of reason and plausibility, he invites us to rework our conception of the universe from a basis of faith in the story of the gospel.

To the question “How do we know?” Newbigin responds: it is by grace that we are invited to know; by faith that we respond, and afterwards come to know. “I am only a witness, not the Judge who alone can give the final verdict,” he writes. Because it is by grace that we know, we may not have definite proof, but despite the challenges of proceeding in its absence, we are “under obligation—the obligation of a debtor to the grace of God in Jesus Christ—to give [our] witness” (94).

Recommended by: Molly

[Jaran · Rating 5 out of 5]

While providing a helpful critique of Descartes' epistemology, Newbigin has bolstered my confidence in Jesus and the appropriateness of my adherence to Christianity. Newbigin claims that possession of demonstrable and indubitable knowledge is far inferior to personal commitment. For Christians, this is a commitment to a relationship with Jesus. I've never before read a defense of Christianity as contained in this book, but I have found it to be truly helpful.

[Colin Skinner · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m gonna read it again soon, but here are my ramblings anyway.

On my first impression I’ll say that the real benefit of this book seems to be digging up long buried cultural assumptions we took for granted. I’m not scholarly enough to know how much Descartes is to blame for our plight as the author thinks (I lean toward it being a bit overblown), but his conclusions are spot on, and I’ve often pondered myself the black hole of postmodern thought. Basically, we’ve been duped to think that all knowledge should be reduced to that which is indubitable, because Descartes set the groundwork for a logical search for absolute certainty.

Newbigin’s big point is that the Gospel is a personal revelation that leads to a relationship and a form of certainty and knowledge not to be found from a series of logical (ultimately mathematical) steps. Which reminds me, his relation of this to Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem (even arithmetic is not provable finitely) was ingenious. And honestly, that’s kind of a good snapshot of his main line of argumentation through out the book.

Read it if you want to hear more! (Also check out the Goodreads summary, because that’s a huge part of the book I didn’t even mention and that the author deals with really well!)

Edit: the reason it got a 3 and not more is because I don’t find the retreat to personal revelation particularly helpful or convincing. Anyone can claim that about anything. What’s the tiebreaker for what I’m supposed to believe? These days I personally lean toward whatever is the most logically consistent.

[Owen · Rating 5 out of 5]

100 pages of pure philosophical spiritual gasoline

[Zach Worden · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant work in Christian epistemology. This was pretty dense in concept, so I’m thankful it was a shorter book. If you’re interested in apologetics, are in the work of science/research, or enjoy reading philosophy, I would 100% recommend. He makes some especially great points about science. I will say, I found this book to be quite helpful in addressing some roots of doubt I’ve had as a Christian. For that, I praise God.

Throughout the book, Newbigin shows the influence of Descartes’ philosophy on the Western way of thinking. Descartes’ critical method set out to give indubitable certainty in every area of knowledge, especially in the debate about God. (Note: Descartes wanted to show that God’s existence could be proven with mathematical certainty, thus, he used reason as his medium).

Newbigin shows that this quest for certainty (yes, with all of the beneficial uses of Descartes’ rationality) has sadly led to only to skepticism, which, taken to its fullest extent has bred the nihilism of Nietzche.

So how is it that we can know things? What is the proper confidence that we should have in knowing truth as Christians?

Newbigin demonstrates (quite well) that all true knowing involves personal commitment to what is given (or revealed). Thus, what is the foundation for our confidence? As Christians, we put our faith in the revelation of God in the person of Jesus Christ. God is not a topic, or the subject of our inquiry that we seek to control and ask questions of and get to the bottom of. This is the move in history from the classical Greek way of knowing versus, what Newbigin argues for as, the Christian way of knowing. Christ, the Word (logos), is the foundation of thinking that is a stumbling block both to Jew & Greek.

Newbigin clashes with the false modern presupposition that we are all honest, free seekers of truth with no bias. Rather, we are false by nature and are disinclined from everything true. We, as idolaters, construct false images of truth shaped by our own desires. “This was demonstrated once and for all when Truth became incarnate, present to us in the actual being and life of the man Jesus, and when our response to this Truth incarnate, a response including all the representatives of the best of human culture at that time and place, was to destroy it” (p. 69)

Thus, if we are to know truth at all, He must reveal Himself to us. We don’t get to make Him our science experiment - that is a different type of knowing, Newbigin shows. We know God only through His personal self-revelation to us - which He was pleased to do through the Incarnate Logos, Jesus Christ, who beckons “Follow me.”

Lastly, I am left pondering more deeply the proverb “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom”, as it really encapsulates the crux of this book.

[Annie Riggins · Rating 4 out of 5]

(4.5) The purpose of this book is “to commend the truth of the gospel in a culture that has sought for absolute certainty as the ideal of true knowledge but now despairs of the possibility of knowing truth at all, a culture that therefore responds to the Christian story by asking, ‘But how can we know that it is true?’”

This book does not seek to fit Christianity into our post-Enlightenment framework to make it make sense, but rather to enter God’s framework by faith and there know the truth — and let post-modern despair dissolve at the heart of the gospel.

I find philosophy very hard to read, and this book covers a lot of it. Brief but dense, and overall, crucial!

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seminary read🤓 This book was a heady one and made me think a lot. Newbigin looked at philosophers, specifically Descartes, search for certainty and knowledge. His main point being that the gospel provides certainty through faith and our personal relationship with God. I will say that I disagree with his thoughts and views of the Bible, nevertheless he had some good things to say.

“The confidence proper to a Christian is not the confidence of one who claims possession of demonstrable and indubitable knowledge. It is the confidence of one who had heard and answered the call that comes from the God through whom and for whom all things were made: ‘Follow me.’”

[Philip Yancey]

Newbigin is not an "easy read," but he's always rewarding.

[Taylor Steele · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Proper Confidence" by Leslie Newbigin offers a nuanced exploration of faith and certainty, particularly in the context of Cartesian influence. Newbigin takes the reader through a historical journey, examining how various philosophers like Descartes, Augustine, and Kant have shaped our understanding of faith and reason. This historical perspective was enlightening, providing a clearer picture of how deeply Cartesian certainty is embedded in our approach to faith.

Newbigin challenges the idea that faith can possess the kind of absolute certainty associated with Cartesian thought. This argument is presented thoughtfully, encouraging a reconsideration of what it means to have confidence in faith. He proposes that biblical confidence is less about the certainty of knowledge and more about trust in God and His guidance.

I found some parts of the book initially difficult to grasp. Newbigin's discussions are intellectually thick, and at times, the philosophical concepts require careful contemplation to fully appreciate their implications (it would help if you came with a background in philosophy).

Overall, "Proper Confidence" is a thoughtfully constructed book that provides a fresh perspective on faith in a modern, skeptical world. It's a worthwhile read for those interested in the interplay between philosophy, theology, and personal belief

[Laney Dugan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite having read a lot about Newbigin, this was my first time reading his actual work. He blends being a very deep, technical thinker with an openness and humility that draws him into the realm of the practical. There were several things I appreciated about his work in this book, one of which was his respectful but fairly thorough deconstruction of rationalism and Cartesian thought, and with it the modern dichotomy between thought/faith and action —which went together historically and weren’t seen as two distinct steps in the process, which is something Mitchell and I noted a few years ago when reading through the New Testament in a fairly short time period. Another noteworthy aspect was his emphasis on the necessary doubt that comes with a personal commitment to a personal being. And lastly, I appreciated his perpetual return to the importance of the narrative world of scripture—in contrast to it being a set of impersonal doctrines we hold, it’s a story we commit to and live into.

I hope Mr. Lesslie Newbigin pops up again in my seminary reading at some point! I would gladly read more of his work.

[Sandra Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sound arguments tracing the modern history to defend the heart of the gospel in the cultural waves of the overly-cognitive Enlightenment mind, as well as the dualistic view of objective and subjective truth.

Very helpful in helping me to reframe the approaches to the questions of the modern minds.

[Sophia Barkhouse · Rating 4 out of 5]

loved this book, very good for a big ole doubter like myself. The end gets a bit murky, not sure how much I agree with him but ask me what I think after I write a paper on it

[Bailey Cowen · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75✨ this book was good for me to read, though it requires thoughtful engagement and I would have loved to have more time to read it.
Definitely helpful for the thinkers and askers in the crowd, whether they are Christian or not, I think many would be challenged and encouraged by this.

[Laura Clawson · Rating 5 out of 5]

May I release my hold on certainty and open myself to proper confidence.

[Joel Wentz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding, and worth revisiting (which I plan to do regularly). Newbigin is conversant in broad streams of history, philosophy, and theology, and manages to weave them all together into a an argument with seismic implications: the West's worship of epistemological 'certainty' inevitably leads towards nihilism and disaster (a proposal that's hard to ignore in 2019). He systematically responds to thoughtful counter-arguments, ultimately leveling a significant critique at both liberal and fundamentalist approaches to Christianity. And he manages to do all this in 100 pages....

I found this small book inspiring, challenging, and exciting, but the reader should know that Newbigin writes with a philosophical density that could be headache-inducing for those who aren't used to that style. The implications of his thought are also so far-reaching that grasping the enormity can be similarly headache-causing, but I would still recommend this to anyone interested in the state of the West, or post-Enlightenment Christianity.

[Dan Glover · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 Stars. The following is not strictly a review but a brief reflection I wrote for a class at Regent College where this was required reading.

Lesslie Newbigin’s essay on what constitutes a proper level of knowledge or confidence (‘with faith’) does an excellent job of making both the valuable insights and the fatal flaws of postmodern hermeneutics available to the church. He shows how the new paradigm or framework through which to interpret reality, made available in God’s self revelation in both his written word and in the Word incarnate, is not the detached Cartesian objective certainty of modernism (21-25) and nor is it postmodernism’s hermeneutic of suspicion (83) through which to identify the leveraging of groups vying for power over those they would control. Rather, all knowledge is based on a faith commitment, presuppositions of how we know and what can be known, even what questions to ask, which comes prior to attempts or acts of knowing. Newbigin appropriates the insights of Polanyi on the philosophy of knowledge to show that all real knowledge is tacit knowledge, received from a tradition or passed on as though by apprenticeship, implicit in our cultural/societal context. This is true even for scientific knowledge which attempts to interpret or make sense of any data it observes (39-64). Polanyi’s insights also lead to the conclusion that knowing how something works is not the deepest level of knowledge about something. If a personal God created it with a telos, and all created reality together has a telos, then the deepest level of knowing is personal knowledge (58-62).

Knowledge is moral, therefore. True knowledge is not merely the intellectual apprehension of facts. It is rather a relational orientation toward God. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, Newbigin reminds us (96). True knowledge is to know things in their greater context of purpose and possibility, which are inherently connected to God’s will for them. We must be rightly oriented toward Jesus Christ, the one to whom history points and in whose hands the future lies. Jesus Christ is the loving self-giving revelation of the one who created and upholds the universe. The truest knowledge is only available in right relationship with Christ as revealed in the word and experienced in the church. It is the Christian mission to declare in word and deed the narrative of truth upon which and within which we are granted self-understanding and orientation to reality. It is our orientation relative to Christ’s question, “who do you say that I am?” and his command to “come, follow me” wherein humanity finds its true place. This must be embraced by faith, and yet it takes no less faith to reject Christ for some other paradigm of reality, which will no doubt often fit better within the plausibility structures of the present time, but which will ultimately accord less satisfaction because it is just not true.

[*Newbigin makes essentially the same argument here about the nature of knowledge as Andrew Louth does in "Discerning the Mystery," where Louth draws on the insights of both Polanyi and Gadamer. While Newbigin’s book does not engage the concept of tacit knowledge (and other aspects of Polanyi and Gadamer) to the depth and extent Louth does in the context of biblical hermeneutics and liturgy/tradition, I am happy to have read this because it is a far more accessible book to recommend to non-specialists in theology or hermeneutics – a simple and easy to understand summary yet one based on no less thoughtful and critical reflection on the church as a witnessing community in the world.]

[Dan Bouchelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential Read

This is Newbigin at his best. Helpful for responding to the new atheists, reductionist modern theological liberals, fundamentalists, and post-modern nihilists. He explains well that we cannot know anything with the kind of certainty that modernity tried to promise, but we can know with confidence the God who calls us into his story. He demonstrates well that the concept of objectivity is naive, but that does not mean we are only left only with subjective leaps of faith and arbitrary meta narratives. For people who can’t buy the false confidence fundamentalism but can’t accept scripture as merely an account of people’s experience of God, this is a God send.

[Anna K Baskaran · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book gave me language for the confidence/assurance I have in Jesus, even though it cannot be “scientifically proven.” Helped me understand my own internal struggle to convince myself why I believed.

[cinlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A challenge to those who hold tightly onto the superiority of scientific objectivism (via Polanyi). Also compares/contrasts objectivism with the certainty Christians hold for the Jesus narrative.

Quotations with page numbers from the Eerdmans 1995 print.

In one of the most concise statements of his position, Polanyi, after speaking of “the personal participation of the knower in all acts of understanding,” goes on:
But this does not make our understanding subjective. Comprehension is neither an arbitrary act nor a passive experience, but a responsible act claiming universal validity. Such knowledge is indeed objective in the sense of establishing contact with a hidden reality, contact that is defined as the condition for anticipating an indeterminate range of as yet unknown (and perhaps yet inconceivable) true implications. It seems reasonable to describe this fusion of the personal and the objective as personal knowledge. (Polanyi, Personal Knowledge). (43-44)

The elimination of the concept of purpose from our efforts to understand the world has momentous consequences. With one stroke it creates the split between fact and value, a split which is such an important part of our culture. The reason why it causes this split is obvious. If one has no idea of the purpose for which a thing exists, one cannot say whether it is good or bad. It may be good for some purpose but not for others. It has been a central axiom of modernity that one cannot argue from a statement of fact to a judgment of value. (56)

Cause is something that can be discovered by observation and reason. Purpose is not available for inspection because, until the purpose has been realized, it is hidden in the mind of the one whose purpose it is.. The modern antithesis of observation and reason on the one hand versus revelation and faith on the other is only tenable on the basis of a prior decision that the whole cosmic and human story has no purpose and therefore no meaning. It is possible to make this assumption, but it is not necessary. The question whether the cosmos and human life within it have any purpose other than the individual purposes we seek to impose on things is one that cannot be decided by observation. If we live with a prior assumption that human life has no purpose, then we shall act accordingly, and there will be no possibility whatsoever of discovering its purpose. As I have argued, only by an act of disclosure of the purpose of human life can we learn that it indeed has a purpose, and such an act of disclosure can only be personal, a revelation. (57-58)

Buber brilliantly expounded the radical difference between two kinds of knowing: that in which I am the masterful actor handling inert material which I am free to interrogate, to manipulate, and to organize,and that in which I am seeking to know another person who can resist my efforts to know and who can interrogate me and make me the object of inquiry. (60)

In The Tacit Dimension (1966), Polanyi addresses the question to which I have already referred: What is a problem? Scientific discovery begins with the recognition of a problem.. But what is a problem? To recognize a problem, says Polanyi, is “to have an intimation of the coherence of hitherto not comprehended particulars,” and the problem is good if this intimation is true. To recognize a good problem is thus to see something which is hidden, and not visible. (62)

If we are to use the word “certainty” here, then it is not the certainty of Descartes. It is the kind of certainty expressed in such words as those of the Scriptures: “I know whom I have believed, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me” (2 Timothy 1:12). Note here two features of this kind of assurance which distinguish it from the ideal of certainty we have inherited from the Age of Reason. In the first place, the locus of confidence (if one may put it so) is not in the competence of our own knowing, but in the faithfulness and reliability of the one who is known. The weight of confidence rests there and not here with us. Secondly, the phrase “until that day” reminds us that this is not a claim to possess final truth but to be on the way that leads to the fullness of truth. I do not possess the truth, so that I do not need to be open to new truth; rather, I am confident that the one in whom I have placed my trust, the one to whom I am committed, is able to bring me to the full grasp of what I now only partly understand. (66-67)

[Ian Ritchie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Newbigin offers an approach to knowledge that lifts the burden of the modernist ideal of indubitable certainty and instead calls us into a kind of knowledge proper to finite, personal beings. The confidence proper to a human creature is not mathematical certainty but courageous and personal commitment to truth understood through story. Truth is real and is the object of knowledge, but the knower is always the subject. Any kind of knowledge that seeks to be "objective," casting off personality and embodiment in order to know without bias is a meaningless pursuit and cannot come into contact with reality. As someone who studied biology in undergrad, this was particularly captivating for me. Newbigin borrows much from scientist and philosopher Michael Polanyi. The excellent epistemology of science presented in this book through Polanyi is worth the price of the whole book, in my opinion. (Whitworth really needs to start teaching Polanyi to the science majors). The presupposition here is that the ultimate reality with which (or with whom) we have to deal is not impersonal but personal. Thus, the only reasonable way to know that reality is through responding to a personal call with a personal faith. There is much to commend about this book, including discourse on scripture and revelation, fundamentalism and liberalism, and much more. It is a much-needed book about faith responding to grace.

[Jeremy Brundage]

I like that this book is focused on the dichotomy of faith and doubt. It’s a good reminder that faith doesn’t have to stand in the place of clarity and certainty, but in the place of ambiguity, and even pain.

[Dre · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this in the same way I enjoyed a bowl of ramen as I read the final chapters. All together good and rich, but like the ramen had a floaty egg that I avoided...Newbigin too had a few things I would caution to avoid.

[Kaleigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is abstract and a bit out of reach for the barely educated (me), but MAN the Church needs this perspective. If you have any doubts or questions about the Christian faith at all, this will be such a help.

[David J. Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some exceptionally helpful thoughts interspersed among long stretches of “hmm, ok.”

[Alex Strohschein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent book by an astute missiologist and theologian. One of the truest quotes from this book is:

“The strong counterattack against the values of the European Enlightenment has come just at the time when, for the reasons already given, the confidence of Europe in its own culture is collapsing. The result of the conjunction of these two forces is the phenomenon of multiculturalism, an ideology that celebrates cultural diversity as an unqualified good in its own right. When this ideology takes over, value judgments claiming to discriminate between different cultural traditions in terms of their intrinsic worth are ruled out of order. Cultural diversity is an unqualified good; judgments of good or bad with respect to different cultures are condemned as cultural imperialism.”

Even many Christians rush to announce their open-mindedness or their inclusivity (so as to be worthy in the eyes of mainstream culture). These can be good values but, as G.K. Chesterton quipped, “Merely having an open mind is nothing. The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.” There are things that "white" culture (itself too easily simplified because some white people were not deemed white until assimilated can learn from other cultures, just as other cultures have benefited from learning from "white" culture.

[Aaron · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very helpful book. Newbigin critiques Descartes' program to find absolute certainty in our knowledge, "certainty" here meaning validation of a truth claim beyond any conceivable doubt. He succinctly maps out many of the historical consequences of the Descartes' influence on western thought and culture, a culture which has largely and with deep irony abandoned the possibility of having absolute certainty in knowledge.

In place of exalting doubt as the key principle in a search for knowledge, Newbigin uses Biblical insights, Augustine's work on epistemology, and the philosophy of Michael Polanyi to give a role to both faith and doubt in our search to know the world. He is affirming personal commitment to knowledge which can be doubted. Proper confidence, not certainty, is available to the human knower.

The book is also a confident assertion of the truth of Christianity. It is a book worth revisiting and pondering.

[Sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A straightforward, easy to read critique of cultural assumptions about knowledge and a defence of Christianity. He ends with this, “The confidence proper to a Christian is not the confidence of one who claims possession of demonstrable and indubitable knowledge. It is the confidence of one who has heard and answered the call that comes from the God through whom and for whom all things were made: ‘Follow me.’”

[Bryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply put, this is essential reading for understanding the Western mind in relation to "faith, doubt, and certainty." Being only a little over 100 pages it is mostly introductory, but what a full introduction it is.

[Soren Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic! Newbigin beautifully argues that the postmodern critique of modernist epistemology (which has undergirded the supposed divide between science and faith) reveals the untenability of Cartesian certainty and the necessity of faith within any belief system.