Science worships at the altar of the gods of Certainty and Repeatability. But increasingly science is discovering that, at it very core, the universe is ruled by random probability. Probability theory partial traces its roots to Blaise Pascal, noted for his eponymous Pascal’s Wager. Pascal writes that there’s more to be gained from wagering on the existence of God than from atheism, and that a rational person should live as though God exists, even though the truth of the matter cannot actually be known. If life were a game of chance, and science is saying it is, then faith is God is a safe bet.
I love the Filipino word for faith – pananampalataya. I would like to believe that the root word is ‘taya’ which means a bet, a wager. Faith is a wager on God. It is putting everything that I have and everything that I am on God. In a constantly changing and ragingly restless world, such safe bet is like an anchor on a stormy sea or a house built on a rock.
Jesus said to the people, ‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord”, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only one who does the will of my Father in heaven.’Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. Matthew 7:21, 24-27