Jacob, I realize that that is admirably post-modern, but I think that the church betrays its biblical vocation if it does not seek to understand as best it can what that vocation is.

Biblical faith is not a matter of individuals privately determining how to feel most comfortable with their beliefs. At least that sort of personal belief-management has to take place within a corporate self-understanding that must somehow be loyal to its biblical origins. That doesn’t have to be understood in terms of a ‘drive for a sense of certainty’. But I think there has to be an element of corporate hermeneutical responsibility involved. So I think we should ‘continue strive for right and proper interpretations’, but I would put the emphasis on ‘continue to strive’ rather than on ‘right and proper’.

"Trust and faith’ are not ends in their own right. You have to have trust and faith in something. And the question ‘in what?’ has to be addressed. I don’t think an existentialist faith in God as the ground of our being sort of thing is any improvement on the modern evangelical personal gospel of salvation.