Biblical Faith Is Reality: Why the Marketplace Cannot Be Neutral

by Dave Miller

For many of us living the covocational life, the tension is not whether faith belongs in the marketplace, but whether faith is allowed to carry authority there. We are often told that faith can motivate us privately, guide our ethics quietly, or inspire our personal values, but that it must not function as knowledge about reality itself.

That assumption is not biblical. It is modern.

One of the most damaging shifts in Western thinking has been the removal of faith from the category of knowledge. As Dallas Willard frequently observed, once faith is classified as something other than knowledge, it becomes non-authoritative. It can then be excluded from law, policy, education, economics, leadership, and public responsibility without argument. Faith becomes opinion. Reality belongs elsewhere.

What is striking is not that the culture has done this, but that the church has largely accepted it.

When Faith Becomes Decision Instead of Knowledge

In much of modern Christianity, faith is framed primarily as a decision. One decides to believe, decides to commit, decides to follow. Evidence of faith is then measured by sincerity, emotional intensity, or ongoing willpower to remain committed to that decision.

The problem is structural. A decision-centered faith places the foundation not in Christ, but in the chooser. It assumes that faith begins at a moment of provocation and survives by human resolve. When commitment falters, the solution is more motivation, more pressure, or more emotional reinforcement.

This is not how Scripture defines faith.

Biblical faith is not a leap into uncertainty. It is the response of a person who has seen reality clearly.

Hebrews 11: Faith as Proof, Not Preference

This is clear in Hebrews chapter 11. The chapter does not describe people who felt strongly, believed bravely, or decided sincerely. It describes people whose lives functioned as proof that God’s Kingdom is real.

Abel offers a better sacrifice.

Noah builds an ark.

Abraham leaves, dwells, waits, and offers.

Moses refuses power, endures loss, and leads a people.

These actions are not attempts to create reality through belief. They are responses to a reality already understood. Faith, in Hebrews, is not believing without sight. It is acting because one sees truly.

Faith does not mean trusting what cannot be known. It means trusting what has been revealed and therefore living coherently with it. Once reality is seen, it cannot be unseen.

A mathematician does not “choose” whether two plus two equals four once he understands addition. Knowledge carries authority. Authority creates obligation. Obligation requires action.

Faith works the same way.

The Moral Weight of Knowledge

Consider a doctor who encounters a clear medical emergency. The doctor sees the situation, understands what is happening, and possesses the ability to intervene. If that doctor chooses not to act, we do not consider that neutrality. We call it immoral.

Why? Because knowledge creates responsibility.

Yet when faith is treated as something other than knowledge of reality, we reverse this logic. The focus shifts away from the emergency itself and onto the doctor’s internal decision-making process. We encourage the doctor to consider helping. We celebrate the decision rather than the action. Meanwhile, the patient remains untreated.

This is what happens when the church treats faith as personal choice rather than an expected response to real authoritative knowledge. We celebrate decisions, affirm sincerity, and encourage motivation, while reality itself continues to demand response.

Faith in Jesus and the Faith of Jesus

This becomes even clearer when we consider the difference between faith in Jesus and the faith of Jesus.

If Jesus Christ is merely the object of belief, faith can remain abstract. But if Jesus is the embodiment of reality itself, then His life is not merely exemplary. It is evidentiary.

Jesus does not act from uncertainty. He lives in perfect alignment with the Father’s reality. In John 17, Jesus speaks not of motivational belief but of knowledge received, trusted, and obeyed. He knows the Father, receives the Father’s words, and lives in complete coherence with them.

The faith of Jesus is His own proof of God’s Kingdom reality.

Faith in Him, rightly understood, necessarily draws us toward that same posture. Not because we are trying to imitate behavior, but because reality, once seen, compels response to the Kingdom reality with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Why This Changes the Marketplace Question Entirely

For covocational leaders, this reframing is liberating and sobering.

Faith does not need permission to operate in the marketplace. It already governs the marketplace because it describes the world as it actually is. Business, leadership, policy, education, and stewardship all assume that knowledge carries responsibility. Only in religion have we pretended otherwise.

Faith is not a private motivation layered on top of work. It is a public, authoritative understanding of reality that demands responsibility, accountability, authority, and action.

To see God’s Kingdom as real is not to hold a religious opinion. It is to recognize the true structure of the world and live accordingly.

And once reality is seen, faith is no longer a decision to be celebrated.It is a response that must be lived.

An Exercise in Hebrews 11-12

Should you consider reorienting your mind and heart to this way of understanding faith, I have provided an adapted reading of Hebrews 11:1-12:2. Each time faith is used, it is replaced with the definition of faith in Hebrews 11:1. This reading helps one to “hear” the word faith in the context of Hebrews and forces us to reconsider our default understanding of “faith” influenced by our culture.

I challenge you to consider how this reading affects your thinking, emotion, and desire on the first reading and then again on the second. Then read again in your Bible without the adaptation. You might be surprised by your initial responses.

Hebrews 11:1-12:2 (CSB) - Adapted with the definition of faith from 11:1

Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. For by this our ancestors were approved.

[We prove God’s Kingdom reality when] we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible. 

[Abel proved God’s Kingdom reality when he] offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By [that proof of God’s Kingdom reality] he was approved as a righteous man, because God approved his gifts, and even though he is dead, he still speaks through his [proof of God’s Kingdom reality.]

[Enoch proved God’s Kingdom reality when he] was taken away, and so he did not experience death. He was not to be found because God took him away. For before he was taken away, he was approved as one who pleased God. Now without [the proof of God’s Kingdom reality] it is impossible to please God, since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

[Noah proved God’s Kingdom reality when], after he was warned about what was not yet seen and motivated by godly fear, built an ark to deliver his family. [By that proof of God’s Kingdom reality] he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by [proof of God’s Kingdom reality].

[Abraham proved God’s Kingdom reality] when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going. By [proof of God’s kingdom reality] he stayed as a foreigner in the land of promise, living in tents as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

[God’s Kingdom reality was proved because] even Sarah herself, when she was unable to have children, received power to conceive offspring, even though she was past the age, since she considered that the one who had promised was faithful. Therefore, from one man ​— ​in fact, from one as good as dead ​— ​came offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky and as innumerable as the grains of sand along the seashore.

These all died [while proving God’s Kingdom reality], although they had not received the things that were promised. But they saw them from a distance, greeted them, and confessed that they were foreigners and temporary residents on the earth. Now those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they were thinking about where they came from, they would have had an opportunity to return. But they now desire a better place ​— ​a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. 

[Through proof of God’s Kingdom reality] Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac. He received the promises and yet he was offering his one and only son, the one to whom it had been said, Your offspring will be traced through Isaac. He considered God to be able even to raise someone from the dead; therefore, he received him back, figuratively speaking. 

[Isaac proved God’s Kingdom reality when he] blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come. [Jacob proved God’s Kingdom reality because] when he was dying, [he] blessed each of the sons of Joseph, and he worshiped, leaning on the top of his staff. [Joseph proved God’s Kingdom reality because], as he was nearing the end of his life, [he] mentioned the exodus of the Israelites and gave instructions concerning his bones.

[God’s Kingdom reality was proven because] Moses, after he was born, was hidden by his parents for three months,... they saw that the child was beautiful, and they didn’t fear the king’s edict. [Moses proved God’s Kingdom reality because], when he had grown up, [he] refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter and chose to suffer with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasure of sin. For he considered reproach for the sake of Christ to be greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, since he was looking ahead to the reward.

[Moses proved God’s Kingdom reality when he] left Egypt behind, not being afraid of the king’s anger, for Moses persevered as one who sees him who is invisible. [Moses proved God’s Kingdom reality when] he instituted the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch the Israelites. [They proved God’s Kingdom reality because] they crossed the Red Sea as though they were on dry land. When the Egyptians attempted to do this, they were drowned.

[Proving the reality of God’s Kingdom] the walls of Jericho fell down after being marched around by the Israelites for seven days. [Rahab, the prostitute, proved the reality of God’s Kingdom when she] welcomed the spies in peace and didn’t perish with those who disobeyed.

And what more can I say? Time is too short for me to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets, who [proved God’s Kingdom reality when they] conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched the raging of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, gained strength in weakness, became mighty in battle, and put foreign armies to flight. Women received their dead, raised to life again. Other people were tortured, not accepting release, so that they might gain a better resurrection. Others experienced mockings and scourgings, as well as bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they died by the sword, they wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated. The world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and on mountains, hiding in caves and holes in the ground.

All these were approved through their [proof of God’s Kingdom reality], but they did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.

Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our [proof in the reality of God’s Kingdom]. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.