It’s a matter of differentiating whys and hows. A reasonable and logical argument can lead you to accept a belief in God, but belief alone is a static thought. For example, you can make a reasonable and logical argument that your wife won’t cheat on you by considering her past and present behavior, but it still requires faith to actively trust her. The brain is the how, the heart is the why. Your feeling is what attracts you to your wife, not your intellect. The feeling is what causes you to rationalize your trust and commit to expressing it. You start with feeling, then formulate logical and rational argument as to why you should trust her. But human behavior is too unpredictable for syllogisms, therefore you inevitably idolize her if you don’t commit to actively trusting her. No human can live up to this ideal. When your wife acts in a way that does not fit your ideal, paranoia sets in. Many relationships are destroyed because either one or the other does not commit to a leap of faith. If you reconcile reason with feeling, then you can confront unpredictability with confidence.
It’s the same with God. If you only accept God intellectually, they you render him a mere thought. But God is living. He is existence itself. Reasonable and logical arguments can lead you to believe in him, but this belief is an idol if you do not actively engage him through prayer and works. It will crumble the second an incident occurs that does not fit your pre-conceived notions of God. This is partly why Christ rebuked the Pharisees. They idolized God as a warrior God, whose Messiah would be a King that would rule by the sword and extol the righteous at the expense of the damned. Their belief was rigid and legalistic. There was no room for redemption or surprises. When the Messiah turned out to be one of peace with infinite mercy, they denied Him, because he did not fit their ideal. But Christ proved that true belief requires both the heart and brain. We can rationalize our faith enough to trust Christ, but we must commit to the leap and act. To act means to be open to possibilities. That’s why Christ said “The law is alive”. Our reason provides us with the confidence that Christ is the law, our anchor, but our hearts allow us to leap into the ocean of possiblites that life offers. Therefore there is the rational belief of objective truth married with the yearning for redemption. This act is love. It’s why Saint James said:
“What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (James 2:14-26 NKJV)
And why Saint Paul said:
"8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."
