How is ultimate truth determined in a Christian world view?

The path to determining Christianity's truth is not primarily about rationality through science or logic. It is not counter to rationality nor is it independent from rationality – we're always using our brains to achieve thoughts. However, rationality is not independent of minds. Minds are more than just deduction machines. Minds are complex entities that also involve human desires and the will.

Christianity says the path to God is about a humble acknowledgement of our finitude: "I am not the final arbiter of reality, morality and truth." Christianity says we each need to acknowledge our moral poverty, biases, hypocrisy and incapacity. It is said that we need to make a decision of the will, committing ourselves to the one with the only truly objective handle on reality in the universe. We call on Him to reveal Himself to us. The existential call of Jesus is "Knock and the door will be opened".

What exactly does it look like to "Knock" and have the "door" opened? Is it some mystical experience or vision in your sleep? I can't speak for everyone because it is a personal experience. For me, it is tied the functioning of the brain and the conclusions that come to gain credibility. It is not something that happened once in the past at a certain point in time. It remains an ongoing existential experience. I will at times proudly think I have gained an objective position into the God question but then need to turn around and humbly acknowledge my incapacity – asking God for the door to the truth about him to remain open.

So how does it work for me? Well, rarely in the complexities of real life are conclusions drawn from purely linear paths of logical deduction. Rather, we have a network of thoughts, ideas and ways of seeing the world. As certain parts of that network or web are re-shaped then a whole series of alternative conclusions gain credibility that previously had little or no credibility. What was once inadmissible becomes admissible. What was once an irrational conclusion for me then becomes rational.

A recent example is when I was seeing John's gospel as lacking credibility because of its differences to the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke). Despite thinking that the differences were just too great, I kept reading John's gospel with my son and also a book that discussed the differences. Before long "the penny dropped" and I came to see the differences from a new perspective. Rather than being an embarrassing oddity, they could very well have been intentional. The author of John's gospel deliberately chose alternative stories to the synoptics because he expected his readers to already have read the synoptics. There are many clues that indicate the author of John expected a prior knowledge that John's gospel itself doesn't provide. For example, the idea of Jesus being born in Bethlehem is assumed knowledge in at least two places (John 7:41-44 and also John 1:46). Without prior knowledge of Jesus birth in Bethlehem, readers would be given grounds for rejecting Jesus - hardly a response that an author promoting Jesus would want.

So in that example, rational deductions led me to discredit John's gospel but rational deductions then also led me to the conclusions about the credibility of John's gospel. Both involved rational argument. However, it was an accumulation of new and sometimes old information that gradually shifted the network of ideas my mind. Eventually that one decisive factor in a network of ideas resulted in a shift – a reorientation of the network. Reading John's gospel and reading defences of John's gospel were essential parts of the cognitive process. This change for me change was not independent of thinking. However, the exact nature of my change in thinking was shaped by my desires, my will and my openness to new ideas. It was thinking but it was very personal thinking – not at all an objective linear path that all others could inevitably be led down.

That doesn't mean all my questions on John's gospel's are resolved. There remain questions about the nature of the long speeches and their language which are unique to John's gospel. On the other hand, I have also gained more information about the eyewitness descriptions of Jerusalem unavailable to later authors – information buried in 70 AD and lost until recent archaeological investigations. What is our overall conclusion about John's gospel? This will be determined by how we weigh certain evidence that is available to us. People will weigh the evidence in different ways. Thoughts are not independent of the minds that formulate them.

The Christian view sees the knower as integral to what they are knowing. The degree to which this dynamic affects conclusions, depends on the topic. The big questions of God's existence and Jesus's historicity are ones in which biases, ignorance, openness and human willingness are inextricably linked to the conclusions – for better or worse.