Consider these three views:
1. A modern 'faith healer' offers to heal a congregant. They lay hands and pray, but the illness remains. The healer dismisses them, saying, 'This is your problem. You don't have enough faith.'
2. A Christian faces several objections to his beliefs that he cannot answer. He says, 'I don't care what people say, I still have faith.'
3. The famous skeptic Mark Twain said, 'Faith is believing what you know ain't so.'

The answer is that all of these examples offer an incorrect definition or understanding of what Biblical faith is all about. Twain's own definition does correctly (with some negative emphasis) embody the way "faith" is understood by far too many today—but it does not match the Biblical definition of that word, and as the first two examples suggest, "faith" is a badly misunderstood concept in the church at large.

The Greek word behind "faith" in the NT is pistis. As a noun, pistis is a word that was used as a technical rhetorical term for forensic proof. Examples of this usage are found in the works of Aristotle and Quintiallian, and in the NT in Acts 17:31:

> Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.

The raising of Christ is spoken of here as a proof that God will judge the world. If we think about the missionary preaching of the book of Acts, Peter's primary appeal was threefold:
1. He appealed to the evidence of the wonders and signs performed by Jesus;
2. He appealed to the empty tomb;
3. He appealed to fulfillment of OT prophecy.

In short, his appeals were evidentiary. Peter grounded belief in Christianity on evidence—or, as the definition of pistis in Acts 17:31 would put it, proofs.

As deSilva shows, the relationship between the believer and God is framed in terms of an ancient client-patron relationship. As God's "clients" to whom he has shown unmerited favor (grace), our response should be a "constant awareness" of prescribed duties toward those in whom we are indebted. This "constant awareness" is the expression of our faithfulness of loyalty—in other words, this is our pistis, or faith. "Faith" is not a feeling, but our pledge to trust and be reliable servants to our patron (God), who has provided us with tangible gifts (Christ) and proof thereby of His own reliability.

> Mark 6:5-6 And he could there do no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, and healed them. And he marvelled because of their unbelief. And he went round about the villages, teaching.

Some claim this verse indicates that Jesus lacked true miraculous power and excused away an inability to heal real diseases as a lack of faith. The word "unbelief" here is apistia, meaning a lack of pistis. In light of our better understanding of pistis, the problem is indeed not with Jesus but with the lack of loyalty and trust by those who reject Jesus. Like the ungrateful client in the client-patron relationship, the people rejected Jesus as a patron in spite of his acts of grace, thereby dishonoring him. Jesus could not heal these people not because of a lack of power, but because of ingratitude and a rejection of his gracious patronage. A rejected patron could and would never force his gracious gifts upon a client who didn't want them!

> Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Blind faith? Not at all. The list that follows offers examples of people who had been given undeniable proof of God's existence and power. Pistis here is a matter of trust in a God who has demonstrated His ability to be a worthy patron, and the examples are those of clients who, knowing this ability, trust in God's record as a patronal provider. Hebrews 11:1 therefore is telling us that faith (trust in our patron, gained by conviction based on evidence) is the substance (an assurance) of things hoped for (expected by trust), and the evidence of that which is not seen, which in context means we expect, based on past performance, continuing favor from our patron.

In conclusion, faith does not have to be, and was never intended to be, a blind trust. If our faith was supposed to be blind and not grounded in evidence, there would be no reason for God to reveal anything, no reason for Jesus to perform miracles for all to see, and no reason for him to appear to his disciples after he resurrected.