Comfortable Faith

I’m gonna take a risk.

I’m gonna risk some criticism or maybe a little judgment.

It wouldn’t be the first time. Easy access to twitter or facebook or any other social media app on a smart phone opens the door for anyone to express themselves and their opinion – educated opinion or not. No offense, but arming oneself with little to no information on a particular subject doesn’t qualify you or me to weigh in on everything

Here’s the question.

Do you ever get comfortable living life by faith? Are you supposed to?

If you answer “yes” then I suppose you can stop reading and go back to your life.

Really? Really at ease, with a slow heart rate and low blood pressure kind of trust in God for everything?

I have to confess that, just when I think “I’m there!” something else comes along to make me realize that, sometimes, my faith is hard to locate.

Where did it go? It was just here! I was on a roll!

Then, with one phone call, a piece of mail or a message out of the blue, I’m sidelined . . . out of the game until I can get my wobbly size 11s taped up and get back out there.

I’m not a young person anymore. There are days I still feel like one, when fewer parts ache or nag at me with a “this-is-taking-a-lot-longer-to-heal-than-it-should” kind of reminder, but youth (at least as defined by the real world) is a thing of the past.

And I’m just wondering, will I ever get this faith thing down???

I think I’m fooling myself by claiming to live by faith, to live in faith when/if everything is perfectly set before me – when the jobs are secure, when the bank account sufficiently full and adequately refilling on a regular basis, when the market is rising, when the bills are paid, when the body is working as it should and the future is bright . . . and I can see it!

I wrote a song a few years ago called “Trust in You”. The first words were:

I don’t trust my eyes anymore
They’re easily deceived
Too often led astray by things
That cannot be believed
Smoke and mirrors
Slight of hand
Make a mockery of the truth
I don’t trust my eyes anymore . . .
But God I still trust You

People ask, all the time, “Who or what is that song about?”. If there’s a real answer or a real story, I’ll give it but lots of times, the song is about what I perceive to be all of us. I guess I want it to be about all of us because I don’t want to admit that it might be just about me! Heck, I don’t want to be alone in this. Who does? And lots of songs are about the person I’d like to be, not necessarily the person I am right now.

I’m do a song most nights called “Sing for Joy” written by Clint Lagerberg. The chorus is very singable and, most nights, people join in.

I will sing for joy
The joy of the Lord
In the middle of it all

And almost every night I tell the audience that this song is not necessarily how I live but how I’d like to live. And it ain’t easy.

Back to faith . . .

There are seasons where, even if things are shaky, even if things around me are in chaos, that I can literally feel the presence of God. I know most of you have felt that, too. But if I said I’ve never ever felt abandoned, I’d be less than truthful. There’s a huge difference in feeling abandoned and being abandoned though. The aftermath of the feeling is usually the proof that I never was alone – that God was faithful and present.

So there are times when faith is weak (and maybe for you, it’s today) that I force myself to look back and take stock of the faithfulness of God in my past. I didn’t say my faithfulness or even my belief . . . but His.

I don’t know why it’s so hard to let God love us. Maybe it’s because we simply don’t believe we’re actually worthy of Him. Ok, let’s get this straight . . . we’re not. One thing sets us right, one thing makes us lovable, one thing makes it possible for God to see us as worthy. The blood of His Son. And when I take a deep breath, put aside all my efforts to “be good” or to prove my worth to my Creator, then I can let Him love me, let Him take care of me. The more I see that image of Him as God and me as a loved child, the slower my heart beats and the peace that passes understanding takes over.

He holds the future and He will take care of it.

Peace.

Wayne