September 2024
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
-Hebrews 11:1
Frederick Buechner, in his book Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC, wrote that faith is better understood as a verb than as a noun, as a process than as a possession. He went on to talk about friendship, that there is no real way to PROVE that your friend is your friend; that they are not merely harboring ulterior and purely selfish motives. What deep friendship requires is faith.
And so it is with our faith in God. There is no microscope or telescope that can give us irrefutable scientific proof of God’s goodness or existence. Do we harbor doubts? Yes, we do, if we care about truth. Doubt isn’t the opposite of faith, but rather it becomes an element of faith. Doubt ensures that faith remains a verb: an active practice.
In C.S. Lewis’ fantasy tale, The Silver Chair, the protagonists, while traveling in underground caverns, encounter a witch who tries to convince them that everything beautiful they remember about the world above (like the trees, the sky, the sun) was all really just a dream that they imagined. In a heroic rebuttal, one of the heroes (Puddleglum) said if that’s true, their ‘imaginary world’ was far preferable to the witch’s supposed ‘real world’. He would live according to faith in the better world, even without irrefutable proof. That’s faith.
We struggle with evil and suffering, which can lead us to doubt God’s goodness. We cannot make light of sin and death. But what strengthens my faith is the question: where then DOES goodness and love come from, if not from a good and loving source (God)? Because I believe that love exists. People really do make sacrifices for the good of those they love. And while there are horrors and evils around us, that is not the whole story.
As it says in the letter to the Hebrews: faith itself becomes evidence that hope is not in vain; that there is more to life than what meets the eye. Praise God for this truth, revealed to us in deep friendship with Jesus.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Matthew