Lately, I've been longing for a good friend. Someone that I can truly talk to and someone who will understand. Someone who shares my beliefs and even my level of compassion. I found myself imagining what I would say to that someone about who I am and what I desire in a friendship with them. Things like: someone to talk to, someone to encourage me, someone to help me get my faith straight. Someone to discuss parenting strategies with - let's face it babies are cute and cuddly and really don't need a lot of parenting, but I'm approaching a parenting stage with my almost toddler that terrifies me! Late night feeds, poopy diapers, and concerns over sleep/feed strategies were a breeze for me. It's the discipling and emotional regulation stuff that scares the crap out of me!!!…...
Getting back to my original train of thought. In this conversation in my head, in the middle of the night, with an imaginary soon-to-be bestie-sister-of-the-faith. I said to her: "I really need someone to help me with my faith, cause I've been failing at it lately". Here's the part that really struck me - "who am I kidding, I've always failed at my faith". WOW. There are so many things I could say about that. I've always failed at my faith. What does that mean to me? Well I suck at doing devotions (like it never happens dispite all my good intentions or planned routines). I never seem to remember to thank God for the good stuff, I'm always turning to Him when I'm in need or hurting. Church is a hit and miss in our house (I'm usually good at finding excuses to avoid the crowds). Family devotions or even praying over meals doesn't happen. And don't even ask me to quote a Bible verse, my memorization skills are lacking. See, my friend, I FAIL at faith.But wait a minute - there is another side of my rational brain that is saying "HOLD THE BUS. YOU ARE LYING TO YOURSELF". The stuff I just described is all a legalistic faith is it not? Sure we need to attend to and do these things (devotions, church, etc) to grow our faith, but does not doing them necessarily mean I am failing at faith itself? I fully be alive there is God. I know Jesus is my Saviour and Lord. He Died. He Rose again, for me, for my sins. I am saved because I accepted His gift of grace. Isn't that TRUE faith?
Hebrews 11:1 NIV "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see."
Wow, I don't actually fail at faith. I'm not a horrible Christian. I'm not faithless. Yes, I need to work on a few things and be a little more disciplined within my faith-walk. But that doesn't make me faithless...
