What is Faith?

Without faith, it is impossible to please God (Heb. 11:6).

Under the shadow of your wings I seek shelter

until harm passes by (Ps. 57:2).

What, then, is the faith that pleases God?  Is it a kind of courage or bravado?  Is it trying to believe things that we are not yet sure about?  Is it a hope that in the end, everything will be okay?

Faith is really none of these things, but instead a quiet confidence that God "has our back"  --- always.  That He cannot fail us in any circumstance....that we can seek shelter under the shadow of His wings until the disaster has passed by.

Faith is confidence.  And how do we acquire this confidence?  It is not manufactured out of nothing, but has a background and a basis.  It grows in relationship and in conversation.  It comes from experience, from "walking with God" all the days of our life, in good times and in bad. 

We cannot wait until we need faith to develop it; it must be growing today if we are to eat its fruit tomorrow.  Today, we plant the seed by turning to God in the smallest things of our lives.  Tomorrow, we cultivate the plot, driving away the birds and beasts that would devour the seed, by once again bringing to the Lord every event of our lives---Good is the Lord to one who waits for him, to the soul that seeks him (Lamentations 3:25).

One way to develop faith, or to watch it grow, is to keep a journal of the events we bring to the Lord.  Most of us pray and then forget what we prayed when the disaster has passed us by.  But if we keep track of our prayers, we soon begin to discover the subtleties of the Lord's action on our behalf.  What we think of as "coincidence" we begin to see as the Lord's answer to our specific cries.  If we forget we cried out, we do not understand that the Lord heard us.

Nothing is too hard for God.  In the Book of Isaiah, He says, Is my arm too short, that I cannot save?  Everything is within His reach, within the scope of His action.  But we must pray with confidence that (1) He hears us, and (2) that He cares. 

I have heard people say, "I sure God doesn't care whether we find a parking space."  Here's my question:  "Do you care?"  "Does someone you love care?"  If the answer is yes, then I think that God cares too.  Why don't we just ask and find out?  If we think He doesn't care, we won't ask.  If we think He doesn't hear, we won't ask.  But if we have the confidence to ask, we will receive.