Faith and Pride

What is faith according to the bible?  Faith is the expectant hope of things yet to come and the ability to rely on things we cannot tangibly hold on to.  According to Hebrews 11, “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.” Hebrews 11:1 (NIV)

What does this mean for those of us stuck in the mire and muck of everyday life?  Very little, I think if you don’t think that you’re stuck.  It has been my experience that faith does not come to someone who thinks that life is fine and there is nothing more, until they are faced with a crisis.  Why is this?  I think the answer is dependence.  If you think all is well and there is nothing except the cards you have been dealt, you have no need to look outside your life.  And that is fine. Some people get lost in entertainment, some find some purpose like raising children or in their work.  Maybe you find purpose in being part of something more altruistic like volunteering your time for a cause. There is no need to look for something that can bring comfort and change the life that you know because you are independent.  You have a purpose, you have what you need, and if you don’t have it, you are capable of getting it.  But I think if you don’t know that there is something better, something bigger than yourself and our busy self-involved world, you will live life with a certain resignation. And resignation serves us well until we face the ultimate crises of the human condition: our own mortality.


You’re reading this.  You don’t believe in some ridiculous giant old man in the sky.  All I can give you is my experience.  (And this is my experience enlightened by 20 some years of serious study, personal growth, discipline and reflection. I had little grasp of these things when I first came, blind and wounded and honestly skeptical, into a church.)

For me, the key at the core of Christianity is control. Faced with a crises, I came to a point where I could not put faith in myself or my friends or my family to control the outcome.  They were not capable.  Humans are utterly incapable of controlling even the simplest things that affect our lives – accidents, disease, death, even the weather. That is the reason Christianity comes to people in crisis and people faced with their own mortality. So Christianity is for the weak. Yes. Humans are weak. At the moment I realized I was weak – that I could not control my destiny - that is the moment I let go of my pride.  And pride holds us all hostage: the moment you conquer it, the moment your eyes are opened. You see this dynamic over and over throughout scripture - man’s recorded experience of God. As soon as a person let's go of his pride, his eyes are opened. And looking out in the great vast void beyond my experience, I found that there is someone there staring back at me, waiting for me to let go of it. It wasn’t until I dropped my pride, (“admitted I was powerless,” in the 12 step model) that my eyes were opened to the possibility of a God who would not force himself on me, but waited patiently for me, for 22 years, to save me from myself.