Simple Faith for a Complex Life

 October 14, 2022

Faith was easy when life was simple. As a boy, I can remember thinking about the responsibility that weighed on my father’s shoulders. Young boys don’t usually think about such things, but I did, and was amazed that week after week as he went to work and came home, my entire life, and that of my mother, my brother, and my sister, rested in his hands. “What if he lost his job? What if he got sick and died?” Those questions weren’t continually on my mind; I was just a boy after all, but those thoughts regularly flitted across the face of my consciousness.

I grew up, and that responsibility shifted to my shoulders, but also to my wife’s as we both worked and shared the financial responsibility for the family. But those were normal times; our jobs were pretty well guaranteed, and though we didn’t make tons of money, we were comfortable and secure. We still are, but looming all around us is the spectre of normal becoming only a memory. Our nation is in catastrophic debt, our culture is fragmenting, people are actually believing that emotion is more determinative of life than biology, violence and fear are flooding our cities and towns. Life is anything but simple.

But it is for complex and difficult times that faith exists. It takes little faith to trust in God when all is well. Why does anyone need God when every need is being met? It is when life comes crashing down on us that we need faith to carry us through. When I cannot see a positive outcome, I need something to lean on that is bigger than my circumstance. I need God.

Over the past dozen years or so, life for me has become more complex. I’m not complaining; by all measurements, my life is far better than that of most people in the world. But compared to what my life had been before, it is now far more complex and challenging than ever before. Less and less is within my circle of control, which means more and more I need to lean hard on God. So I do. And he continues to bear me up and keep me going, for which I am grateful tonight.