"Sometimes when I pray I feel stupid. I feel like I'm just talking to the air or my ceiling..."As she sits across from me I listen to her vulnerable honesty about her frustrations and confusion. She goes on to explain how she's grown up knowing ABOUT God. She's ALWAYS been in church. But something was missing. As I look through her glistening eyes I see a longing to experiencing the VERY REAL, VERY PRESENT, God she has read and studied about for most of her life. I listen to her desire to know this sweet Savior more intimately and personally, but her doubt of this miraculous, unseen Father makes it seem impossible, even foolish. How does she put her faith in and give her life to someone she can't even see?I feel like we've all faced times of doubt where we have asked these very same questions. The struggles this beautiful child asks are not as "silly" or "out there" as she believes. I've met with many girls that have struggled with the same questions along their journey of faith. To which I have to reply isn't that what the journey of faith is all about... asking questions, seeking answers, and discovering just how REAL and PRESENT our LIVING God really is!
Hebrews 11 tells us that "Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen. It gives us assurance about things we cannot see." Faith IS believing in what we cannot see. We could never grasp faith if we never sought after and questioned that which we cannot see. I've discovered that its in my seeking that faith develops more. The more I seek, the more real He becomes to me, and the more confident I become in my own faith.
Over the past few weeks I've been stuck on these verses below. Colossians 1:15 says "He (Jesus) is the image of the invisible God" It all starts with Jesus. Jesus makes this seemingly invisible, distant, fantasy God become VERY visible, close, and incredibly real. Infact, Jesus has become the most real thing in the world to me. Jesus resembles all that God is. The gospel of John explains this so clearly. Chapter 1 says "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God" & vs 14 goes on to say "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." By humbling himself and becoming a man- He made himself accessible to us. Because of Jesus we can now encounter our loving Father God. And since Jesus is the image of the invisible, we will discover more about this wonderful King by consuming ourselves with His word! Jesus is the Word so the word is the most tangible picture of who God is. When you seek God by reading His Word the invisible suddenly becomes visible. And the more you get to know Him the more you will want to know Him. And soon you won't feel so "foolish" because He will become the only thing in this world that makes sense.
That's all for now... enjoy discovering more about this "Not so Invisible God!"
"So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the WORD of God" Romans 10:17
