DEEP FAITH

I have a question for you. Do you think that Jesus spoke more about love or faith? Let's take a survey. How many here think that Jesus talked more about love...raise your hand? How many think he talked more about faith?

Well, using word search on my computer, here are the results. Jesus talked about love 41 times in the four gospels. He talked about faith 116 times.

The story about the doubting Thomas is all about faith. So let's look at faith.

I don't know if we think much about faith. We talk about rules and doctrines...and we talk about faith to some extent, but I don't know if we really give it serious reflection.

Obviously, we have a certain belief in Jesus and look to him as a human being and the Son of God. He led a good life, did wondrous things, died and rose from the dead. We believe in what he taught, by word and deed. We follow him.

That's all good. But there is more to faith than that. While Jesus is the fullest revelation of God, and we go through him to God, I'm not so sure we venture into the depth of faith. Like my playing in the ocean, we wade around in the shallow water, but may be afraid to go out into the deep.

Deep faith begins with a sense of the colossal magnitude of God, and what it means to believe in God.

Let's put it in perspective. The earth, along with eight other planets, revolves around the Sun, one of the many stars that are part of the galaxy called the Milky Way. A galaxy is made up of a large group of stars and other space objects that swirl round and round in a huge circle. 

Now picture this. Light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles a second! This means that in one snap of my fingers, light goes around the world seven times. One snap of the fingers. Seven times. Well, how long would it take light traveling at that speed to cross the width of this great circle of stars called the galaxy? It would take 100,000 years. A hundred thousand years...at the speed of light! That's how big our galaxy is.

There's more. We know that there are other galaxies. Do you know how many? More than three hundred billion. When you think of the size of our galaxy...it takes 100,000 years to get across the diameter at the speed of light. Think about three hundred billion galaxies; it's mind -boggling.

Now, God created this. God is greater than all this. It staggers the mind.

That's what I mean when I say that we have to get beyond the shallow waters of faith, which sees God as sort of a special person out there somewhere. God, this living, loving being that we call God, is utterly beyond our imagination, greater than our comprehension.

When I ponder this, I am filled with awe and wonder at the thought that this great, colossal, holy being called God created me, listens to me, loves me. Probing this very thought is diving into the depth of faith.

How can we possibly believe in someone of that magnitude being so personal? Reason alone is of no help because we're dealing with more than our mind can take in.

Why, then, do we believe? Is it just a wish that maybe there is a loving, living being that is greater than the forces of the universe, and is working to bring it and us all to goodness?

Now we get to the heart of faith. We can believe in God because God takes the initiative to connect with us. For some incomprehensible reason, God created us so that we could relate to God. God made us that way. There is a pull in us toward God that was put there by God. 

Just as a baby is drawn to its mother, we are drawn to God. 

We don't summon faith ourselves. We don't fabricate it, reason our way toward it, and discipline ourselves to believe. It's already in us to be drawn toward God.

What we have to do is allow ourselves to get in touch with this pull towards God. That's what faith is. It's simply sensing this pull towards God, like a baby to its mother.

That's why it's good sometimes to image God as a mother. It's in us to be drawn toward God. That's the way God created us.

Faith is nothing more and nothing less than sensing my connection with God who chose not to be distant, but to be close to me...encircling me, enfolding me. As others have said, It is breathing God's breath and hearing God's heartbeat in mine. It's something very real, not a vague wish. It's already in us.

We simply sense this pull and let ourselves be drawn to God. When I tune into it, and move with that pull, I experience deep faith. And the more I open myself to that awareness, the more I move with it, and my faith gets stronger and stronger.

Let the doubts come. It's such a colossal truth that we can't help but doubt it now and then. But the pull is always there, stronger than any doubt. And when I let go, let God, then I feel a deep down peace that no one can take from me...the peace that Jesus gave in today's gospel. And especially here at Eucharist I learn from Jesus, and I join with him as he did on the cross in laying my whole existence into the hands of this living God.

That's why Jesus talked about faith so much. When we have faith, love follows, and all the rest follows too.

That's why Jesus said, Blessed are those who have not seen, and have believed. What we believe in is more than what we can see. It's more than Jesus' resurrection. It's more than the marks in his hands and the wound in his side. It's more than miracles and apparitions. It's nothing less than this great and unimaginable God who loves us and encircles us and enfolds us. 

We simply experience the pull in us towards this God, and we know with everything in us that it is true, and we go with it, and enjoy it, and we say, Thank you. And wouldn't you know, the Greek word for thanksgiving is Eucharist.