Everyone Has Faith in Something
“Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” Hebrews 11:1
This morning as I begin writing I approached my chair, and without thinking I just sat down. Now, that may not sound so spectacular to you until you realize that it was, in fact, a fairly large act of faith. You might think, “What do you mean? You see the chair, it’s right in front of you and you just sit in it. No big deal.” Yes, but how do I really know the chair will hold me? Actually, how do I even know the chair exists? It could just be a figment of my imagination.
You see, we are pretty limited in what we know, aren’t we? It may seem like we can know a whole bunch, but we really don’t. We accept much of life upon faith. “And so,” you may ask, “what is this thing you call faith?” Instead of giving you some sort of proper definition, let me simply put it this way: faith is sitting in the chair.
It’s not blind faith as we sometimes call faith, since I can see the chair and there are plenty of logical arguments for the fact that this particular chair will hold my weight. But faith is actually sitting in the chair. Faith is letting my weight rest fully upon it.
You can probably see where I’m going with this. Everyone has ultimate faith in something. You may know someone who says “I don’t believe in God because I am a scientist! Science is logical and relies upon facts!” Well, any good scientist will tell you that, yes, even science is built upon faith. There is no scientist that knows everything, or every outcome to every test he or she might perform.
In fact, there is no scientist that can guarantee with absolute certainty that the result of the same experiment produced over and over again will produce the same result. There is a strong element of faith involved. It’s not that there aren’t good reasons to believe it, but at the end of the day it is still faith to believe it.
Okay, so you may be thinking, “Great this is supposed to be my devotional, and it’s getting all philosophical and stuff. Yuck.” Well, let’s bring it home, then. There are many wonderful reasons for you to believe and trust in God this very day. There are wonderful arguments (many we’ve already covered) on why you can and should trust God with your life.
But here’s the thing: Faith is sitting in the chair. Faith is putting your full weight upon him.
Now sometimes we look at other people and we think, “Wow, they have great faith, but my faith is so small.” Listen, it’s not about you, or how big or great your faith is. It is about the object of your faith! Faith is not something that you are doing or producing, it is simply the act of trusting and resting in the thing that is big enough to hold you. So, today don’t beat yourself up for having small faith, but instead turn and sit in the chair, so to speak. Put your full weight upon him. I promise he can hold you.