Faith

Faith - believing in something you cannot see, trust.

Faith seems almost like an emotion in that it is like fine silk, passing through our lives, just as silk slides through our fingers.

Sometimes faith is strong, sometimes it is weak. Sometimes faith is in people which for the most part will at some point fail on you. Sometimes faith is in material goods, that are lost, stolen, destroyed, lose value. Sometimes faith is in this or that god either contrived or known.

Faith is personal. It changes over time due to our experience with it or from knowledge received because of it. It may change as we change in our perception of the world around us, events or just how we feel a certain day.

Sometimes though one's faith in a particular instance may be in some primary entity in one's life, like God, with a capital G, referring to the god of the Israelites of ancient Palestine and later the nation of Israel.

As the story of the Bible unfolded through the Old Testament and into the New Testament, followers of Jesus began to accept the God of the Israelites as their own God to worship. These followers were comprised not only of Jews but also from non-Jews in various parts of the Mediterranean world of that time. This group expanded over time landing more so in Europe than in other places.

It seems that around the time of the Reformation, that an element of Christianity lost for many centuries to the masses, that of personal faith started reappearing. Instead it seems to have been gobbled up by organized religion in the emergence of the Catholic Church, that becoming the official religion in many countries.

Martin Luther with his writings started questioning the official church on several points among them faith.

Which brings us via fast forward to today.

Personal faith - that which one can claim as their stake to which the rest of their life is tied. We all have faith of one kind or another, something we believe in to help us in times of need, something to cling to, trust, relate to.

Hope

Hope springs eternal... so said -Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man, Epistle I, 1733.

Statements that last that long, down through human memory or postings not lost, must have some validity, else they would have been lost in the shadows of time.

At some point Hope must give way to Trust for while we may hope something may happen, if it is to come to fruition at some point we must Trust that it will else we are hoping on air.

Trust seems to go hand in hand with Faith that He that puts desires in our hearts puts Hope and Trust there as well.

Rush Limbaugh once said something that has stuck with me since then - "Words mean things". I know they mean things from painful experience. I've known many words that hurt either by my usage of them towards others or others towards me. I also know the painful experience of using words when I was using them without understanding.

Therefore going back to Faith, Trust and Hope what do they mean beyond the dictionary meaning to me?

There is the blurb in the Bible that says - Faith is the evidence of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen. Based on past performance we hope things will continue in that same vein and our faith is believing in things we cannot see be it God or some action we have faith in people to perform.

Trust is built on repeated actions either by God or man, a pattern emerges of their actions and thus a trust relationship with this is formed. From time to time they may not act as we would have them act but as they continue to show the continued pattern that what they say they will do, trust continues to grow.

Hope is more nebulous for while it may be a product of faith and / or trust, it may also be for some new action as well.

Sometimes though these all seem to blend into a fluid almost blended set of actions so that we may forget that they are indeed unique parts. They may be like a biscuit in that a biscuit is made of many individual parts but we usually don't think of them.

Broken hearted

Thought sparks from many different occasions. While reading another blog's comment section there was the notation - blog torture, it should be a crime along with talk about a corn harvest reminded me of corn feeding the world.

It also made me think of broken hearted. Odd that two such seemingly random thoughts should come from the same root. This post will not seek to tie those two thoughts together for other than coming out of my head, with its own random thoughts, I see no connection at this point.

As to broken hearted it is often hard to put a handle on such unless one has some specific event or cause to tie it too and even then it may be hard to describe just how such affects us. This will be an attempt to do so for one specific situation.

At the moment I am broken hearted for some I love and care deeply for but am unsure how to reach out to with that love and deep care without pushing them away. I feel so inadequate on so many fronts, in this relationship, as I wander through this minefield of thought, speech and actions.

Prayer has helped in some respects as I seek wisdom, ask for guidance that I will act, do, say only those things that are not hurtful, are helpful, that explain what I believe without denigrating their beliefs, loving them, coming along side them, being there for them in whatever life throws their way, letting them know that they are family even if they are not biological or in any way legal in family.

We adopt those who we feel kinship with just as we too are adopted by others to include in circles of love and admiration and make them family. Most people don't realize this but I believe such to be fact if one cared to analyze this for what it truly is.

Why am I broken hearted? I am broken hearted because I know how inadequate I am in this respect. I feel that I've missed the mark, that while I had hoped for one thing, that hope is diminished. I do trust that perhaps progress that I cannot see, is there, that in some small way, my inadequate and bumbling actions, will not negatively effect this relationship or any other relationship.

Some of this comes from our modern world where we seek instant gratification, everything tied up in a neat little package like a TV show resolving everything in a short time frame instead of realizing that relationships with people take time, as each party feels out the other, ideas are exchanged, hearts blend together in common purpose while maintaining individual purpose as well.

I need comfort in the fact that I have done nearly all allotted to me for this time and space and that I must trust to the future the opportunity to come again to further till the soil, water the plants or reap the harvest of a relationship well founded.

Yardsticks

Whether we like it or not, we are measured each day. We are measured by our fellow human beings that we come in contact with or who know us from a distance. Relatives, friends, coworkers, customers all measure us in each situation we face.

We are measured against their yardstick for that particular situation. Sometimes we measure the full length of the yardstick, sometimes we even measure beyond the yardstick but often we most likely fall short of those doing the measuring with their particular yardstick.

We, too, may have our own personal yardstick either self imposed or perhaps by one's god. A yardstick we must measure up to or feel like a failure. I am often reminded of a storybook character, when thinking my yardstick is best. That character is one of my favorite characters yet he too had faults, chief among which I believe to have been beating himself up over not measuring up to his self imposed yardstick. That character was Horatio Hornblower.

While yardsticks may give us a degree of measurement, whose yardstick is most important? One can waste their life trying to measure up to other people's yard sticks or one can determine the important one and go with that.

Some times it can be difficult finding the yardstick to best measure by but once found provides a standard and a peace of not having to worry about what others think one should use.

While I have not necessarily found my yardstick, I do know that it will not be other's or mine that I follow. That said, what other yardstick is there? It seems that it would be God's.

While I know I can never measure up to His yardstick, I can always strive to and having strived can rest assured that having tried my best, that such will find favor with Him.

When tragedy strikes

Often the question comes when tragedy strikes - where was God?

God allows certain events to happen, that we deem tragedy, and often it is to us, to create change, deepen commitments, open new avenues of service to name a few.

Discovering this morning the tragic news of a couple, who had adopted 12 children, many of which were special needs, found murdered in their home last Thursday in Florida, is one such event.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/07/10/Florida.couple.killed/index.html

I have no answers to this question only compassion for the children left behind.

Finding Comfort

In the summer of 2003 my Mom's youngest sister died of cancer. We had known of her status as being terminal for several months and it saddened us deeply but she told us not to fret for she knew where she was going once her life with us had ended.

She was an aunt I held in high regard for we shared many common interests among them learning and preserving our family history. While I cannot say I got the passion for genealogy from her, she encouraged me as I pursued our history sometimes together or on separate paths.

I saw her for the last time one week prior to her passing. Even then she wanted me to provide her with information for her calendar of the dates for her grandparents which I did. Even though the morphine and the pain must have been horrific still she was thinking of others at that late stage.

At the funeral I found comfort not in the words the minister said but in the music played or sung. I don't recall any particular song that was played at the funeral only that they were comforting.

The old songs brought me comfort even before the funeral as songs for such an occasion ran through my mind. The tunes kick in from time to time also bring remembrance.

I have found little or no comfort in the modern songs of the religious tone. The old hymns now largely forgotten waiting to be sung are rich with words of comfort if one takes the time to listen to what they have to say.

My aunt had planned her own funeral but I don't believe she really knew how big an impact her life had had upon others. Our family is not large but friends, co-workers, people whose life she had touched all came to bid her farewell. The procession from the funeral home to the cemetery about 15 miles away was the largest procession I have ever seen for a non-royal person.

We were about half way in the procession because I didn't get in the family line and yet many vehicles were behind us. At least 75 vehicles comprised the procession. As we passed through the town, men on a construction site stopped their work, removed their hats in respect. Further on a woman mowing her lawn stopped as well.

Now six years have come and gone since her passing and I still miss her. I find comfort in the old songs who tell of where she's gone, where she's waiting for her family.