When Faith is Hard to Find

Bebo Norman has a song and one of the lyrics says, “When your faith is hard to find, borrow mine.”  I’m in a place this week where my faith is hard to find.  Things I have been praying about haven’t worked out the way I thought the Lord told me they would.  And that’s hard because I love the Lord.  I don’t remember not loving the Lord.  Honestly.  Some of my earliest childhood memories are of feeling the sweet presence of the Holy Spirit.  I can truthfully say that the Lord Jesus has always been my closest friend.  I love to hear him speak and over the years, I’ve heard so many words from the Lord that have always given direction to my life.  This is the first time I can remember being so far off base in my interpretation of what the Lord said, and though it is still possible I will still see his hand in a mighty and unexpected way, it doesn’t seem probable.

So that line from the Bebo Norman song is resonating… When your faith is hard to find, borrow mine.  I’ve heard people say that they love God but not the church.  I know Christians who don’t go to church for one reason or another.  People who don’t build around themselves a community of believers.  People who think their relationship with the Lord is private and solo.  I’m going to be bold and say that’s no way to live.

I’m going to be honest that this week has shaken me, and my faith IS hard to find.  But I’m borrowing on the faith of so many women the Lord has put in my life over the years, and I’m borrowing on my husband’s faith.  And it’s a sweet, sweet picture of what the church should be – what the church is in its best form.

Matthew 18:20 says “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” I know this is true.  I have reached out in desperation to my tried and true college friends – my sisters.  I have sent texts and called them in tears, unable to speak for long periods of silence.  I have reached out to close friends in Winston, who have responded with calls and texts of assurance.   One Bible Study member and dear friend left the bag pictured above on my porch while I was napping with my kids.  She did that within hours of receiving a group text and told me in our phone call later that "Cake makes everything better."  She was right. I have texted and emailed friends from Charlotte, ladies I knew for only two short years when I was newly married.  Women who have sent back long emails and even called me to encourage me with practical advice and lists of “to dos.”  I am beyond blessed to have so many beautiful, precious friends that span so many years in my corner.  I have heard God speak in every single one of their voices when I am unable to hear his voice on my own.  They have given words of encouragement from their own lives, from their marriages, from their knowledge of me.  Some have known me long enough to remind me of who I am in the Lord – of where I have been and the ways I have seen God move.  They have leant their faith, and in the midst of all these interactions, I know the Spirit is moving. 

Emily and Marianne, two of my friends from my college years, have both shared advice from Marianne’s sweet father, a godly man who passed away last year.  In his words: “Don’t listen to your feelings, listen to the truth.”  The truth is that God is good, God is fair, He is for me not against me.  He is for our family.  He has plans to use Andy and me in ways that glorify him, which is the greatest joy and privilege we can imagine.  All of that is true no matter what my feelings are saying, and praise the Lord for the community he has placed around me and my family who can speak this truth when Satan’s lies are creeping in.

You can’t do faith alone.  You just can’t.  It is when two or more are gathered in the name of the Lord that you can be sure he is there.  It is when people gather together that the truth is more clear and easier to grasp.  And today, in the midst of my struggle, I can praise God for the community he has given.