Living by faith

O, to be like one of the disciples, to whom Jesus explained everything in private as the Gospel lesson in Mark tells us. What did He tell them about the Kingdom of God that He did not tell the crowds of ordinary people to whom He spoke through parables? Did He make God’s message clearer to them? I don’t know the answer to that. But what can be much clearer than the image of a tiny mustard seed growing to become a large plant or a kernel of corn growing to a plant that yields a thousand fold in the harvest? Even a child can understand these images of the Kingdom of God as a reality that expands miraculously as our faith grows.


But can we simply live by faith? While the idea is not complicated, the practice seems to be for most of us. We lose our confidence and our faith dims. We struggle with suffering and we draw back, seeking more certainty, more details, and more reassurance. But the Old Testament lesson and the Psalm tell us that during times of affliction, we should be even more confident that God’s will and the Kingdom of God are our refuge. Even while suffering, we need to endure and continue to do the will of God to keep our lives on track. Trusting in the Lord and doing the will of God will make our steps surer and give us more confidence in God’s promises.

We will experience times in the midst of life’s distresses where we will lose our confidence in ourselves and our faith. Those distresses could shake our beings and threaten our sense of our very identities. When that happens, we should draw on our baptism experience and the promises God made to love us and care for us as a member of the body of Christ. Drawing closer to HIm is how we can experience the Kingdom of God and live by faith in confidence and without fear. That enlightenment also means that we should readily and without judgment welcome others into the Kingdom through our church communities. We were reminded that if we would love each other and reassured each other of God’s love, we would see the Kingdom of God grow miraculously. Today I pray that church communities everywhere could confidently love all who seek the Kingdom of God.