Devotionals by Dr. M. Craig Barnes
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
We sometimes hear people speak of faith as if it were a possession. "Do you have faith?" they ask us. "Keep the faith," they encourage, "because the last thing you ever want to do is lose your faith." But this language is foreign to the Bible. Faith isn't something that we get; it's something that gets us. We don't possess it; we are possessed by it.
It's analogous to another of the Bible's favorite words, which is love. We don't actually say, "I have love for you." We say, "I'm in love with you." It is a way of saying that the love has grabbed hold of me, taken over me, overwhelmed me. My life isn't mine anymore. That is how we should think about faith. It grabs hold of us and changes everything about us. Our life isn't our own anymore.
Faith emerges not because we've argued ourselves into believing, or because we've found the courage to take a leap of faith. It isnšt primarily a matter of the intellect or emotions, but the will. Faith is a choice to believe made for the same reason people choose to love. We get smitten by it.
The legacy of faith is that it makes you hopeful. That's not because you have faith in what will happen, but because you choose to believe you are loved by God no matter what happens. Only then are you free to enjoy the unpredictable mystery of life.
-- Craig Barnes