Simple Faith

I long for simple faith. I wish I could easily proclaim orthodox understandings without wondering, "Do I really believe that?"

But I don't have simple faith. I have complicated, agonized faith. Unclear thoughts that roam free, untethered to words or reason. So, I blog in search of clarity. I write to nail down those pesky, free-flying, out-of-focus thoughts. I want to look at them up close. Examine them and see if we can be friends.

Well, starting right now, I blog.

I am propelled in this direction by the convergence of three random things.

First: my husband told me yesterday, out of the blue, I should write more.

Second: my chair of Outreach for our church said last night our church needs a blog (this is not that, but might be a precursor). This got me thinking about blogging.

Third, in wandering around the internet this morning, I ran across a link from a Norwegian pastor to the website "Desiring God." I glanced at it and moved on. A couple hours later I googled "pastors and blogs." The first link was to John Piper's blog entitled "6 Reasons Pastors Should Blog." He is the owner of the Desiring God site. I should stumble on the same website quite by accident, TWICE? By the way, the article was compelling.

So here I am.

And now I can give you an immediate example of my spiritual struggle.

On one hand, I view those three random incidents as The Hand Of God. That's the simple faith I long for. God at work in the details of my life. Guiding and shaping and opening doors. I do believe that.

My head is screaming, "Are you kidding me? You think God has nothing better to do than lead you, via Norway for crying out loud, toward a place where you can write about things you barely grasp?"

My simple spirit shouts back: "Yep."

And that's when the fight started...