Gritty Faith

Lent begins. And on Sunday I'm breaking away a little from the usual Lectionary passage and looking at a passage from Romans chapter 10 (verses 8-13) about faith. For Paul, faith is a gritty concept. There is nothing easy or sentimental about it. When you consider his life, and how he changed from being a persecutor to proclaimer of the Christian way, you realize he did nothing by halves. He was an 'all or nothing' kind of guy.

Faith was something that was deeply embedded in his being. It was his heartbeat. He breathed faith. Yet that faith also had concrete expression. It was a faith in certain concepts and understandings of who Jesus was and what Jesus had done for him on the Cross. It was a faith rooted in the current activity of God, expressed through resurrection power and the activity of the Holy Spirit.

It was faith that fermented into actions that expressed the Kingdom of God at work in the world. It drove him to do things and go places and take risks and rise to unimagined challenges. It graced his life with confidence, hope and joy, even in the midst of the darkest outward circumstances.

I came across this video of the hymn “It is well with my soul”... that tells of the life that lies behind words. As with Paul, what is revealed is not wishy-washy faith, but faith as true grit.

Wherever and whoever you are... I would encourage you to make the most of this season for reflection and contemplation. Our lives are driven by our inner principles. The Christian gospel suggests that one of the most powerful of those can be faith.

"When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, 

When sorrows like sea billows roll;

Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say, 

It is well, it is well, with my soul. "

(Horatio G. Spafford )