Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” – John 6:28-29
Faith is a calling. It is backed up by a universe of tangible facts about the goodness and greatness of God. Yet faith is still an extension of trust outward so that we are certain of what we do not see.
Faith is a process. Believing is a flow of relationship–back and forth–a continual conversation of a person and The Person. That’s why faith builds over time. The conversation courses back and forth; you go over old topics you’ve shared with God as well as new subjects, questions you never would have thought to ask years ago. But with each declaration we make to God, whether it’s thanks or praise or pain or anguish, that link gets stronger. And when we listen to God, the certainty that he is there in all of his greatness and goodness becomes firm ground beneath our feet.
For most people, the process of belief-building doesn’t happen along a completely smooth, upward path. Believing may surge ahead with new insights and convictions, but may also get bogged down, slowed so that it looks motionless, or even on the slide. We can have fits of temper when we stomp our feet and declare that we will not believe, like a teenager asserting independence. Or we may race down a faith road that is off course, only to find ourselves confused and retracing our steps–if we are wise about it. On our best days, believing is like a walk–steady, progressive, intentional. It may be the walk of friends, or the march of the soldier into some battleground of life. Our steps toward God are sometimes lunging, at other times running, or creeping, or stumbling. Style is not the issue, and it’s better to fall toward God than away from him. One foot in front of the other, and you’ll be moving toward the destination.
Faith is an invitation. For all the teaching that Jesus did from one village to the next in Galilee, and among the imposing pillars of Solomon’s portico at the temple in Jerusalem, it all boils down to this: Believe. Which is not to say believe in anything you choose. It is an invitation to believe the realities that Jesus explained as meticulously as a carpenter carving and piecing together wood into the furniture of life. It is to believe him, and in him–and in the believing, to gain the “right to become children of God.”
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