Peter's Challenge: FAITH

In my previous post (Peter's Challenge: 8 Weeks to Love), I talked about my "eight weeks to love" plan, and my first step was faith, the most tough and most foundational step. After about two weeks of deliberation, I finally grabbed a faint hold of my idea of faith. Since faith is the foundation for the attributes to follow, the time is absolutely necessary.

When I focused on faith the past couple weeks, I realized it requires belief and trust in something or someone. I realized there are some beliefs that can only be held onto by faith. Sometimes, you must have definite knowledge of faith, knowing that there is no absolute truth about an idea but at the same time knowing that is can must and only be accepted by faith, infallibly holding an indefinite ideology. The expression of this belief requires trusting God with the rough spots, trusting that God is on my team and will work things out for the better. There are so many aspects of God that I don’t comprehend, but one definite concept is that I am loved and cared for by God. God designed us to live in community and work with one another, and my role is to participate as a unique piece in God’s Creation. This participation requires the output of some of my greatest struggles, in the event that those form much of my being and much of my story. But because of past events, I have trust issues that have allowed me to build up some of the greatest walls against people. So part of I’m discovering that part of the expression of my faith is that I need to allow myself to be vulnerable and loved unconditionally by God and others. The Holy Spirit is making a better story for me, and I must forfeit my story.

Basically, I have been discovering that faith is optimism, a hope for something uncertain, holding onto the hope that things will work out, and knowing that regardless I can trust that God will provide and work things out for the better. I had been trying so long to prove to myself that some things were absolutely true, but that completely defeats the purpose of faith. Sometimes you just gotta hold on tight and see how things roll out.

PS. I had a conversation with the author of the Shack back in August that plays a huge role in some beliefs that I realized I can only hold onto by faith, click here to read it.

Peter's Challenge: 8 Weeks to Love

With the harsh spiritual season of winter this past spring, I spent my summer reconstructing my spiritual life back to a healthy spot. All I could really come up with was that I needed to "love." Returning to Point Loma, although still on the edge, I made my focal point of this year to love others because as a Christian that is what I am called to do. Two weeks ago, I went to my first church service at Flood Church after being back to San Diego, and Scripture reading stuck with me more than any other reference from a church service. The reference was 2 Peter 1:1-9, but the portion that stuck with me came from verses 5-7.

For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith, goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.

Immediately, those verses hit me. I had been focusing on love, and here Peter lays out a "formula" of virtues, leading you to love. I realized, “This is it! A way to construct a virtuous character focused on love!” I admire most that he tells us to "add to," making sure you hold on to what you learned before. At the beginning and the end are the most important ones to remember because "faith" is your foundation and "love" is your goal. Because of this, I am doing an eight week plan to get to love. Each week, I am focusing on a different one of these virtues, hoping that in the end I reach love. The process will not start until I grab a semi-firm grip on faith because it is one of the most important traits. 2 weeks ago I decided I was going to do this plan... and I still haven't left “faith”... I hope I grab ahold of this soon...
As I go along, I will be laying out a timeline/reminder on my wall of the focal words and important dates when something powerful happened or I learned something amazing that will link back to an entry in my journal. Right now, I have “Faith” taped on my wall, with a date (17 Aug 11) which I will get into more detail about when I write my “faith” follow-up blog. I pray that this is a life-changing process and something glorious rises out of it… and I can cut my padawan braid. Pray for wisdom in this time of discovery.

NOTE: For those who don’t know, I have been growing a padawan braid since my spiritual life became rough, and it has become an on-going symbol of my apprenticeship to God and that I am not ready. When God shows me something profound and I am ready, I will cut it off. But until then… it continues to grow.