Faith is such a strange word. I know.. I know.. it is not a word that you would usually describe as strange. But hear me out! On one hand, we use it to reference hope. “I have faith that God will… (insert object of faith here)”. You can also use to build someone up… “I have such faith in you!” or to thank someone… “You’ve been so faithful!” On the other hand, when the going gets tough, faith isn’t so happy and cheerful of a word. It is something that we moan and groan about. It is something that, at times, we actually have to work really hard to develop. We chastise ourselves for not having enough of it. We worry that we are having faith in the wrong things, which usually means we are having no faith at all. Many times we have ‘pretend’ faith. We say that we have faith in something with our mouths, but in our hearts there is doubt the size of the red sea itself. The object of our uncertainty feels as wide as the sea and the obstacles as dangerous as the whole Egyptian army.
Maybe I am the only one that feels this way, I don’t know! I just know that so many times I have to *force* myself to have faith, and I get so fet up with myself for not just having it in the first place!! I know exactly how the disciples must have felt when Jesus said them, “Ye of little faith!” Some theatrical versions of that show Jesus chastising the disciples, lecturing and upset at them. But for some reason this isn’t how I picture it. I see Jesus shaking his head and smiling, “Ah, Ye of little faith. Don’t you know? My children, don’t you see?” Jesus is patient with us and knows our short-comings. He knows where we struggle and he meets us at our point of need.
Today, I am taking many steps of faith. I feel I have 2 roads in front of me. One looks like a scary road that makes me gulp looking down it. The other is a nice highway that looks really appealing. Most times it would make ‘logical’ sense to take the comfortable easy route, assuming that God was pointing that way. But it seems like today He isn’t pointing at all. There is no neon sign saying “Yo Krista, go this way! Love, God.” He is just saying ‘Have Faith in me Krista’ and I am supposed to figure out which way on my own. In my heart, I know the answer. The desires of my heart lay at the end of the bumpy scary road. The Bible promises that God will give you the desires of your heart. I think many times we don’t receive them because we aren’t willing to go down the bumpy scary road.
I had great plans of being faithful to my blog this week, but, well, life happened. Work has been crazy busy and I’m just needing to make it through this week! In fact, I’ll be working on my quarter payroll tax file tonight while watching Biggest Loser, go figure!
Writing related? Well, the guidelines for the Genesis contest were released yesterday, which I’m uber excited about. I found ACFW last year about a month too late to enter, which was good though because my manuscript wasn’t even close to ready! I think it is about there now, and I’m excited to enter! Please keep me in your prayers as I fine tune my manuscript(s) for preparation to enter.
Regardless if I final or win, I’m really excited to get the feedback. I entered a contest a few months ago and got such helpful feedback and made much needed changes, so I’m curious to see if people have a better reaction or not.
It is also spurring me on to edit LOL faster! I’m doing a read through at the moment and am 2/3rds of the way through. It’s amazing how many little things I still find, missing words like the and a, and just things that now sound really stupid. Did I really write that?? Ha!
I’m entering Genesis as well. I joined too late last year…funny, we’re kinda the same there. I wasn’t ready then, either.
Are you entering any more contests? I am finding them fun, exciting, scary…but worth it when you get the feedback from the judges. It’s great!
I might… if I know about them! if you know of any good fiction contests for unpubed authors I’m always game:-)
They are fun exciting and scary! There’s that pit your stomach that say’s “Ack, what if they hate me!” but it is usually so worth it, even if you don’t win, to get the judges feedback.