Fear

None of this means that faith is easy. It lives on the precipice of fear.

See, when faith opens your eyes, light floods in. And anywhere that light floods in, the shadows seems to grow taller. When you decide to believe in God, to truly believe in Him and take Him at His Word and live like the Lord of the Universe is not setting you up, the monsters you face grow bigger. At least, it seems that way.

The world asks more of you. The mountains are taller. You discover that when you do the smallest little thing in faith, you suddenly are faced with a bigger thing and a bigger thing and a bigger thing, all designed to get you to reach one conclusion: this one must be impossible. 

The first thing was hard. The second harder still. The third...harder. But this one? This one is harder even than that, and at some point, you'll start to think that you're reaching the point where faith can't. You'll start to think you're reaching a mountain that faith can't move, a road that faith can't take, a step that faith can't make. And the funny thing is that even for all the mountains, for all the monsters, for all the shadows, it is never faith that will fail you.

It is you who will fail faith.

Because as we saw yesterday, faith doesn't worry about such things. Faith knows, and it knows you can. When the mountains get too big, when faith seems so small, it is not faith that is failing; it is you. Faith believes it can because it still knows that it can. But you don't. You don't know any more, and you start to doubt.

This is the challenge of faith.

The paradoxical nature of faith, real faith, is this: even though it lives on the precipice of fear, faith does not fear. Sometimes, its breath still catches in its throat a bit. But never in fear. When faith catches its breath, it's always in awe and anticipation. Always humbled by the realization that this, too, is happening. This, too, is real. 

Faith sits on the narrowest ledges and dangles its feet off the side. It jumps from the highest places, dives to the deepest depths, walks deliberately into the most dangerous brambles because it knows where God is calling it, and it knows that wherever God is calling it, there is something amazing going on. But that doesn't mean that faith is unaware. Faith knows acutely the ledges on which it sits. It knows full well the heights from which it jumps. It knows the pressure of the depths. It knows the tangles of every vine, the prick of every bramble. And it holds its breath.

But it goes anyway. It goes because this...this is the place that God has called it to. This is the place that God has called you to. And God never sets you up to fail. 

So take a deep breath. Hold it for a few seconds. Not in fear and doubt, although this is the edge on which faith sits. No, breath it in in awe and wonder, in anticipation, in humble recognition that this is really happening. This is really real. 

Faith knows.