FAITH: The Key to Our Hopes and Dreams
Monday, January 18, 2010
Life is not easy; life is difficult. Just open your TV and watch the news or read the newspaper for a quick proof. Everywhere we see starvation, poverty, sickness, oppression, injustice, war, violence; accidents, calamities; and so on and so forth.
In the midst of the everyday difficulties in life, hopes and dreams are born. For those who are starving, they hope for a simple meal; for those who have cancer or other life threatening disease, they hope that a cure will be on hand; for those who are poor, they hope that they will get that education, job or business to alleviate themselves from poverty; for those who are oppressed, they hope that someday justice will be served; for those who meet accidents or calamities, they hoped that they can recover, and recoup their losses; and many others. For those who are on the other side of the fence, those who are more fortunate, they hope that they will not experience the suffering of other people and that their fortune will improve even more.
Yet even if we are armed with hopes and dreams, it doesn’t necessarily translate to reality. We could die from a hundred of reasons (gunshot, disease, famine, accidents, etc.), we could be robbed, we could loss our job, our business could go down underwater, we could be jailed, and so on and so forth. So really there is no 100% assurance that we will achieve our hopes and dreams in life. There are things/events that are not within our control, that can have a significant impact on us.
Should we give up hoping and trying?
The answer is a resounding no!
To those things that are within our control, we should give only our very best. To the things that are beyond our control, we’ll have to put our trust to those who have control over. A farmer can only cultivate the soil, plant the seed, put fertilizer, water the seed, and remove the weeds, but he can never make the seed grow. He has to trust in nature that the seeds will eventually grow and will bear fruits, otherwise there is no point in planting on the first place.
To go through with life thinking that we can make it on our own is like being a blind man who tries to enter a house by touching, and banging his body and head against the brick wall hoping that he’ll find the door or that the wall will collapse.
There is a better way!
In reaching for our hopes and dreams in life, we have to give our very best. We have to have confidence that we can do it with the things that are within our control like our free will, the power of our words, our attitude, our skills, our knowledge, and our natural abilities. But most importantly, we have to realize that we cannot make the seed grow, that we are blind to some things, that we have no control over the unpredictable future. So if we are wise blind men, we will call out the owner of the house, and ask him to open the door for us.
The owner of the house, the vast universe, is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And he is our God too.
For us to reach our hopes and dreams, we have to labor with confidence on the things that we have that are within our control, and we have to trust in the Almighty God that he will help us deal with things that are beyond our control like the events in our life that will have an impact on whether we can attain our hopes and dreams or not.
The reward is our hopes and dreams in life, and the key to the door is faith in God.
What is faith?
To have faith is to be sure, to be certain without a single strand of doubt that what you believe in is in fact the reality, the truth.
In human existence, certainty can only be attained naturally through experience. The good news is that there is a natural process to grow in faith or certainty of our thoughts and beliefs. This means that anyone can learn it, replicate it, and can apply it to his own personal life.
How to develop our faith?
The process of developing faith is as follows,
HEAR => QUESTION => BELIEVE => ACT => EXPERIENCE (attain certainty)
Allow me to use the latest mega-fight between Filipino superstar, Manny Pacquiao, and the Puertorican bomber, Miguel Cotto, to illustrate farther the process.
QUESTION
There must be a moment in his life when Cotto must have asked, “Is it possible that Manny could be faster than me?”
BELIEVE
According to Webster’s New English Dictionary, to believe is to consider or accept an idea, principle or belief to be true.
But no matter how strong is your belief, it doesn’t necessarily equate to the reality, the truth.
Finally, Cotto convinced himself that he is faster, as well as stronger. He must have itched to get a mega-fight with Manny not only to net millions of dollars but more importantly, to test his belief. This was evident in his reply to Jim Lampley when interviewed just a day before the fight.
“Do you think Manny is fast?”
“I train for speed. I can see nothing,” Miguel Cotto answered without a trace of doubt in his voice.
ACT
When Cotto was offered the opportunity to fight Manny, Cotto stayed true to his belief -- he signed the contract, trained the best he could, and last Nov. 14, 2009 (US time) in front of a sold out crowd in MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada, he traded punches with the pound for pound king.
EXPERIENCE
After 12 rounds of brutal boxing, Miguel Cotto became certain beyond any reasonable doubt who is the faster boxer. And he also learned something new -- that his best punches couldn’t hurt Manny, and that he could not possibly defend against Manny because his punches comes from unexpected angles.
“I can’t see where the punches were coming. I was not able to protect myself.” Cotto told Larry Merchant right after the fight.
“I fought everybody (considered a great fighter) – Mosely, Margarito, Clottey – and I can say that Manny is the best fighter of our time,” added the humbled Cotto.
What does faith in God means?
It means to be certain beyond doubt that he exists even if we cannot see him, and to be sure that by following his ways and obeying his commandments we will attain our hopes and dreams in life. It means experiecing God in our everyday life.
How to develop our faith in God?
Now let’s put the process in action.
HEAR
We receive an invitation from God. Our journey of faith starts with knowledge of Jesus Christ life, the Son of God. By hearing his life, teachings and commandments from our friends or preachers or by reading from Christian books and the bible, we receive an invitation from God to know him more. If you feel curious, interested and a lot of questions run in your mind, then you are on the right track. You are ready to proceed to the next stage.
QUESTION
We ponder upon the invitation. Is Jesus Christ for real? Is it true that he will help me achieve my hopes and dreams in life? If God is for real, why he allows so much suffering in the world? Why can't he just snap his fingers and make everything good? These kinds of questions are normal and natural, so don’t be too hard on yourself. It's OK to doubt as long as you continue to look for proof. It also helps to approach the "right" people to help you figure out the answers to your questions like your pastor, your parish priest, your spiritual director, a friend whom you know is very passionate with God, etc. The point is, ask to people who has strong passion for God, not to people whose faith in God is as cold as dead meat.
The worst thing we could do at this stage of the process is to ignore what we’ve heard, to stop investigating further, and to get stuck in this stage of the process. Question if you must, but don’t stop looking for answers from the right places.
BELIEVE
We begin to see signs in our life that God is for real; maybe it’s the passion in the voice of the preacher, the peaceful and joyful ways of a friend who is passionate about God, the success of a firm believer who triumph against all odds, an unexpected arrival of money when we're down to our last penny or while reading the bible we accidentally came across a line that struck us. Whatever it is, something inside us comes alive, and it feels so right, so peaceful and so satisfying. From a fertile soil of doubt, a seed of belief grows. As we get drawn closer, and closer to God, a point will come when we have to decide to know God more intimately, and to follow his ways. When that time comes, we are ready to move to the next stage.
Just a short side note: the reason why many Christians (Catholics, Protestants, Born Again, etc.) don’t grow in faith is because they only believe but refuse to follow. The pleasure of the ways of the world is simply too enticing for them to totally leave behind, so they become part time Christians – follower of God when nothing is at stake, lawless when the stake is high or when the earthly offer is so juicy to resist.
ACT
The bible is very clear about faith.
To act in faith means to COMMIT (1) To seek knowledge of God (his teachings, his commandments, and his ways) by reading the bible, listening to preaching, etc. (2) To apply that knowledge in our everyday life.
God doesn’t want us to leave him behind the doors of our church building, Sunday school, bible study, etc. We must commit ourselves to see him in our daily experience, and to apply his teachings in all aspect of our life – family, finances, work, relationships, etc. at all times most specially in times of trials and difficulties. We have to remember God in everything that we do.
When your wife nags unreasonably at you, would you shoot back with blazing canons and mortars or would you follow the words of God in James 1:19, “Everyone must be quick to listen, but slow speak and slow to become angry.”
When you meet a beautiful, sexy lady would you indulge in lustful thoughts or would you look the other way and remember that you are a married man. In Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, “But now I tell you: anyone who looks at a woman and wants to posses her is guilty of adultery with her in his heart.”
To grow in faith, we have to be full time Christians!
EXPERIENCE
You see, it is necessary for us to act on our belief for our faith in God to grow stronger. When we follow his ways, there will be a lot of moments along the way when we have go against the ways of the world; when we have to choose to obey God’s commandments even if we cannot see him, and abandon our old ways and comfort zone. If we can stick to following God’s ways, and persevere ‘till the end of the testing even if the world is screaming against us, even if there’s a part is us that is revolting, then our faith will become stronger. A part of us will die, but out faith will grow.
In closing, each of us has our hopes and dreams for ourselves, and for our love ones. In order to attain these, people normally work hard to please their bosses at work or their business customers, and there is nothing wrong to this except when they go against God’s will just to get that promotion or to win that business. There’s a better way, and that is to grow in our faith in God. This is the master key to our hopes and dreams in life.
PS: If this post inspires and enlightens you, then give praise to God for all glory and honor belongs to Him alone. And forward this to your friends whom who think needs to hear this message...
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