What an incredible week is shaping up as we move through to the weekend. If everything goes as planned we will be receiving rain by the time you receive this blog and the cooler weather is to follow. Football time in Oklahoma often comes with the first games average temperature around 100 degrees. This week the forecast says we should see a high of 86. That is hard to believe. I think there are a lot of things in our lives that are hard to believe.

Believing is to… accept something as true: to accept that something is true or real - accept somebody as truthful: to accept that somebody is telling the truth - credit somebody with something: to accept that somebody or something has a particular quality or ability.

Why then do we struggle so in believing? Have we been misled so many times that it becomes difficult to believe anymore? I remember driving along the country roads when I was a young boy. We would be in the middle of nowhere and my Dad would honk the horn several times in a row. When we asked him what he was doing he would tell us, “That’s the way you keep the elephants away!” He would then say, “Look, it works!” Does that mean my Dad was lying to me? Of course not, I never saw an elephant on any of those roads. Believing is difficult because when it comes to something we cannot see we can neither prove or disprove that which we are being asked to believe.

Living in the wilderness for 40 years as the Israelites did seems to me a relatively easy journey with respect to belief. God was with them in a visible and provisionary form. Walking through life today we are challenged to see God in His creations. I’m not talking about the hills and trees, but through the people who He has created in His image. Often times we question this creation known as humans because of our inhumanity to each other. God is not looking for puppets to inhabit the Promised Land, but people who believe Him enough to know He is seeing them through to the end. When we boil away all the “stuff” in life we are left with an incredible decision to make about the way we live. Will we believe in the face of hardship? Will we believe in our trials and tribulations? Will we believe when the things of life are really quite spectacular? When we can answer, “Yes!” we begin to grow as disciples. And there lies the foundations of faith. I challenge you to share this week how you have come to the knowledge of faith through your belief. As you share others will believe.

On the journey together,

Kirk