Saturday, June 02, 2007

Fears

[an old draft. published as-is because, well, it's interesting]

One of my biggest current fears or worries is whether the faith I have is sufficient to do the task I have set out for myself. Do I really believe enough to set myself up as a leader?

How does one measure faith?

This fear is particularly insidious because it is so hard to discuss. In fact, I wouldn't even post about it on here were this blog not (more or less) pseudonymous. What would people think??

Of course, these thoughts all seem a bit ridiculous when written out - how much faith does one need? Well, one could link to an obvious answer:

5
The apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith!’ 6The Lord replied, ‘If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea”, and it would obey you.

It's a fairly non-answer kind of answer, as these things go. I can't really put my faith on a scale, and see whether it measures up. As "just" a church-goer, this isn't really an issue - I have found that my faith can be somewhat cyclical, and I certainly have some doubt-filled days, but it's not particularly difficult to ride them out. Even in my most questioning days, church is very valuable, so the waxing and waning is more of a philosophical issue than anything else.

However -

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