Opening Prayer:
Lord,
I believe; help my unbelief! Amen.
Scripture: Mark 9:14-29
Journal: Where are you struggling with the tension between
faith and doubt? Is there room in you
for both? Where in your life are you
praying the prayer, I believe; help me overcome my unbelief?
Reflection:
It is the cry of each of our hearts at one time or
another, if we are completely honest. It
is a cry that voices the all too familiar tension between faith and doubt: “I
believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”
And at its core it is really a prayer, a desperate plea to God, begging
him to take the tiny bit of belief that dwells within our hearts and grow it
into something bigger and more substantial; something big enough and
substantial enough to be trusted, to be relied upon.
But logic would say, “How can both exist
at the same time? Are they not mutually
exclusive? Can there really be belief
and unbelief in one heart simultaneously?”
But our hearts know the truth, because
our hearts are not bound by logic—they go far beyond. As Pascal once said so beautifully, “The
heart has reasons which reason knows not of.”
And anyone who knows the heart of a loving and desperate father understands
exactly what Pascal (as well as the man in Mark 9) meant. It is a heart that says, “I believe. I really do.
But this is my very own son; the one who means more to me than anything
on earth. Therefore, please help me to
not only believe, but to really trust you—even with the most important thing in
my life!” (Reflections by Jim Branch)
Prayer
Closing Prayer: Lord, you know what’s going on here. You know where I’m confused and where I hurt
and what I’m questioning, and what I’m wondering about. I’m captive to my past, captive to my fears,
captive to my false sense of security, captive to my pride and my judgmentalism
and my petty demands. You know about all
the times I’ve failed to let your Spirit blow through my life. I feed on emptiness until I’m stuffed, and
then I wonder why you seem so distant.
From all of these chains there is freedom; from all of the cages, a
key. Release me. Reveal yourself. And set me free. (A Heart Exposed by
Steven James)
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