Late one afternoon
archaeologist Gene Savoy and his companion
became lost in a jungle in Peru.
A sickening feeling came over them.
They Knew
that if they did not reach camp by sundown,
they would never reach it alive.
They began to run about feverishly,
searching for the trail
that brought them into the jungle.
Suddenly they realized
that this feverish running
was only making matters worse.
Then they stopped and stood perfectly still.
As they did,
a thought passed through Gene’s mind.
God is in the jungle; it is God’s house.
When Gene was a boy in Oregon,
his parents had taught him that God
created the universe,
sustains it
and lives in it.
Instantly,
Gene relaxed and put all his faith in God.
He said later,
“I looked up into the beautiful world
of wild orchids, and fragrant blossoms
where hummingbirds hovered.
Yes, God was here, too. My heart quieted.”
Then, as I stood and stared,
something within me seemed to say:
“Walk a few paces to the left.
As I did, there was a tiny trail!”
Gene said later,
“I am proud of all of my discoveries.
But my greatest discovery, I believe,
was in recognizing God’s presence everywhere.”
That story fits beautifully
with today’s Scripture readings.
First, It illustrates the prophet Habakkuk’s words
in the first reading, when he says,
“The just man, because of his faith
shall live.”
And second, it illustrates
Jesus’ words in the gospel reading,
when he says,
“If you have faith the size of a mustard seed,
you would say to this mulberry tree,
‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’
and it would obey you.”
This brings us to an important point
about faith.
It’s a point we tend to forget –
one that can cause unnecessary worry.
The point is this:
Even the strongest faith in God
tends to go in and out of focus.
What is clear to us one day
becomes cloudy the next.
Like the sun,
our faith sometimes hides behind a cloud
and disappears for a while.
We’ve all experienced this in our lives.
How do we explain it?
These times of darkness are usually caused
by one of three things:
human nature, ourselves, or God.
First,
they may be caused by our human nature,
which has “highs” and “lows.”
In other words, our faith simply reflects
the natural mood swings of everyday life.
Commenting on these swings,
one writer says:
“On one day, life is beautiful. . .
we appreciate everything and everyone. . .
on such a day it is difficult to know
why we ever thought life was difficult.
On another day, however, nothing is right. . .
it is a time
when we count more enemies than we have
and find fault with every friend.
On such a day, it is difficult to know
why we ever thought life was easy.”
Our faith is like that.
This simply goes with the territory of being human.
Second, the periods of darkness of faith
may be caused by ourselves.
We can bring them on by neglecting our faith.
That is,
we can let our faith grow weak from sin
or from lack of spiritual nourishment.
In other words,
just as our body grows weak from abuse
or lack of physical nourishment,
so our soul grows weak from sin
or spiritual nourishment.
Third and finally,
these periods of darkness may be caused by God.
That is,
God allows them to happen
in order to strengthen and deepen our faith.
God uses them to help us to mature in our faith,
just as God helped Abraham mature in his faith.
Abraham was thrown into darkness
when God asked him to sacrifice his son Isaac. (Genesis 22:1-12)
Regardless of the cause
of these periods of darkness,
the agony they can produce is great.
In his novel The Devil’s Advocate,
Morris West describes the agony of a person
experiencing a long period of faith darkness.
The person says:
“I groped for God and could not find God.
I prayed to God. . .and God did not answer.
I wept at night for the loss of God. . .
Then one day, God was there again. . .
I had a parent. . .God knew me. . .
I had never understood till this moment
the meaning of the words ‘gift of faith,’ ”
And so we come back to our original point.
At times in our lives,
our faith seems to go behind a cloud
for a while.
This creates a period of faith darkness.
Sometimes this is simply a reflection
of our human mood swings.
Sometimes it is caused by a neglect of faith:
either though sin
or a lack of spiritual nourishment.
And sometimes it may be allowed by God,
in the sense that he uses it
to strengthen and deepen our faith.
Jesus teaches us that faith starts with humility.
The beginning of true faith
is accepting that Jesus is the creative Word of God,
Who brought everything out of nothing.
As we seek to strengthen our faith,
it would be wise to do everything out of our love of God.
Learning to know, love and serve God better,
may seem to have no immediate reward,
except peace in our hearts
and the knowledge that though trusting in him
we will be granted a share in his everlasting glory.
