So we started this blog over a year ago because we have awesome conversations together on the phone, and we thought that it'd be nice to open these conversations up to our close friend The Internet. As you know through a plethora of conversations with me, one of my favorite discussion points is faith.
Much of our education is taught in terms of absolutes:
Christopher Columbus was the first European to step foot in the Americas.
Pluto is a planet.
Message is only a noun.
In reality, there's strong evidence in historical writings that the Vikings actually stepped foot in the Americas first; scientists decided that Pluto is too small to warrant the title "planet": and message is now also a verb. Part of upper education and adulthood is coming to terms with all the grayness of reality and truth. And this grayness can be disconcerting when it comes to religious truth.
Growing up, my Sunday school teachers said with the same surety of my history teacher speakig about Columbus that God exists. They professed it as knowledge, as absolute truth. And unlike Columbus, the validity of this statement on God's existence matters quite a bit more than America's discovery.
In all of our epistemological exploration of truth, it's easy to be left feeling nihilistic about obtaining any sort of knowledge.
epistemology: the study or a theory of the nature and grounds of knowledge especially with reference to its limits and validity (m-w.com)
But maybe we're thinking about Gospel truth the wrong way. A core reason that Latter-day Saints believe they come to earth is to be tested, and that test is all about faith. Now let me be clear about what I mean by faith. Faith is not knowledge. Faith is belief in the unseen, the unknown. Faith, for me, is a choice. So, when we read in the scriptures that we are sent here to have trials of faith (1 Peter 1:7) and to walk by faith (2 Cor. 5:7), we are being asked to choose belief in God even when His existence and presence in our lives seems unlikely. If His very existence wasn't brought into question as a sincere option for belief than we wouldn't really be tried in our faith. A trial of faith requires that there be two legitimate options: God lives or He doesn't.
Even though these two options are absolute in nature, our faith in them is far from absolute. Again, our faith is not knowledge. God does not require us to choose Him with absolute knowledge. He just asks us to choose Him, even if that is with a granule of belief. This is where one of God's most beautiful gifts comes into play--agency. Steph, I've been fascinated by the idea of agency recently. Faith in God is a choice we make with this agency. And though I believe that God does interact with His children on the earth, these interactions are rarely so undeniable that they don't require the action of faith.
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| Photo Credit: Nationaal Archief |
What I've learned over the past five years is that this choice of faith again and again can be, and maybe always is--I don't like to talk in absolutes ;)--extremely testing. At times I feel as if God made it as close to impossible as He could to believe in Him. And in some kind of masochistic way (and only when I feel some confidence in my faith), I love that it is that hard. I love that it takes so much of my energy and emotions to keep believing in Him throughout my life because I know I'm stronger for it.
Steph, what's so beautiful about this relationship between faith and agency is how they run parallel in the grand plan of God. Simply put, faith is us trusting in God, and agency is God trusting in us.
So, here I am, knowing absolutely nothing, reframing God again and again in a similar way that I am rethinking the characteristics of Pluto, and holding on to these few granules of faith that I carry with me in hopes that at some distant date, I'll know.
Cheers,
Amanda
P.S. I'd truly love to have a conversation, Internet friends, so please join in.
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