A Useless Faith

You should never question God, or so I was taught. God did not like questions, and even more importantly, God did not like people who dared to ask him questions. Good Christian girls buttoned up, sat down, and kept their mouths shut, to do anything else was to invite the wrath of the Almighty and inflame the ire of the Most High.

And I tried to be good. I really did, but who can live like that? What is the point and why would you? It never made any sense to me. Why in the world would you say you have a relationship with anyone who could not tolerate a question? Is not a faith without answers useless? But these were questions I didn’t ask because questions were not allowed.

Until the day I discovered that I needed the answers more than I needed to be safe. I asked my questions of God in defensive anger and offensive pride, too scared to reveal my desperation and too terrified to give into the shelter of false humility. I needed to know why my life had fallen apart, why - even when I did everything right, played by his rules - he had allowed me to be hurt so deeply. I raged at the heavens, hurled insults at the sky, demanding to know where he was and if he cared at all. I screamed blasphemies and thundered accusations into the night, caring little for the consequences, for even to be struck down would prove my faith had not been in vain.

Night after night, you could find me there, pacing like the wounded beast that I was, and night after night, nothing but the echos of my cries could be heard. No bolts of lightening, no smiting of the unbeliever, just silence in return for my abuse.

Some would denounce my behavior, chastise me for such audacity and brazenness, but I learned something in those times. God does not flinch before our questions. He is not scared of the scars that make us lash out in pain. He waits patiently until the storms of our emotions are spent, and he speaks in the quietness that follows, honoring our honesty with his presence and tending the wounds we are brave enough to bare.

It is there that the we learn that real faith has room for the questions, even the unanswered ones because the faith is not in answers it is in the abiding presence of our King.