Faith Like a Child

1 Corinthians 13:12-13 NIV

¹² For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. ¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. 

I’ve always been a little offended by the phrase ‘faith like a child’.  It seems like an insult to my intelligence, as if God is asking me to blinding accept everything that comes into my life.  Recently a friend of mine said that she doesn’t believe in a loving and omnipotent God because she sees (and experiences) so much pain in the world.  Wow, can I relate!  I don’t know why children die.  I don’t know why children are abused.  I don’t know why marriages fall apart.  I don’t have the answers to all these questions.  Hurtful things have come into my life but I do not know how I would survive without His love and friendship buoying me up.  I can share with you some of the nuggets that I have gained while the Lord has walked with me through dark places.  I can tell you about the sweetness of knowing that no matter how much someone hurts me, Christ knows how that feels because of how He was wounded on the cross.   Sometimes I feel abandoned, but when I looks back later I can see that He was with me, sustaining me.  When a hole is left in my life by the death of a friend (or a relationship), God fills that hole either with a new relationship or with a new richness in my relationship with Himself.  I can’t say that I have blind faith.  I do question God.  I don’t always understand why things happen the way they do.  But I have become convinced of this, God loves me.  He will work it all out in the end, somehow.  That’s what ‘faith like a child’ looks like to me.