Living with doubt
Doubt.
Doubt makes faith, faith.
If it was provable beyond a reasonable doubt, we wouldn’t need faith.
I can’t prove Christ rose from the dead, and you can’t disprove it.
Belief is a choice. Faith is a choice.
And I choose faith because I need it.
The promise of Easter is not eternal life, at least to me.
The promise of Easter is that the wisdom, the life of Christ, lives on.
Had there not been a resurrection, it’s almost certain we’d know nothing of this man, Jesus.
And what Jesus taught us to do is feed the hungry and take care of the poor.
He taught us to shelter the immigrant, to seek justice for the down-trodden.
Jesus taught us not to judge, lest we be judged.
When confronted with a woman who had committed adultery, the crowd wanted blood. Jesus, looking her in the face, invited anyone who was without sin to throw the first stone.
As, one by one, the crowd dispersed, silent, shamed, Jesus asked the woman,”Is there no one left to condemn you? Then neither do I. Go now, and sin no more.”
His harshest criticisms were directed at the leaders of the synagogues and those business men who used religion to make money.
He said it would be harder for a rich man to enter heaven than for a camel to walk through the eye of a needle.
Jesus wanted us to take in the homeless, to take care of the sick, to give away our fortunes and serve those on the bottom rung of the social ladder.
How are we doing at that?
In our time, as greed and liars command our attention, as we wantonly bully and blame and judge, where is the evidence of Christ in our lives?
The promise of Easter is that Christ still matters even when we cannot find proof every day.
So in my doubt, I choose faith. I choose hope.
I choose to believe.