Today it occurred to me, if asked why I believe in God what I might say. Something I've often struggle with because I could have a million answers, - do you want a short one or a long one, do you want a tear-jerker or a heart-warmer, are you actually open or just trying to catch me in what you perceive to be a hollow label?
Something happened today that led me to my concise answer, which here leads to the broader one:
The biggest and best blanket statement I can make about why I believe in God is that He meets me where I am, every time.
Every time, He stoops to my level, to communicate how I need to hear it that day, or that minute. If I need something specific to remember I'm loved, boom. If I feel insecure about something, He sends someone to tell me the exact opposite of what I'm believing - the truth. If I need my attitude whipped into shape, He puts me back in my place; not unlike a father setting a child back in their timeout chair after they throw a tantrum. (Yes, sometimes I have what I think I would refer to, mostly in loose but honest terms, as tantrums...) When I am frustrated with Him and it feels like I'm talking to myself, He meets me in conversation. He waits on me when I'm stubborn, shelters me when I'm weary. When I'm fighting battles that are far above my ability, He enters in with ferocity. When I mess up, for the hundred-millionth time, He welcomes me back mercifully. I hold up my messy broken pieces, and He gives me back a whole.
Every time He meets me where I'm at. I've learned not to believe in Serendipity or coincidence, because the thought of all things I have needed and have found, being coincidental is absurd and improbable. It's maybe not always shocking, or mind-blowing, but it's always just what I need, where I am, and I never feel anything but loved. Loved in empathy. Loved in affirmation. Loved in correction. Loved in jealousy. Loved in gentleness.
When I think about it, that's what's worth talking about. I have many answers and look forward to many more compounding throughout my life, but that's the short version. It's why I believe what I believe, even when I don't have all the other answers. One thing built on another, and another on that, all to the point that is the sum of my faith having survived and grown.
Don't believe it to imply that my life has just been easy, all daisies and roses, but this is how I'm sustained. The beauty being that it only takes being open to God showing up in your life, and He will.
He is relentless, He is personal, He is absolutely on-time, and His purpose is Love.
