"Without faith it is impossible to please God", from Hebrews 11:6.
There's a story told about destroying a young boys faith. A man asked "who in here thinks their faith is unshakable?" A boy raised his hand. The man said, "ok son, I have a quarter in my pocket. Do you believe I do? Based on what I've told you, what you know about me, etc...what do you believe?". The boy said, "I believe you do."
At this point, the boy has faith. He does not have answers or proof, only what he believes to be true. The man then shows the boy that indeed there is a quarter in his pocket. He announces, "Son, I've successfully ruined your faith. You no longer have faith, you have the actual proof now, the answer."
So it goes with our faith in God. You do not have the proof or the answers, you only have what you believe to be true. You might be right and you might be wrong. Saying that out loud causes a lot of problems for some people. To me it's rather comforting to not need to have proof.
Are you positive about what you believe to be true? How can you be? Faith leaves room for a different answer by its very definition. This is VERY different from not believing anything though. The boy in the story didn't throw up his hands and say he refused to believe anything. He took what his experience was and made came up with what he thought was true. According to the biblical verse above, throwing up your hands and refusing to believe anything makes it impossible to please God... I would submit that being arrogant about the certainty of your belief is also discounting what it means to have faith and thus to please God...
For many years I was absolutely positive that what I believed was true. I would argue with others about it. My favorite thing to say to people now is, "You might be right". I honestly have no clue what the answer is, I only know what I believe based on my experience. That's all God seems to ask of us. Figure it out for yourself, have faith cuz you'll never truly know.
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