Faith Beyond Slogans and Words

I’ve spent a large part of my life around Christians. I’ve preached in churches, led ministries, built businesses with people of faith and sat with people through some very difficult seasons. So I know the language pretty well.

“We’re trusting God.”

“It’s in His hands.”

“Everything happens for a reason.”

“God has a plan.”

There’s nothing wrong with those words. I’ve used most of them myself. What I’ve learned, though, is that saying something about God and actually trusting Him can be two very different things. Sometimes our faith sounds much stronger than it feels. And I think that’s okay to admit.

We learn the language early

If you’ve been around church for any length of time, you learn certain phrases. You know when to say you’re blessed. You know the right answer when someone asks whether you’re trusting God, and you know the verses people quote when life gets difficult. After a while, those words can come very naturally.

The danger is that faith can become part of our vocabulary without changing very much about the way we live. I can say I trust God and still worry myself sick about something I cannot control. I can talk about generosity and still hold onto money with both hands. I can tell somebody else that God will provide while quietly panicking about my own future. I can pray for direction and then refuse to move until every risk has disappeared.

I’ve caught myself in enough of those contradictions over the years to be careful about judging anybody else for them. Faith is much easier to talk about than it is to practice.

Some of my strongest faith has looked fairly unimpressive

When I was younger, I probably imagined strong faith as something dramatic. Big decisions. Bold prayers. Miracles. Stepping out and doing something nobody else understood.

There have certainly been moments like that in my life. But a lot of the faith I value most now looks much more ordinary. It looks like keeping your word when breaking it would be easier. It looks like treating somebody well when they can do absolutely nothing for you. And it looks like doing the work properly when nobody is watching. It might mean saying, “I was wrong.”

Sometimes it means staying quiet when your ego desperately wants the last word. There are days when faith is simply choosing to behave like the person you say you believe God is shaping you to become. Nobody puts those moments on a stage. They probably wouldn’t make a very exciting social media post either. Yet I suspect they matter enormously.

Faith has to survive ordinary life

It’s easy to feel spiritual for an hour on a Sunday. Monday morning tends to be a better test. How do I behave when an employee frustrates me? What happens when a deal falls through? How do I speak to my family when I’m tired? What do I do when somebody gets the opportunity I thought should have been mine? How do I respond when the answer to my prayer appears to be no? Those moments tell me quite a bit about what I actually believe.

Over the years I’ve become less impressed by declarations of faith and more interested in what faith produces in a person. Does it make me more patient? More honest? More generous? More willing to forgive? Can I hold my plans a little more loosely? Can I listen when I’d rather defend myself? Those questions are harder than putting a Bible verse on the wall. They’re also much more useful.

God doesn’t need me to pretend

One thing age has given me is less interest in pretending I have everything figured out. There have been seasons when my faith felt strong. There have also been times when I had plenty of questions. I’ve prayed without knowing what to pray. I’ve wondered why something happened. I’ve disagreed with the timing. And I’ve wanted answers that didn’t come.

For years, Christians have sometimes made doubt sound like the opposite of faith. I’m not sure I see it that way anymore. Some of my most meaningful conversations with God have started with, “I don’t understand this.”

There’s something healthy about being honest enough to say that. God already knows what I’m thinking anyway. Pretending certainty probably isn’t fooling Him. Faith has become deeper for me when I’ve been able to bring the confusion with me instead of waiting until I’ve cleaned everything up.

There are things I’ve had to unlearn

One of them is the idea that faith guarantees a certain outcome. Pray enough and the business works. Believe enough and the relationship heals. Trust enough and the door opens. Live correctly and life will reward you accordingly.

That formula can sound wonderful until life refuses to cooperate.

I’ve seen very faithful people go through very painful things. I’ve watched good plans fail. I’ve watched people pray for outcomes they never received. I’ve experienced enough disappointment myself to know that faith cannot depend entirely on getting the result I wanted.

If my trust in God only works when life goes my way, it isn’t going to survive very long. At some point, faith has to become big enough to include disappointment. That doesn’t mean pretending disappointment doesn’t hurt. It means God doesn’t disappear simply because the story took a turn I wouldn’t have chosen.

Faith still asks me to participate

This is something I keep coming back to. I can trust God and still have responsibilities. If I’ve hurt somebody, prayer doesn’t replace an apology. If my finances are a mess, asking God for provision doesn’t remove the need to look at the numbers. If my health needs attention, faith doesn’t excuse me from taking care of myself. If I believe God has given me something to build, I still have to show up and build it.

There have been times in Christian circles where waiting on God almost becomes an excuse for doing nothing. I don’t think that serves us very well. Some prayers require patience. Others probably need a pair of shoes. Get up. Make the call. Have the conversation. Start small. Do the next thing you already know you should do. Then trust God with the part you cannot control.

Our words eventually need evidence

I don’t mean evidence in the sense of proving something to other people. I mean evidence in our own lives. If I say faith matters to me, somewhere along the way it should influence how I make decisions. It should affect what I do with money. It should shape how I treat people. It should challenge my pride. It should change the way I carry success and failure. It should have something to say about my calendar, my relationships, my ambitions and the way I respond when life doesn’t cooperate.

Otherwise, faith can slowly become branding. I don’t want that for myself.

This is why trust sits at the end of the Seventh Hand

In the Seventh Hand Principle, the final part is GOD: Learn to Trust Him.

The other Hands ask quite a lot from us.

→ Have a God-size dream.

→ Act in small steps.

→ Nurture daily practices.

→ Develop in all dimensions of your life.

→ Learn to be okay with big tensions.

→ Fortify your character.

Then comes trust.

I’ve come to appreciate that order. Faith doesn’t remove the work that came before it. We still dream, act, build habits, care for the different areas of our lives, live with uncertainty and work on our character. Eventually, though, we reach something we cannot manage. That’s usually where the slogans become less useful. You can’t control another person. You can’t guarantee tomorrow. You can’t force a business to succeed. You can’t prevent every loss. And you can’t map every turn your life will take. Somewhere in that space, trust becomes more than something we say.

I’m still learning

I wish I could tell you that after all these years I’ve mastered this. I haven’t. There are still things I try to control. There are still moments when I worry before I pray. I still catch myself asking God for guidance while quietly hoping He agrees with the plan I’ve already made. That one always makes me smile when I notice it.

I’m learning. Perhaps that’s a better description of faith than I once realized. Learning to listen. Learning to act. Learning to let go. Learning to trust God when I understand what He’s doing, and learning to trust Him when I don’t. The words still matter. I just want my life to say them too.