Faith is the thing that makes walking with God possible and foolish and challenging. It looks different from day-to-day and comes in multiple forms and sizes. It’s a mustard seed when all we have is “blind faith” to trudge onward. But, when our hope is high, faith looks like excitement and expectation. Regardless of appearance or emotion, faith is crucial to our walk with the Lord.

I truly believe most Christians are miserable because they stopped trusting the Lord to lead them. (Faith is trust in the Lord. Simple as that.) We have moments of glory, but when life becomes difficult, we turn away. We settle for protection and safety amid our suffering. Better said, we hide. We stop moving. We believe lies when we need faith.

There’s a reason the lies exist. It’s because evil is real…and NOT a human invention. The goal of all evil is to separate us from Him. And, the tactics may change, but the base remains the same. The enemy never stops preaching his oldest lie. Each time life turns sour- the bills pile up, our bodies decay, relationships spoil, cars break down- he whispers, “God isn’t who He says He is.” This lie has many variations: life sucks, the world sucks, you’re alone, no one loves you, no one cares, life is unfair, you’ll never learn, you’re stuck, this is hopeless, etc. Each of those lies is meant to keep us in bondage.

But, the Lord is good, and His mercy is endless. Nothing separates us from His presence. The life we live is one of faith and love, and eternal hope. How sad it is when we turned to Him but did not follow in His shadow. It is at these moments the misery enters. Most of us know how to grope for the Lord in dark moments, but we are weak when He asks us to follow Him.

This week I was confronted with several opportunities, and my initial reaction was, “hell no!” But then I remembered Corrie Ten Boom. I remembered her faith when confronted with her nazi prison guard in a church after the war. She didn’t have the faith to forgive him, so she asked for faith to shake his hand. That was her mustard seed moment. Of course, she did forgive him. I love that story because she knew where the Lord wanted to go, but she was too scared to go there. Instead of running from the moment, she asked for the resolve and took the immediate next step. It’s that simple.

Faith isn’t the ability to move mountains. That’s the work of the Lord. Faith is the act of saying, “Lord, I trust you,” then…whether trembling or excited, we take the next little step forward.