I have a very good friend who is a seeker of truth. She looks for truth in the world around her but still struggles with the concept of God. Years ago, during a conversation with her, she said, "You are lucky that faith comes so easily to you." For some reason, that bothered me. I didn't like the idea that some for some people, faith was just easier. That makes is seem a little unfair for those seeking truth who don't have a natural inclination to believe in God or that Jesus Christ is our Savior. (Not that anything in life is necessarily "fair" in that sense of the word.)
One of our Church's (and probably any religion's) most fundamental doctrines is faith. In fact, "We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ..." (You can see an outline of our fundamental beliefs here.)
First comes faith. As with a lot of things in my life, I thought I understood what faith was until life got hard. And then I struggled. I believed in God and in Jesus Christ--but did I believe that they could help me in my day to day life and struggles? Did I believe that I could be better today than I was yesterday? Did I believe that I could change? The promise is that true faith in Jesus Christ gives us the capacity to overcome hard things and to truly change (Like He promises here and here and here.)
What I have come to realize through study and prayer and experience is that faith is gift from God. The desire to believe in Him may come more easily to some than others initially. But once you have that desire to believe, you have to work to have more faith and to understand and see Heavenly Father's hand in your life and in the world around you. Just like you have to work and experience things to obtain any other kind of knowledge or belief, faith in Jesus Christ requires effort. It requires studying God's words through His prophets. It requires "trying out" or experimenting on those words.
"But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words." Alma 32:27
So yes, the desire to believe or ability to believe that God is real might be easier for some initially. But once you have that desire, everyone has to work hard to keep it. To understand it. To develop the kind of faith in a Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ that allows them to truly change you and make you more than you could ever be on your own.
When my little girl was learning to walk, I would hold onto the back of her shirt and follow behind her. As long as she felt the tug of my hand on her shirt, she felt like she had enough support to walk by herself. And then I started to let go. She would walk a few steps on her own, but once she realized I wasn't holding on anymore, she would grab onto her own shirt. It was kind of funny because obviously, her grip on her own shirt would ultimately do nothing to keep her on her feet. She couldn't hold herself up with her own hand. She needed somebody else to hold her up when she was unsteady. It was kind of funny until I realized that I do the same thing in my own life....I hold onto myself sometimes, as if I can really keep myself from falling just by holding onto my shirt.
I have had to reason things out in my mind and study and think things through and ask a lot of questions. And sometimes, I have had to get out of my own way--let go of myself and what I thought I understood...because my reasoning and logic wasn't enough. When I have done these things, I have found and been given answers and felt peace every time. Sometimes the answers came immediately. Other times, they took a LONG time to come. But I have had prayers answered in inexplicable ways. Miraculous ways. And this makes my faith stronger. I believe that anyone can have this experience if they put the thought and work into.
For those of you who struggle to even believe that God is real and that He loves you and wants you to be happy, but don't see how that can be possible because of the world we live in and the things you have had to face in your life--or simply because it logically doesn't make sense to you-- I like the example that Bruce C. Hafen gives in a speech he gave a few years ago about the battle between reason and faith:
He showed this painting by Eugene Bernard.
It is a depiction of Christ's disciples, Peter and John, who have just been told that Jesus was alive. Someone had seen him. It defied all reason. These 2 men had watched their friend die on a cross. They had seen his broken, lifeless body in the tomb. So why are they hurrying down the road to the place where Christ supposedly will be? It is because they cling to the belief that it is possible. It is worth it for them to put in the effort to go and see. It is worth the trip down the road if there is the slightest possibility that their friend has defied all natural laws and risen from the dead. And even though it makes no sense to their brains, they want it to be true. And it was true.
Elin
Who is still working on her faith...
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