It's amazing how sometimes in the middle of a big crisis I face spiritual blackouts. It's like standing in a dark tunnel and asking myself, how am I so sure this tunnel ends and there is light on the other side. It's totally insane when you think of it. Every obstacle you are facing seem to either appear like a mountain sometimes or in contrast seem like a glass panel. While sometimes you feel there is no point stepping one more foot ahead because there is nothing beyond this point and other times you are full of inspiration and faith to move in a certain direction.
"We live by faith and not by sight". I cannot think about a single step I have taken in life which is not a reason of my faith. Stepping out of the house and it's only faith that assures me I will get an auto to reach office. On reaching office it's only faith that assures me that it's the same company's office where I am employed and there hasn't been an overnight closure of business. I mean thinking of life, what is that one thing where we do not use faith to move another step in the future...."faith not sight"...I still can't see what the next moment will be, nor do I know what will be the next sentence I will be typing in this blog post.
I witnessed a miracle or almost close to what we can term as a 'miracle' in the last week. What happened with me only happens in movies where an over ambitious script allows every impossible possible. And yet my faith flutters in front of everyday decisions.
What makes my faith flutter? Why do I face these momentary blackouts in my faith? In all my understanding, it's when I want to take complete control on the consequences of my next step, like writing an ambitious script where each act is written with the end in mind. I want it to work backwards in life too. I have decided what I want as a conclusion and therefore I want to ensure every step I take leads me to MY conclusion. If I notice my everyday activities I don't have any control on the outcome of any step I take... even to save my own life. I eat in faith that what I eat will not flare up my ulceritive colitis.
For me spiritual blackouts happen when I have two drivers driving my vehicle of life. I pray, 'God I give you full control' and there I am with the map in hand on the navigator's seat giving instructions about the shortest route to MY final destination. Like Philip Yancey says, "the opposite of faith is not doubt it is fear". Fear that my driver will take me to a wrong destination or will take a longer route or even a detour. What the heck, if I have to do all of it then the driver needs to be given a pink slip, I need to be behind the wheels instead...yet I pray, 'God I give you full control'.
This blog post is really me thinking aloud sounding off the little revelations I get about life, God, me and the divine association between us. Faith is faith and faith is reason gone courageous(as said by Philip Yancey). If I reason I will face a blackout and my reason will freeze me and tell me..'no point its over'....where as faith will tell me to be sure of things I have not yet seen or perceived.
I must look back and look at all the situations where reason cornered me and told me, 'no point it's over' but I still stepped out in faith and how each of those steps in faith led me to a destination which I could never perceive. Then I look at all the decisions where things were under MY complete control, yet it all fell apart and I said to myself, hey! it was perfect as per the plan, this can't go wrong! This recharge of faith is necessary to manage the momentary blackouts or else I will be like that climber who died hanging two feet above the ground because he could not gather enough faith to cut the rope in the night.
Until next time.... to deal with blackouts, keep charging your faith lamp.
