Faith

We all believe in something

Faith is a belief system. Faith can be belief in science or philosophy. It can be placed in people or systems. Faith fills in the blanks for: If I do __, then __ will happen.

What we put in those "if, then" blanks determines how we act, and it determines how we react. We're pleased when those expectations are met, and we're disappointed or angry when they aren't. Consider the belief, "If I work hard in school, then I will get a good job, and then I will be happy." If that belief system is correct, then after accumulating a high GPA and landing a well-paid internship, which leads to a well-paying job with decent perks, excellent benefits, and generous pay, you should achieve your final goal of being happy. If that's you, then congratulations. Pop that bottle of champagne, you made it. But what if you don't get a good job? What does that say about how hard you worked? Maybe it means you didn't work as hard as you think you did. Maybe you went to the wrong school. Maybe you shouldn't have gone to school. If you do get a good job without having to work hard in school, how hard will you have to work at your job? Maybe you can snuff by life with only giving minimal effort and still be happy. Or what if, after it's all said and done, and your name is golden plated over your desk, and your wallet is so big it can't fit in your pocket, you're still not happy?

Maybe it's time to reconsider your blanks.

But it's not that simple, is it? There's death and loss. Hunger and pain. Loneliness and betrayal. If it was easy as filling in the blanks, then life would be nothing more than a gum-ball machine, and we'd all have gum-balls wouldn't we? But life is not simple, and it is not a gum-ball machine. So, maybe it doesn't matter what we believe in? Maybe instead of trying to fill in the blanks, we just leave it all blank. But even,"if it doesn't matter what I believe in, so I'm not going to believe in anything" is a belief system. If you were to say, "I don't believe in anything," then you aren't thinking hard enough. You may not believe in God, but to say you don't believe in anything is just lazy. The very ability to construct that sentence means that you've thought about what you wanted to say (albeit not much) and determined that if you said it, the best outcome would occur. Or maybe you realized the best outcome wouldn't occur, and that's why you chose it.

Anyone who is not brain dead seeks some form of accomplishment. What are they trying to accomplish? Maybe they are filled with a sense of purpose. Maybe they are looking for money. Maybe they are just trying to avoid the most amount of suffering they can while having to put up with an ever-present hurt and pain. Maybe they are just numb and they think if they just keep going, maybe they'll feel something someday. Even the suicidal believes that if they "end it all" the pain will stop. Everyone has something we put in those blanks.

Why have faith?

"Why have faith?" That's what Christians say to non-Christians to become Christians. Or to get Christians to stay Christians. "Why have faith?" Assumes one does not have faith and that faith is an option. As we've already explained, we all have faith in something whether we realize it or not. The real question is, "Why do we put our faith in what we do, and where should we put it?"

Consider this:

A woman wakes up one morning and wants to help her neighbor. She thinks if she does that, either her life or her neighbor's life will improve. For whatever reason, she bakes her a cake and gives it to the neighbor. The neighbor likes it and the woman felt good doing it. She starts baking more cakes and giving them to more people. Her life suddenly gets better and so does those she gives cake to. If she keeps doing that everyday, she becomes a humanitarian.

One day, our humanitarian gives cake to a teenager. The teenager likes it. The next day the teenager wakes up, wants to bake a cake, but can't. She needs eggs, milk, and butter, all of which she doesn't have. It's also raining. She'd have to go to her car, go to the store, come back to her car, and then go back inside. Between each of those intervals, she would get wet. "Why would life give her something so good then take it away from her? What's the point of it all?" She curses. She shakes her fist at heaven and laments she was ever born. That's what teenagers do. But if that happens to her everyday, she could become a nihilist.

Our experiences shape our beliefs, and our beliefs shape our expectations.

What comes first?

If a baby is never around people, will a he ever learn to walk? My guess is no. Children who grow up without any human contact are often hunched over. I wouldn't call that walking. It seems we learn to walk by observing other people walk, then trying it ourselves. Perhaps we begin our walk of faith in a similar fashion.

We need someone to teach us. If we knew everything there was to know about life when we came out of the womb, we'd be baking cakes and filling out job applications on day one. Instead, it takes around 20-25 years for the brain to finish developing. Until that happens, parents are supposed to be the ones to teach us. They are supposed to be nurturing, protective, and wise. Maybe that is how it's supposed to be, but it isn't always way. There are children who have lost a parent through death or divorce. Some parents choose to walk out of their children's lives. And some parents are just monsters. What then of your belief system?

Maybe we should look beyond our parents.

There's plenty of places to look . There are 7.5 billion people on the planet. That means quite a few of them have survived long enough to reproduce. That also means there's plenty experience we could learn from. Whatever blanks we're missing in our belief system, someone has probably given a TED talk about it. Wherever we're trying to go, someone's footprint can take us there.

We just have to find the right footprint.

7.5 billion people is a lot of people. That's too many to talk to. There isn't enough time or resources to sift through that many experiences to find one we're willing to aspire to or one that matches our situation. We could waste our entire lives searching, and zero time doing. Second, not all of them are worth sifting through. There are people who think they have the answer, but they really don't. That complicates our search. One way to narrow down the search is Zipf's law. We could just look to those people who are at the top, and ignore the rest. But that creates another problem. How can we trust them? They may be accomplished, but that doesn't mean they want to help us. It's a long way to the top if you wanna rock 'n roll, and a long way down. They fought hard to be King of the Hill, and they may not like sharing spaces. Maybe they are willing to help us... for a price. Can we afford to pay it?

But not everyone is competitive, and neither is every problem. We've come this far without killing ourselves off completely (so far at least). So, let's say we find someone who is really good at something in the field we are looking for, and is willing to help us. That's only one field of our lives, one area out of many. Other problems and other challenges will come our way that they haven't dealt with. So, we'll need a new mentor. And thus begins our search anew.

Here's another problem: we are so unique that we will experience some things that no one else has gone through. We might have to go about it on our own. If we only live to be 80 years old, then we only have 80 years to get things right. If we want to bake a cake or give it away, we only have 80 years to figure out the best way to do that. And after all, if we want to give all our cakes away, wouldn't we want to know the best way to make the recipient happy? Otherwise, why give them away? If it's to make ourselves happy, then all the more reason to know the best way to give out cake. But we are more than cake, and our problems are more urgent and complex. Some problems need to be solved now. We don't have 80 years so solve everything. And even if we did, there's no guarantee we'd even get it right.

Maybe it starts with want

Here's the crux of the problem in valuing experience over want. In order to know what's significant about the past, you have to have some idea of where you want to be. The past can clarify what you want, but it can't tell you what to want. We have to have a reason to do something. Milk doesn't teach us to drink, and being thirsty doesn't teach us to want milk. When there's no one around to teach us how to walk, or even crawl, there's something inside us pushing us to move. It's the feeling of hunger, danger, or the urge to explore. We need it. We want it. We go and get it.

When we first felt hungry, there's plenty of things we could have eaten: apples, eggs, honey. But we wanted more. We wanted burgers and ice-cream and caviar. When we wanted to explore, we weren't just satisfied with looking up and gazing into heaven. We had to go there. So we invented planes and spaceships and rockets. Looking under a microscope wasn't enough either. We had to split atoms, spin them around, and crash them into each other. As we discovered more around us, we became more aware of its danger. Safety was no longer a warm blanket and a bottle of milk. As we became more aware of our dangers, we found ways to protect ourselves from them. We invented bank accounts, bullet-proof backpacks, and vaccines. If this pattern continues long enough, we could reach super-human possibility. We could overcome any danger or threat or challenge. Anything we want, one day we could eventually have.

So why the hell do anything we don't want to? Life is short, and time is limited. If what we want dictates how we act, and how we you act gets us further or closer to our goal, then we shouldn't do anything that doesn't help us reach our goal, I don't want to go out tonight. Then don't. I don't want to clean the dishes. Then don't. I don't want to get to know her parents. Then don't! But why don't you want to do those things? It's not like you don't ever want to go out, you just don't want to go out tonight. It's not like you want to live in filth, you just don't want to clean right now. And it's not like you don't want to meet the parents. You just don't want to meet her parents. Maybe they're weird. Maybe you don't know how to act around them. Maybe you're afraid they won't like you. We have many wants, and those wants are conflicting. We can't rely on wanting and wishing our way to where we want to be. Some wants are predictable, like hunger or sleep. Most wants are like the wind, they come and go as they please. If we rely on what we feel like doing in the moment, we'll get very little done during the day, and at the end of the night, we'll have laundry list of unfinished dreams. If we only focus on what we want in the future, we'll miss out on so many once-in-a-lifetime opportunities right in front of us. We have competing wolves inside us. One wants success for the future. The other wants success for the moment. Which will you feed? And when's the right time to feed it?

There's another wolf. It's what other people want. Our spouse, our parents, our friends, our teachers, our boss, our government. They all have wants too. How do you feed that one? The same way you feed your own. By doing what it wants. That can be a good thing. Maybe we live with our partner and she motivates us to clean up after ourself and be more social. We want to be with her. She wants you to be with her. You don't want to clean the dishes. She wants you to clean the dishes. You clean the dishes. Happy wife, happy life, so they say. But maybe she doesn't want what's good for you. Maybe she says to use you in one way or another: I don't want you ever going out unless I go with you. Maybe she latches onto you like a leech and sucks everything good out of you. Maybe it's your boss. Maybe we like what we do, but your boss asks too much. You want a paycheck, you want to keep your job, but you don't want to stay at the office anymore on weekends. Maybe it's the State. Maybe they want the greater good for the people. After all, the State is made of many more intelligent people than you. Maybe they want what's best. Maybe they want you to pay taxes and obey the speed limit. Even if you don't like taxes or the speed limit, you can see some good that could come of it. If anything, maybe you do it so you don't get put in jail. But maybe the State wants you to serve in the army and kill those in the gulags that are against the State, those that were once your friends. It's hard enough balancing our own wants, let alone tightroping around the wants of others.

Why bother with faith at all?

Whether we have allowed life to take us where it wants, whether we've looked for more in ourselves or in the world, whether we've chosen to do the minimum to survive, we do those things because we think it is the best option for us. It's working for enough people to keep society functioning well enough. And it's working for enough people to get things done and be happy sometimes.

Correct faith

Every challenge is as unique as the person experiencing it. Our battle may be internal or external, habitual or spontaneous, extended or brief. We're not that smart and we're not that capable of going at it on our own, and we don't have the time or temperament to do so. And we're just as dangerous to ourselves as any friend or foe would be. But if we do nothing, our situation is not guaranteed to get better. It could even get worse. So, we have to do something. We've learned that wherever we turn to, we're just as likely to get confused, hurt, or frustrated. Where does that leave us? It leaves us alone, drifting through an ever-changing ocean, with nothing to grab.

Maybe we've got it good. We have a good job, good family, good health. But everything that grows decays. One day things will change. We'll change, our body will change, and everything around us will change. We can enjoy food and family for a season, but that goes away. We eat, then we get hungry again. We love, and then we lose. We live, and then we die. We need something that lasts, that doesn't go away, that doesn't change. We need something Eternal.

We need something that doesn't change. We need someone who knows and wants what's best for us; someone we can trust. We need someone loving and strong.

We need a God.

Do we really?

If there is a God, then (you name it). Where is he? Why did he let this happen? Why didn't this happen? Life isn't a gum-ball machine, and neither is God. But here's the truth: We don't fill in the blanks, God does.

God has said, "I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say; but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise." What does that mean? That means God is the lawgiver. That means he gives the "if, then" statement already filled out. It means if we do things his way, then he will come through in his way.

But God is known for burning cities if they don't do what they say. Christ said that he is going to turn family against one another. He said if your eye offends you, then you should pluck it out. Didn't the prophets say, "God is love"? That doesn't sound like a loving God. Maybe he's got favorites? One prophet tells us why that's false. He says that God loves everyone and wants everyone to come to him. That prophet also says God doesn't do anything unless it benefits everyone else. Moreover, if God wasn't the same yesterday, today, and forever towards everyone equally, then we wouldn't be able to trust him.

If God is out there, if he does treat all men equally, if he did raise the dead, heal the leper, feed the hungry, comfort the afflicted, forgive the sinner, then he can do the same for us. If he can do the same for us, then we have to do it his way. That sounds like wishful thinking. That sounds made up. That sounds impossible. To that God says "Try me. See if I'm real or not." With God, nothing is impossible. God promises strength, guidance, and a way to do everything he asks us to do.

If we want to believe in God, we have to protect and feed that want. If what we belief in is failing, or it's not meeting expectations, then learn about God and keep his commandments. Do that and see what happens.

Have Faith.

Addendum

Where can he find what he was to say? He has said that whether he's said it himself, or whether his prophets have said it, it's the same. So, we can turn to his prophets or to God. Both tell us his words. Both tell us, plainly, the "if, then" statements. God and his prophets have spoken in the Bible and the Book of Mormon. His prophets speak today. And he can speak to you right now through prayer.

But those books were written thousands of years ago, prayer can be just be chemicals in your brain reacting to mediation and thought, and those "prophets" could just be crazy. All valid points. The Book of Mormon says that if you only want to know if God is real, keep wanting until one day you know he's real. The Bible says if you try and get to know God, you will. He will tell you in "your mind and in your heart" if you want him to. If God is out there, you can know for yourself by reading about him and praying to him. If you do that with sincerity, he will answer in a recognizable, familiar, unique, and unforgettable way.