there lives more faith

The preacher challenged our faith this past Sunday.  The preacher said faith is realizing that if God doesn’t give us something, we don’t really need it.  Faith is accepting what God has ordained and believing that in the moment he is providing what we need.

I like the line in Tennyson’s poem below … “And Power was with him in the night, which makes the darkness and the light, and dwells not in the light alone.” God made both light and darkness … he lives and reigns in the depths of darkness as well as in the bright light of day.

You say, but with no touch of scorn,
Sweet-hearted, you, whose light-blue eyes
Are tender over drowning flies,
You tell me, doubt is Devil-born.

I know not: one indeed I knew
In many a subtle question versed,
Who touched a jarring lyre at first,
But ever strove to make it true:

Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds,
At last he beat his music out.
There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.

He fought his doubts and gathered strength,
He would not make his judgment blind,
He faced the spectres of the mind
And laid them: thus he came at length

To find a stronger faith his own;
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone,

But in the darkness and the cloud,
As over Sinai’s peaks of old,
While Israel made their gods of gold,
Although the trumpet blew so loud.
~ Alfred Tennyson