Faith Is Not to Have a Perfect Knowledge

We hear many these days urging the necessity for faith ⎯ faith in the future, faith in God, faith in the ultimate triumph of right, faith in the unknown ⎯ but what is this faith that is so freely talked of, but too little understood? Faith is that quality, a gift of God, that enables men to believe things they cannot see or touch ⎯ to trust for things that have not yet happened. Faith is that quality which enables a man to rise above the misfortune that does not seem justified, to live above the sorrow he cannot understand. Faith is that quality which sets apart a man of great and humble wisdom from the shallow cynic ⎯ for when we lose faith we are soon numbered among the cynics. But usually even men who deny the existence of faith have within them some vestige of it that helps them to keep their balance, for in reality we must all live by faith, because no one knows what tomorrow will bring and without faith despair would be complete. Faith is that quality of divine trust within us which prevents the uncertainty of the future from destroying the present ⎯ which brings peace in the midst of confusion, and sweet sleep while the tempest is raging. It is not certain knowledge. It is trust, belief, a conviction of all that God has revealed, all that He does reveal, and all that He will yet reveal. It is a force in the lives of all good men, and it leaves unendurable emptiness when it dies or departs. Blessed are ye ⎯ ye have faith.