Faith Among The Faithless: 10-Day Reading PlanSample

I often wonder what it might feel like to come totally alive to God in this life. I think of Paul’s advice to “pray unceasingly” (1 Thess. 5:17 DARBY). . . . I think of the powerful spiritual presence of older saints who’ve devoted their lives to seeking God’s face: the wisdom they share, the peace they exude, the vulnerability they experience both in their aging bodies and their battered souls. I long for that peace and that life-giving presence.

It’s hard not to see the corollary between their suffering and their grace. There’s no doubt that some of that journey comes through suffering. That was certainly true of Mordecai and Esther. One cannot imagine them as the founders of a twenty-five-hundred-year-old religious festival apart from their encounter with death. There is a bridge between our suffering and our awakening. . . .

This is Esther’s road map for life with God. It is, in a sense, a map drawn to help us find our way back home. I believe that’s why God is “hidden” throughout the story. It is the story of a group of people finding their way back to God through a darkened world; finding their voice for faithful, vulnerable witness; and seeking to ensure that the generations after them don’t make the same mistake.

Maybe you read this and feel as though you don’t need the lessons Esther offers. You don’t need the awakening. You don’t need to take the time to honestly assess how assimilated you might be. I can say with all sincerity: good for you.

But I need it. And I need the help finding my way home again. And I’ll probably need that help for the rest of my life. I also need help finding the courage to stand while the world around me bows to idols, the courage to die rather than live an empty life of numbness.

Most of all, I need the hope it offers for faith among the faithless. Sometimes, that phrase is good for describing the gap between Christians and the world around them. But sometimes—and perhaps more often—it describes God himself at work in a world gone mad. Because the darkness overwhelms me, and my own faith fades all too often. But “if we are faithless, he remains faithful” (2 Tim. 2:13).

I may not see his hand or hear his name, but I know he hasn’t left us.