Blind Faith

I woke up this morning thinking about the phrase "blind faith." My first thought was that faith isn't blind, but then I thought, "yeah, it is blind." We don't see God or the things that we hope for, and yet we still believe. That's not to say faith is irrational or mindless. I see the fingerprints of God everywhere I look. It seems kind of irrational to ignore the evidence that it is all around us.

But sometimes the world doesn't look so good, and things aren't going so well, and we become weighed down by the cares of life, and it is easy at those times to let circumstances block out what we know to be true about God. It is at these times that we need faith the most. I thought of the verse, "For we walk by faith and not sight (2 Corinthians 5:7)," and of when Jesus said to Thomas, "blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed (John 20:29). Then I thought about Hebrews 11:1, which says in one version, "faith is...the conviction of unseen realities." Finally my thoughts rested on a delightful poem by Emily Dickinson.

I never saw a moor,
I never saw the sea;
Yet know I how the heather looks,
And what a wave must be.

I never spoke with God,
Nor visited in heaven;
Yet certain am I of the spot
As if the chart were given.