Great post. If God made it easy.......then what would happen to our faith? It wouldn't be, and we wouldn't grow :) In fact, we wouldn't grow in any areas if God made it easy. And that's the allure of cults........it's easy to follow.

Cindy, now that's an interesting angle!

Tammy, I know that you know that you know, but how did you know in the first place? Was it a feeling, or did you see/hear something that you could no longer argue against? I started asking myself these questions, which caused me to change the ending of this blog about 10 times, then I just cut it off completely. So this is the blog with no end, haha! (Ok, look all you Calvinists, I never said you were wrong, just that it isn't all wrapped up as tidy as you think it is!)

Mary, I'll give ya an amen to that! Awe just isn't the same as love.

Bubbles is first, yay!! 

I believe because we are so spoiled that we want quick fixes with little or no effort on our part with true unconditionally love it takes effort and it's not a quick fix but when you submit .oh the blesses and love you receive.  There are miracles everyday but we walk on by without even noticing.  God shows Himself in His Word which is preached far and wide but yet some walk away.  satan and his angels were in the presence of God Himself yet repelled and walked away.  We must stay strong and continue to tell the Good News of Jesus Christ and pray for hearts to be open to receive the salvation that only comes through Jesus.

Mike, I too am in agreement that God does make it easy to believe, only it's the "arrogance of the sinful soul" that challenges...   so if your really God, then prove it to me."

What a foolish soul indeed, that dares to challenge the one who opens our eyes each day.  

Great thought.

Pastor Aminata 

Pastor Tim, that is a homerun comment, thanks! So well put, what a great point. I agree, God still does the miraculous. But miracles aren't as common as some might want to believe (nor are they as rare as others might suggest). And the bottom line, our faith should not be based on miracles, neither should we expect or demand miracles to strengthen our faith. Our faith should be based on the measure of truth we see and the many things God has already done for us, right? (Well, that's what mine's based on.)

Perhaps the coolest thing, is when you aren't looking for the miracle, and it happens anyway.

Glenn and Debora, thanks for your comments. :-)

Melanie, signs/wonders as God being God....there's a thought! Thank you for your input, it means the world to me!

Cheryl (from OK), glad to encourage you -- or shall I say, glad I could return the favor.

Pastor Aminata (and Pastor Tim), yes, there is the perspective that God makes it easy to believe. But he doesn't do it on our terms, does he? I believe that is where the original blog I am responding to diverged from you. People want belief to be so easy, they want God to be so obvious, that it isn't even called belief anymore!

Thanks, I treasure your input! 

I think we're surrounded by signs and wonders every day -- all day long -- but we fail to appreciate them.  And I wonder if we hunger for easy belief because we're lazy.  OUCH. (stepping on my own toes there)  It reminds me of how the Israelites would set up a pile of rocks to symbolize some time when God did something extraordinary -- and every time they passed by it, they'd be reminded and possibly even have the opportunity to explain the story behind the memorial to someone else.   How much effort do we put out to set up our own memorial stones of remembrance?  (Ouch again)  I think belief is a lot easier if we get the focus off of ourselves and onto God alone.  What a conundrum -- we want it to be simple and easy so we won't have to work at it or struggle -- yet we want to complicate it so much!  We can't seem to be satisfied with simply sitting down somewhere quiet and asking God to reveal His Word to us.  Like the very WISE Bubbles said, God wants us to want Him...and part of that wanting process is to put out the effort to build up a relationship with Him.

Good thoughts on this rainy morning -- thank you for reminding me how Good, Perfect, Lovely, and True everything of His really is. :)   

Amen Shirley!

Yes, God's handiwork is everywhere. Not necessarily supernatural evidence, but it's all still his handiwork. If we look for God in it, we see him all over. (As has been said here more than once.) Rom 1:20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

But if you don't want to see God, voilà, he's invisible and silent! Hmm, I think there may be more to it than that though.

2 points

1) What makes something a "miracle"?

2) The word "faith" has turned into a wishy-washy warm fuzzy.  I'm tired of it being used to describe something that we're not sure of, so we should just wish a bit harder.  Let me ask a question.  Did the apostles have faith at any point?  Did the fact that they saw Jesus do miracle after miracle decrease their faith?  (If you take Hebrews 11:1 

to mean that you only can have faith in things that are not seen, there is no way they could have "faith" in Jesus Christ.  We are not more blessed if we have doubts and instead of looking for truth, just try to scrunch our nose up and conjure up some faith.

Faith is not throwing our hands up and saying "God couldn't possibly want us to know that" that is used as a cop-out for so many things. We get so afraid of being called Doubting Thomas that we don't realize that the issue with the questions Thomas asked wasn't that he asked them.  I actually respect Thomas a lot because while he did have questions, they were legitimate.  (Well I hope they were legitimate because I think I would have probably had the same ones.  "Wait, you're trying to tell me that Jesus who we saw dead is alive again and walking up to you guys now?  Peter, you said you wouldn't deny Him and yet you did it three times!  And our buddy Judas... he betrayed Him.  Why should I believe any of you guys?")  And he owned up to them, and once he got them answered he picked up his cross and followed Jesus to his death.

One of the best visuals I've run across as an example of the word "faith" is the picture of a daughter standing at the top of the steps when her daddy gets home.  He sticks out his arms and she jumps knowing that he will catch her.  Why?  Because he's done it every other time.  That's why she has faith that he will do it again.   

Mike,

I'm not certain what you are trying to say in the second to last paragraph, because I'm not sure where you are looking to end up so if I take this the wrong way I apologize.  I don't think we have "greater" faith because we do the unknown (vs. doing the known).  Actually I think that attitude is dangerous in many ways because it turns back Christianity into a works based religion.

I think faith really should be more closely tied to the word "trust" than I do "hope" which is what I feel your example is implying (but I may be focusing on the wrong syllable (because  it's bolded)).  If she trusts in her father's strength and knows that he can catch her, it doesn't matter whether the actual experience is new as to whether it is "greater".

What defines something as a supernatural occurrence?  Since scientists are working to understand how the universe came into existence... are they working to "undo" a miracle? 

Mike,

Think of the Centurion who asked that his servant be healed.  There were people all around who were being healed during that time (and I'm guessing that's how the Centurion heard of Jesus).  Most needed to "test" the result (checking the skin, standing on the leg) before believing.  However the distinction with the Centurion is that he trusted that if Jesus said his servant was healed, he would be.  He had greater faith because he believed Jesus could do what he said he would before seeing the result.

Those who had to test the results before they believed had hope, not faith regardless of whether they acted on someone's word (or demonstrated capabilities) or not.

BTW, what I'm driving at with the definition of miracle is this.  If you want to explain away a miracle, you can.  And the more it occurs, the less miraculous that we think something is.  We can explain it, we say.  Doesn't make it any less miraculous.

Mike is certainly right that any ongoing display of signs and wonders could potentially be perceived as inconsequential.  In fact, such displays (as pointed out) did serve their immediate purposes but did not command the beliefs of all those involved (even some witnessed Jesus' post-mortem appearance in Galilee and still didn't believe - Matt. 28:17).

I also wanted to add that God is probably not interested in whether someone comes to acknowledge God's existence if it is not followed by one's commitment and trust in Him.  One angle on this is captured in Mike's statement that God wants "lovers and not servants."  Of course, we can't even guarantee that acknowledging God's reality will even sufficiently make anyone a servant.  After all,

The only thing required of God is to provide a sufficient way for those who would respond to Him with love and trust if they were ever approached with the Gospel.  Remember, atheism is a relatively new phenomenon in terms of biblical history.  Virtually no one was an atheist in antiquity (which is why the Psalmist adamantly declares with confidence, "the fool has said in his heart, 'There is no god'" - Ps. 14:1).  God need only insure that those who would positively respond to Him do in fact receive sufficient grace to make that choice - and how in the world could we show that this isn't going on?

Oh, no doubt, Mike.  It is a hard word for 'most'; however, that does not make it untrue just because by someone's own free will they choose not to believe it.  When I finally got the mind-set that God is ultimately responsible for everything, I also came to realize that I must continue to share the good news of Christ because, "I" am not sovereign and do not know who God has elected to believe and who he has not elected to believe, and because, as the old song goes, "Everybody ought to know who Jesus is," and, because His mercies are new every morning!  God is God and he can do whatever he wants, wherever he wants and to whomever he wants, and therefore, his praises will continually be in my mouth!  I love you, Mike; you make me use the other 95% of my brain, LOL.  Thanks, as always for another great blog!  <><

Tom, I really like that! "to put your full weight upon" sure captures the idea of trust to me....kind of like walking out on ice, or maybe even water (like Peter)

Gene, there are those subtle simple wonders that leave us in awe of God's power, knowing only he could orchestrate something so purely brilliant and flawless (like a sunset), then there's the flagrant supernatural events like the things Jesus did. It's all God, some of us see God's hand in it all and are left praising and worshiping. Sounds like you're in this camp...to the glory of God!

Pastor Dan, that is an excellent scripture. Don't be surprised no one else thought of it, most people think of things like the reality of hell, and the impossibility of crossing over from death to life, as the main points of that passage.

Angie, you write beautifully, have you written songs? My comment to Gene could be to you too! 

Linda - amen dear sister. Can't argue at all, good points concerning the totality of God's power and sovereignty! :-)