what about when your faith is broken?

Sometimes, life breaks you. It gets to be too much, pressing you flat to the ground with your face in the dirt. You know what you're supposed to do—pray--but you just can't seem to find the words. Everything has crashed down around you, overwhelming you, and you feel like you can't breathe. People tell you, “Everything will work out. Just have faith.”

But what if your faith is broken?

What if you simply don't have it in you to “just have faith”?

I've been there. I've found myself down in the depths while the people around me are saying all I need is the faith that everything happens for a reason (please believe me when I say that those words are seldom comforting) and that it's all part of God's plan. I've had my faith shattered into so many pieces that I didn't think it could ever be repaired.

“if we are faithless, He will remain faithful...”

~2 Timothy 2:13a

God knows that we will face things that shatter our faith into a million tiny pieces. He knows that we will feel abandoned, lost, and alone. He knows that sometimes it's hard to even remember to breathe in and out, and that everything else is simply too much.

Through all of it, though, He isfaithful. It doesn't matter when my faith is shattered, because His faithfulness can't be broken. And eventually, He gathers the shattered pieces back together. Piece by piece, He slowly mends our faith. He reminds me that I don't have to remember how to breathe, because He breathed into my lungs and they automatically strain for more of His breath. He quietly reminds me that He holds all of creation in place, keeping it from spinning out of control, so what makes me think that I can spin out of His control?