I’m the type of person who learns best by example. Our best example for everything, of course, is our Savior, Jesus Christ. His life has been a great example from before He was born to after. As the Son of God, we always have his life to study in examples of faith.
In Sunday School, there have been discussions of faith in all aspects of our life. Do we have the faith to pay tithing (10% of our income) when we don’t have enough to pay the electric bill? This is a matter of faith. Should we follow a prompting to visit someone out of the blue when we hadn’t called ahead? This also takes faith. Does my family have enough faith to be obedient to attend church every week? We just have to try.
I love how Paul writes to the Hebrews in chapter 11 and proclaims the faith of these great prophets and others exercise in their life. By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than his brother Cain. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death. By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not yet seen, prepared an ark to save his family and the animals. I’m sure that took a lot of faith too.
Through the faith of Abraham, he traveled to a strange place, having no idea where he was going. By Sarah’s faith, she conceived Isaac even though her time for child bearing had passed. By that same faith, Moses fulfilled his destiny and led the Children of Israel out of bondage. He was raised in the Pharaoh’s house and didn’t have to put himself in such dangerous circumstance, but he did. He withstood the wrath of the Pharaoh, led the Children of Israel out of Egypt, which included implementing the Passover and parting the waters of the Red Sea. This allowed the Children of Israel to be out of the reach of the solders chasing them. This all took faith to accomplish.
What about our faith? We won’t be building arks anytime soon or parting the water to cross on dry land. But we do have challenges to face sometimes. Sometimes those challenges are daily. We teach teens to obey and reverence the gospel of Jesus Christ. We speak at work sessions and lead co-workers to improve businesses. We promote honesty and integrity in civil offices. All these opportunities take faith and the more faith we use, the stronger it becomes.
From the words of Richard G. Scott (a priesthood leader in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints): “Despite all of the negative challenges we have in life, we must take time to actively exercise our faith.”
And although Paul did not mention Adam and Eve’s faith, Elder Scott did. By faith Adam ate the forbidden fruit to bring man to earth to experience trials and tribulations. Sometimes what might seem like a small and simple thing has great bearing on the rest of the world.
Faith in the greater good, faith in God above, faith that we can accomplish what we set out to do all have an effect on how we treat other people, including our own families. Whether we realize it or not, by moving our life forward to improve and serve, we practice our faith, which becomes stronger. This is a rhythm of faith can be stopped if we were to just give up but we shouldn’t. We should always move forward. Our life is made up of small steps in faith as I believe God intended. As Pierre Teilhard de Chardin said “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” Faith is part of that human experience.
Valerie Steimle has been writing as a family advocate for over 25 years. As a convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she promotes Christian living in her writings and is the mother of nine children and grandmother to twelve. Mrs. Steimle authored six books and is a contributing writer to several online websites. To her, time is the most precious commodity we have and knows we should spend it wisely.
To read more of Valerie's work, visit her at her website, The Blessings of Family Life.
