Sometimes I would sit on my daughter’s bed as she lied there not able to fall asleep. She was afraid of a robber coming in through her window and stealing her.
I know this happens sometimes. I know it is theoretically a possibility. But I cannot tell her about this possibility. I must tell her I am confident that will not happen because I am there and I will protect her.
She seems to trust me when I say that and it brings her peace.
But the truth is I cannot protect her. If I am awake and hear or see the robber in my house I will try. But what she is afraid of I cannot prevent: a thief in the night who quietly comes in through the window.
But I provide the peace and feign confidence and she thinks that I know.
This is the same thing I do with my faith.
I tell others I know things are true. But what I really know is that sometimes I cry when I am in front of others and sometimes I cry when I talk about what is important to me and sometimes I cry when I am grateful or relieved or hopeful or stressed or tired or when I am done with something I’ve worked hard to complete or when I witness beauty or when I feel connected to someone or something.
But it is not the tears that bring others hope. It is the confidence that others want to see behind them. I have wanted to find confidence in those tears. So I take them and I tell myself that only God could be the source of those tears. He would send those tears as proof that he is and that I am in the right place at the right time. Because he would want me to cry with conviction.
The hardest to explain to myself is that sometimes I cry when watching a show on Netflix or a movie in the theater or when reading a book on my Kindle. These stories that are not true, they bring the same feelings of gratitude and admiration and connection. But they are not true. The feelings are true, but not the stories.
But if the feelings are true, do the stories need to be true? Or is it enough that the feelings are true, and that makes the stories true in a different way?