It is love that impels them to pursue everlasting life; therefore, they are eager to take the narrow road of which the Lord says: Narrow is the road that leads to life Matthew 7:14. (Rule of St. Benedict 5.10-11)
When my son was not yet six years old, he asked me at Christmas: “How can God be both everywhere AND a baby in a manger?”
I said, “Yes, and he’s also a Spirit who is present to each of us at every moment.”
He said, “That’s CRAZY.”
So I said, “One day you’ll learn that the really dangerous crazy people make perfect sense. Everything fits together neatly for them.”
Fortunately, at that point he dashed off to something else, so I didn’t have to explain that the baby is an exiled king who will one day return, and we’ve given him our allegiance, which involves us in all sorts of struggles while we wait for him to reclaim his inheritance.
Or maybe that’s not theologically correct. Maybe he is already King of everything. It’s just that his enemy usurps his territory and seduces the allegiance of his citizens—usually the easy way, with inducements. For those who don’t respond to inducements, there are threats. For those who disregard threats, there are punishments. Some of these are worse than being condescended to at cocktail parties.
Sell out?
In other words, there’s a romantic loyalty in the Christian call. Something about love.
The Christian does not obey a set of laws, a system of ideas, an abstract principle or an impersonal force. The Christian has committed to obey a person. That person is Christ. So, Christian faith is not an exercise of the imagination. Nor is faith an intellectual assent to a set of propositions. Still less is it membership in a club. You do have both an imagination and an intellect, and you are free to join clubs, but faith is something else. Faith in God is trust in a person.
It’s exactly at the point of obedience that you start to wonder if you really believe in this guy. Why should you put yourself out for someone you neither know nor trust?
You shouldn’t. If it strikes you that God asks far too much, proceed with caution. Take a step in the direction of what he seems to want, and see what comes of it. And begin to claim his promises for yourself. It’s only as you begin to experience God making good on his word that you’ll begin to feel confident in him. If you never expect anything of him, you’ll never know him.
Also realize that if you are yourself untrustworthy, you will never know God. “Faithless” means treacherous, fickle, false. This sort of person is incompatible with God. If you want to experience a relationship with God, be faithful in your dealings with other human beings.
