beliefs

Lately I've been realizing that the things I believe in, the ideas upon which I've founded my life, are not necessarily things that I have taken for my own. The reason they are still in my life and that I believe in them is because they're familiar. I was taught them when I was younger and grew up knowing and believing certain things. I simply never knew anything else. But as I grew older and had my eyes opened to the world around me, I realized that what I had believed all my life was not necessarily something everyone believed in. It didn't surprise me that there were immoral people, those who didn't believe what I did because God was repulsive to them. All they wanted was their own sin. What did surprise me was that even Christians didn't believe some or even most of the same things I did.

So this year, my last year of high school and my last year of the familiar before I leave home and enter the craziness of the world around me, I'm going to dig deep into what I believe and why I believe what I do. I don't want to believe something simply because people I know do, even if they're my own family or close friends. I want to believe something because I know it's true, not because someone else does.

In my quiet time today, I read Isaiah 40. Verses 6-8 stood out to me as something to hold on to as I try to figure things out.

"A voice says, 'Cry out.' And I said, 'What shall I cry?' 'All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field. The grass withers and the flowers fall, because the breath of the LORD blows on them. Surely the people are grass. The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever.'"

We are like grass, and like the flowers of the field. We grow, have our short lives under the sun, and then we wither and die. But God's word will stand forever. What do I believe? One thing I know for sure is that God is real. He is more real than anything in this world. And as I do my digging, I will lean on him and his word.