Faith is an odd concept. I remember the first time it was brought to my attention in a way and place that I couldn’t ignore. The pastor in catechism stood before my desk and demanded that understand it.
I muttered and meandered with a skill that has always gotten me through such situations until he decided to help me out.
“If you were on your back porch on the railing and your father came out and asked you to jump and he would catch me, faith would be closing your eyes and leaping into his arms. Faith,’ he said, “was what drove that leap!”
As I walked home afterward, the conversation bothered me. I didn’t like thinking about closing my eyes and jumping. I wanted to jump with my eyes open. Do we really have to close our eyes?
The one who would catch me was my father, not a stranger. He had caught me before. Faith seemed to me to be an action based on experience. It is not simply a belief in a theological or historical belief, it is an action. It is a habit of thinking and acting based on knowledge gained by experience. It is not blind.
My Bible Study Notebook 