This week (early June 2015), I am in London. I
will be travelling around UK for 2 week at least. I am travelling with my
family and my in-laws. The aim of this "temporary migration" of a
nerdy Singaporean to a far away land of mittens and body overall is because my
brother in law (30 years old married with a son) is doing his PhD in Christian
ethics and politics. He is no doubt the brainy one here. His father is a pastor
(for at least 30 years) and in tow is his wife, a devout believer. In fact we
just celebrated their 41st anniversary on Monday, 1 June 2015 (at Four Seasons Peking Duck
restaurant at Chinatown, London).
My point of this post? Well, it has been an
eye-opening trip so far and the family bonding is the fire that sets my heart
alight amidst the chilly windy weather of London. And on one of the nights,
after dinner, we had an engaging discussion (if not slightly heated) about my
faith. But here is a little backdrop to set the stage.
If there were a barometer to measure one's level
of belief, with doubt at one end and belief at the other, then I would be the
pendulum that swings towards the side of doubt. As a student of faith, my
report card would show marginal passes at best (even red overall at times).
Belief is a strange creature of mental deliberation for me. I can never take it
hook, line and sinker. I have a mind that cannot take yes for an answer or no
for a question (that is, "yes, I am 100% sure" and "No, I am not
100% unsure?") The problem with me is that I am not 100% sure. Neither am I
100% unsure. Both statements find me stumped.
For this reason, many will label me as
wishy-washy or half-past-six believer, or a backbencher. I can't really blame
them. But for me, belief and faith are personal, and annoyingly subjective
even. Just as no two fingerprints are alike, no two consciousness are the same.
My consciousness speaks for myself and the consciousness of others speak for
themselves. And speaking for myself, I can identify with the many doubting
Thomases who struggle with faith as often as they struggle with understanding their
body's quirks after forty.
So, that night after dinner, being solemnly
arraigned, I was asked, "Personally, do you really believe?" I guess
it was an expected (and fair) question since the only thing my wife could
remember about her childhood is Sunday school, prayer after meals, biblical
heroes of old, church choir and getting to church 30 minutes earlier. Her
family had totally immersed her in the Christian culture and tradition. And questions like that is always answered in the positive, and most definitively.
It is also an important question. "Do you
believe?" is a question that is unassuming in its form and essential in
its substance. You see, we all live our whole life riding on the coattails of one
belief after another - although we often fall short of being faithful to or
consistent with them in thoughts and deeds. Paradoxically, having no belief is
in fact a powerful belief no less (nihilism and fatalism come to mind). So, having the right belief is like a moral compass in life. It takes us from the lost to the found, the wanderings to the destination.
So "Do I believe?" was the enticing
appetizer for the night and mental indigestion was my strange company.
Suddenly, the usually eloquent me (mostly talking poppycock) was tongue-tied. I
was groping. I blurted out, "I keep an open mind." That was all I
could say. It was not a yes (I believe) or a no (I do not believe) but a
yes-and-no (Neither I believe nor disbelieve). Suddenly, I lost my center and I
couldn't completely understand why I would withhold a definitive stand (so as
to make an endearing impression with my in-laws).
Maybe the rustic and warmth setting have
romanticized my sentiment into a spineless jello and I wanted to be tactlessly
honest with dastardly consequences. The night was then spent trying to cement
me into a definitive position. It was definitely not an entrapment. It was a
clarification. But stubbornly, I resisted their earnest attempts for reasons I
am still hopelessly befuddled. But this post is not about me; god knows this
restless mind of mine will never settle down in the near future. I am an
incorrigible over-thinker.
This post is actually about my brother-in-law,
Nat, and my father-in-law, Dad. Nat, a PhD candidate, knew his faith well. He
does not just study it as an academic course, he tries his earnest best to
live, uphold, protect, advance, and savor it. It is simple faith from a
thinking man. Unlike many whom I have unfortunately come to know, Nat will say
it as it is and mince words only if he was in the presence of pristine royalty.
Other than that (what are the odds of that happening right?), he puts it in the
best way he knows how and it was good enough for me.
He no doubt wanted me to take a position because
without a position, whereforth do I set off from? And without an end in mind, where
then should I start with the first step? So, Nat changed tack. He proposed probability - "Do
you believe more than you disbelieve?" Like feeding an old man without
teeth, Nat fed me the empathy of a bowl of porridge. It was more digestible,
more palatable. And I answered that in the affirmative - "Yes, I believe
more than disbelieve." But that was not all.
Nat knew my struggles and spelt it out in a way
that risk himself being labeled a doubting Thomas himself. He said - and I
paraphrase for effect from my subjective standpoint - "I understand where
you are coming from. But I admit my ignorance here too. I do not have the
answers about gratuitous suffering and all. Faith is a mystery revealed in Christ.
It will always remain a mystery. But it is not a mystery that repels faith. It
in fact embraces it. It is a mystery that deepens understanding and not muddles
it. It is a reasonable mystery but not always an agreeable one. So, it is not
unreasonable not to be 100% sure at times. For me, I know for whom my Savior
died for and I rest in that blessed assurance amidst the understanding I know
not."
That was what I heard in my heart from Nat and it
went in some ways to stabilize my restless existential palpitations.
Then came my dad. He was relatively silent
throughout. He elected to counsel via silence. He asked the same questions no
doubt but he asked it with the heart to understand and not with the mind to win
an argument. His silence ministered to me more than what words could ever do.
And if applied wisdom ever practiced favoritism, then it would be silence above
words, understanding above arguments, and pleading ignorance above showboating
knowledge.
Dad spoke to me and his words unspoken stayed
with me throughout the night right through the morning. It was in the
morning-after that the clouds began to clear for me and it cleared just enough
for me to catch a glimpse of the meaning of faith, the humility of acknowledged
ignorance and the power of selfless love. Cheerz.
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