by Norma Budden

Created on: September 26, 2010   Last Updated: September 30, 2010

Faith - just the sound of the word carries enough power to fill our souls with hope. It doesn’t matter whether that hope is for something soon to be achieved or is for a long term goal which we strive to attain.

There are many Biblical references pertaining to faith and for good reason; without faith, nothing is possible. It’s definitely impossible to please God unless faith is being exercised.

When many humans think about God, we conjure up a mental image of a man who sits on a throne ready to lash out in judgment at the slightest provocation. Even in this grim situation, faith is still being exercised because belief in God does exist, even though He cannot be seen.

However, when we believe that God desires to share our joys and sorrows - that God desires to have a complete relationship with His human creation - our faith seems to multiply; we achieve a level of joy that many cannot attain because they continue to feel isolated during the rough times and experience shallow “highs.”

1 John 5: 3-5 speaks about the type of faith we should have if we desire to please God. Verse 3 is particularly interesting. Paraphrased it says, “For ‘this’ is the love of God, that we keep His commandments which should not cause us sorrow, pain and grief.”

Let’s take a closer look at this verse, shall we? First of all, what happens when we step outside of God’s ideal for our lives? What happens when we deliberately disobey His commandments? We encounter situations and, as a result of choices we make, we find ourselves on paths often leading to destruction. Heartache, sorrow and loss become faithful companions; joy, peace and hope take a nosedive.

However, God loved us and His desire was to spare us from all of this emotional agony, thus He created the commandments. He knew just how much of a mess we would get ourselves into, as a society, if there were no laws established - no rules to guide us from one day to another.

On the other hand,  by keeping God’s commandments, we are prevented from getting into many situations which would have the ability of putting us in compromising positions. We maintain our reputations and can keep our families together more easily. We don’t suffer loss from letting go of relationships that we shouldn’t have been part of in the first place. We don’t suffer withdrawal symptoms because of placing other things and people more highly than God. We can trust each other

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