The Faith That Finds Me

I didn’t think I ‘believed’ ™️for a very long time. I wanted to, but I didn’t have that dignified, stoic, gentle head-nod-along-to-the-gospel-reading thing everyone else seemed to have. What I had was more of a bewildered, stumbling, uncomfortable, needy, loud thing that would claw its way out of every grave I tried to bury it in. Surely, whatever this thing was, it wasn’t faith.

I didn’t know this at the time but it turns out I landed in a corner of Christianity that’s known for dignified stoicism. That quiet reverence, the restraint, the careful composure. What I did know was that everyone else seemed to glide through the labyrinth while I kept tripping over the front steps. Where they nodded thoughtfully, I scribbled notes in red pen. Where they folded their hands neatly, I left lipstick prints on the chalice. Where they carried themselves with grace, I pulled faces with the acolytes to see who would giggle first.

I thought that disqualified me. I thought faith was supposed to be disciplined and contained, that it never allowed itself to spill over the edges. But here mine is, refusing to be managed. It pushes through in the lump in my throat I can’t swallow down. In the way my heart aches open at the wrong times. In laughter that breaks through when I least expect it and tears that surprise me in the middle of an ordinary day.

It isn’t polished. It interrupts. It leaves crumbs on the table and tracks mud across my freshly mopped floors. It rearranges the room, whether I’m ready or not. And I’m starting to love that about it.

Maybe that’s what my faith actually is. Completely lacking in polished composure and the only thing it’s certain of its uncertainty. But it’s also the quiet persistence that keeps nudging me forward. The pull toward love when anger feels safer, toward hope when despair feels easier, toward community when solitude feels more convenient.

I used to think I had to change my faith to measure up to everyone else’s steadiness. Now I think maybe the only thing I need to do is allow it to be itself and come find me anyway. And maybe it’s about time to trust that even in my clumsy earnest doubt, faith is already here, waiting for me to stop running from it.

So here I am. Still scribbling, still laughing at the wrong moments, still spilling over the edges. Not because I’m steady or sure, but because faith keeps finding me.