Forward Movement is an official, non-profit agency of the Episcopal Church whose mission is to create compelling content for Christian living. Since 1935 we have published the quarterly devotional Forward Day by Day, as well as pamphlets, booklets, and books that encourage and nourish people in their lives of prayer and faith.
FRIDAY, August 7 (John Mason Neale)
Mark 9:14-29. I believe; help my unbelief!
The story is told of Queen Mother Elisabeth of Belgium on a visit to Communist Poland in the 1950s, asking her state-appointed escort if he was a Christian. "Believing, but not practicing" he replied. "Oh, of course," said Elisabeth, "you are a Communist." "Practicing, but not believing," said the escort.
The spiritual life often seems to be just such a contradiction, a seesaw between belief and unbelief, at times filled with certainty and at times plagued by doubt. Sometimes I find myself going through the motions, practicing but not believing, and at other times I find my faith strong despite my struggles with organized religion.
It is in the very struggle between belief and unbelief that growth takes place. A complacent faith is a dying faith. There is always a new and grander horizon in the journey of faith. Believe what you are able and ask the Lord's help for the rest. He healed the son of the man who doubted, and neither will he turn you away.
He that undertakes to believe sets upon the hardest task that ever was proposed to men....Believing is sweating work.
-John Bunyan
PRAY for the Diocese of Rupert's Land (Rupert's Land, Canada)
Ps 88 * 91, 92; 2 Samuel 12:1-14; Acts 19:21-41
View the daily Lectionary Readings at Satucket.com.
Or view the Bible passages at Biblegateway.com.
A Meditation for Pentecost
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