The Believing

I didn't have my camera with me.  It was the perfect shot.

An entire row of them, flying past the window of my car.  I've stopped to let them pass, the sound of the gears changing, chains ratcheting, the rubber of the tires as they hit the pavement and quickly pick up on the other side.  The wheels are spinning, the boys are laughing,  hurrying past to get to class.

Further away, the soybeans flutter in a breeze that belies the sticky heat.  Silvery waves that go on for miles.  The sun beats down on us.  We've got very few places to retreat.  The pavement is hot and the air is heavy.  The tabernacle, of interminable age, with lofty heights and creaky wood is a marginal refuge in the dismal heat of the day. Whatever breeze there happens to be floats through the open spaces between the planks.

Later, after we've lifted our praises together in that lovely place, and the visiting evangelist has spoken Truth to us from the Word, an older gentleman stops me.

"See here," he says, "Thomas said he must see it to believe it, but that's not what the pastor said, he said you must believe it to see it."

"Yes." says I.

He goes on, "it's like a wheelbarrow see, one hand you have works, but you aren't saved by works.  The other hand is the faith.  The believing."

Ah yes, the believing.

But what's IN the wheelbarrow?

What is it that I have out there in front of me, pushing before...or perhaps always reaching toward?

Shouldn't I know, in order to really believe?  Believe that what is here is only temporary and that what is "there" is more real than what I could ever know now, here?

Is it hope?

Is it Jesus?

If one hand, even ONE lets go, that wheelbarrow becomes practically impossible to move.  Certainly far more difficult than it was ever intended.

Is it the working out of my salvation?

On the one hand, faith.  The choice to believe and be saved.

On the other hand, works.  The product of my salvation, by faith.

The one hand doing tangible things that can be seen, the other hand simply making the choice to do what is asked.

To have faith.

To believe.