Proverbs 20:6
Many a man proclaims his own loyalty,
but a faithful man who can find?
It is a curious fact of the Christian life that we cannot have certitude about whether we shall go to heaven. That is not, however, the same as saying we must live in eternal fear and doubt. Rather, it is to say that certitude is a different and weaker thing than faith. The devil always wants us to look to ourselves and ask “Am I certain I trust Jesus?” This is to turn our eyeballs inward and try to find our lives by looking within. It is a process that is never-ending and always futile, for it teaches us only despair or presumption. Either we are incapable of certitude (and therefore live in endless worry that we don’t have sufficient faith and are doomed) or we are falsely certain of ourselves (like a certain apostle who cockily declared, “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death!”). In contrast, to this entire wrong-headed search for certitude is the Lord’s teaching: “Believe in me.” Instead of asking “Do I trust Jesus?” the sane and sensible thing to do is ask “Is Jesus trustworthy?” This is a real act of faith for it turns our eyes outward to Jesus and not inward to fantasies of despair and presumption. Today, recognize that “the faithful man” has been found. He is not you or me, but Jesus. Look at him, not at your ever-shifting states of mind, and he will be faithful to you.
