Archives For Have a Little Faith

Questioning God

November 24, 2011 — 5 Comments

Today I am finishing my series on my thoughts from my interview with author Mitch Albom about  his book “Have a Little Faith” and the upcoming TV movie based on the book that will be on ABC Sunday, November 27th.

Three thoughts came out of my interview with Mitch:

  1. Faith should change our attitude.
  2. Responding to a crisis of faith.
  3. Questioning God.

Also, thanks to Hallmark Moving Pictures, I am going to be giving away two copies of  “Have a Little Faith” this week.

Here’s how to enter:

  1. Leave a comment. (1 entry per comment)
  2. Tweet this: Win a copy of “Have a Little Faith” by @MitchAlbom @KevinMartineau’s blog. Details here: http://su.pr/17qSjV #giveaways (1 entry for every tweet or RT)
  3. For bonus entries: Google +, Digg, Like on Facebook and/or stumble this post. (1 entry for each)
  4. Contest closes Thursday, November 24th at 9 pm PST.  I will announce the winner’s here on Friday morning at 9 am PST.
***** CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED *****
CONGRATULATIONS TO CARLA MCNIELL AND ROB ROSS!
PLEASE SEND ME YOUR MAILING ADDRESS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE! :)

Now on to the interview!

ME: If you had only 5 minutes with God what would you ask Him? (in the Epilogue of the book Mitch asks this question of the Reb.)

MITCH ALBOM: Well the Reb’s response was to give away 4 minutes basically to other people.  But now I feel like a hog if I take the whole five minutes [laughs].

Um … but if I got a minute or 2 minutes or whatever it was I would … [pause] I would ask … [pause] I would ask: Are You, are You really there with us in every decision that we make?  And if You are … why do You allow us to make so many bad ones?  What are we supposed to learn?

Not in a critical sense but clearly, you know, if God is all-powerful then God could stop us from doing anything.  And what is the value of us being wrong so many times and hurting people and making the wrong decisions? What are we learning from it?

Is it just free will, it is just that whole story about you make the choices, I gave you everything you needed to make the right choices you just have to do so? Or is something more or are You not with us on the small decisions?  Are you just here for the big ones?

You know, I guess that’s the thing I wonder.  I look around at how so many people are, you know, losing their way and uh, you know, I just can’t believe that God wants that to happen so there must be a reason that He allows it to happen, you know.

And I suppose I would ask that question about children too.  You know, why? When children die, you know, or they get sick, why?  What  aren’t we getting about that because there’s just no, you know, it is beyond my understanding.  Especially to faithful people and all.  Why do You bring some people home so soon?  Now, um, I don’t know if He would have any answers for me but those are a couple of the big ones.

Questioning God

A year and a half ago I found myself asking a lot of these same questions when a little girl from our church was tragically killed.

Why did this tragedy happen?

Why did this happen to someone so young?

Why didn’t God stop it?

Why God? Why?

Even a year and a half later I don’t have the answers to these questions.  I don’t know if there ever will be any answers.

Despite all this though, I have found comfort in one very important truth: God is good all the time. 

God is good even when there is tragedy.

God is good even when I don’t understand.

God is good even when bad things happen to good people.

GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME!

Focusing on this important truth helps me to continue to move forward.

If you had 5 minutes with God and you could ask Him any question, what would you ask Him?

In Books, Christian living, Have a Little Faith
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Responding to a crisis of faith

November 23, 2011 — 9 Comments

Today I am continuing on in sharing my thoughts from my interview with author Mitch Albom about  his book “Have a Little Faith” and the upcoming TV movie based on the book that will be on ABC Sunday, November 27th.

Three thoughts came out of my interview with Mitch:

  1. Faith should change our attitude.
  2. Responding to a crisis of faith.
  3. Questioning God.

Today I want to share Mitch’s response to another question I asked him and I want to share the resulting thoughts that surfaced for me .

Also, thanks to Hallmark Moving Pictures, I am going to be giving away two copies of  “Have a Little Faith” this week.

Here’s how to enter:

  1. Leave a comment. (1 entry per comment)
  2. Tweet this: Win a copy of “Have a Little Faith” by @MitchAlbom @KevinMartineau’s blog. Details here: http://su.pr/4vrr90 #giveaways (1 entry for every tweet or RT)
  3. For bonus entries: Google +, Digg, Like on Facebook and/or stumble this post. (1 entry for each)
  4. Contest closes Thursday, November 24th at 9 pm PST.  I will announce the winner’s here on Friday morning at 9 am PST.
***** CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED *****
CONGRATULATIONS TO CARLA MCNIELL AND ROB ROSS!
PLEASE SEND ME YOUR MAILING ADDRESS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE! :)

Now on to the interview!

ME:  Have you had any crisis’ of faith since writing the book?  (This was a follow up question to the first question I asked him.)

MITCH ALBOM: Um … crisis is a tough word because it implies something that I am not sure I would agree with, you know, for me.  But I did … when Pastor Henry died.  Uh … we were in New York and we had gone to New York to film the “Today Show” to talk about the one year anniversary of fixing the roof and what a great story it was.  You know, how the church had received so much attention since the book came out, how happy Henry was and we just had this great morning together at the “Today Show”

It was a crisp winter morning and it was December 21st and as we were going to the airport.  Henry said “Boy, New York sure has changed since I was here all those years ago.  I wish I could stay another night and see some of my family”

And I said “Well Henry you can stay another night.  All you have to do is just change the ticket”

And he said “You can do that?”

And I said “Yeah. You just make a phone call and you can do it.”

So we did in the car.  He ended up staying and I ended up going home.  We hugged at the airport and we talked about seeing each other on Thursday and I never saw him again.  He died that night.

I have had many, many … many hours of wondering, you know, why that happened.  I wouldn’t call it a crisis it just sort of  internal wondering.

You know, did God want to take him home then? Had He let him sort of see the mountaintop?  You know, got him all the way back to where he began in New York and then said: “Okay that’s it?” You know, should we have gone in the first place?

You know,  all those kinds of things goes through your mind when someone dies too young.  I would say that would probably be one.

Responding to a crisis of faith

I think all of us have gone through some sort of crisis of faith or as Mitch called it “an internal wondering.”

We can’t believe that our parent died at such a young age.

We can’t believe that our spouse walked out on us

We can’t believe that we have just been diagnosed with cancer.

When we come to this point in our lives, it feels like there is no way past our problems. We’re convinced that life will never be the same again. We feel like there is no hope.

The truth is though, we can find hope in the midst of any crisis we face.  We can have hope when it feels like there is no reason to have hope.

We can have hope when our hope is based on a powerful, in-control God who can do and will do the impossible.

This kind of hope is based on a God who has defeated death itself!

When everything seems hopeless we need to remember:

Even though life is uncertain, God is not.  While our power is limited, God is limitless.  He still has the whole world in His hands.

Your world may feel chaotic and hopeless right now but remember God is still in control!

Have you ever had a crisis of faith? If so, would you be willing to share your story with us?

In Books, Christian living, Have a Little Faith
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Faith should change our attitude!

November 22, 2011 — 19 Comments

A few weeks ago I was approached by Grace Hill Media and they asked me if I would be willing to interview author Mitch Albom about his book “Have a Little Faith” and the upcoming TV movie based on the book that will be on ABC Sunday, November 27th.

I was honoured to be asked and I agreed.

I conducted my interview yesterday and I wish I could have spent a lot more time digging deeper into the issues that surfaced through the interview.   Since time did not allow me to do this yesterday with Mitch I am going to use the next three posts to do this.

Three thoughts came out of my interview with Mitch:

  1. Faith should change our attitude.
  2. Responding to a crisis of faith.
  3. Questioning God.

Over the next three posts I want to share Mitch’s response to three of the questions I asked him and I want to share the resulting thoughts that surfaced for me .

Also, thanks to Hallmark Moving Pictures, I am going to be giving away two copies of  “Have a Little Faith” this week.

Here’s how to enter:

  1. Leave a comment. (1 entry per comment)
  2. Retweet this: Win a copy of “Have a Little Faith” by @MitchAlbom @KevinMartineau’s blog. Details here: http://su.pr/1PAgy2 #giveaways (1 entry for every tweet or RT)
  3. For bonus entries: Digg, Like on Facebook and/or stumble this post. (1 entry for each)
  4. Contest closes Thursday, November 24th at 9 pm PST.  I will announce the winner’s here on Friday morning at 9 am PST.
***** CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED *****
CONGRATULATIONS TO CARLA MCNIELL AND ROB ROSS!
PLEASE SEND ME YOUR MAILING ADDRESS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE! :)

Now onto the interview!

ME: You say “Have a Little Faith” took you on a journey back to faith.  It has been 2 years since you wrote the book.  Where are you in your faith journey now?

MITCH ALBOM: Much deeper.  Much more daily and even hourly than I was even before the book came out.  I think what happens as a result of a book, at least if it is embraced in any kind wide scale, you start to be dipped in the water of the reach of the book.

So all of a sudden I am at a lot more churches.  I am a lot more synagogues. I am doing a lot more religious things in the time since the book came out.

Just sort of coincidentally I ended up taking over a mission orphanage in Haiti … It ended up sort of falling into my operation or else it was going to close up.  So I end up operating now, and I go down every month, a Christian mission in Haiti and I see the joy and the comfort that faith gives these kids who have nothing and it is inspiring.

It is just beyond words that I can give you in terms of how magical faith can be for people who have so little and yet are so joyous.

So between stuff like that and the visits to the churches and the conversations and the visits to the synagogues and even in conversations like this with you I think faith has grown exponentially in terms how I spend the hours of my day.

Faith should change our attitude!

faith

What resonated with me here is Mitch’s description of how he has seen how faith changes people’s lives.  He has seen faith bringing joy to people’s lives that we would least expect it from.

I remember when I went to Mexico during my first year of Bible school and how overwhelmed I was with the people’s joy.  These people had nothing in comparison to me.  They were living from meal to meal not knowing when the next one was coming.

And yet they were joyful (I will never forget their smiles).

They were grateful for what they had (even though they had so little).

They were generous with what they had (It was hard to accept their generous gifts).

Faith should change our attitude!

It should change our complaining into joy!

It should change our sense of entitlement into gratefulness!

It should change stinginess into generosity!

How else should faith change our attitude?

In Books, Christian living, Have a Little Faith
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