August 10, 2025; Hebrews 11:1-2,8-12,13-19; 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time
People who do not have faith in God live their lives by knowing and not knowing. We who do have faith in God live our lives by knowing and believing. The difference between knowing and believing is important. We know the things we can see, the things we can verify. We know when the sun is shining. We know that we can isolate a teaspoon of salt by using a measuring spoon. We know that when our speedometer says 70, our car is going 70 miles per hour. The things we know are essential. They allow us to manage our lives. They reveal to us what things are and how we can use them.
But there are other things in life we cannot verify and, therefore, we cannot know. We do not know that our marriage will last. We do not know that our investments will increase. We do not know how many years we will live. When people who do not have faith face these unverifiable aspects of life, the only thing they can say about them is, “I don’t know.” We as people of faith have another possibility. We can choose to believe. Now the model of believing in the scriptures is Abraham. In today’s second reading the author of the book of Hebrews tells us that when God asked Abraham to leave his home, Abraham went without knowing where he was to go. Abraham went not because he knew the way, but because he trusted the one who called him. This reveals the nature of believing. Believing is entering into a relationship with God and clinging to it. Believing does not allow us to know the future. It calls us to trust in the one who does know the future and to believe that God cares for us.
So knowing and believing are not the same. We are believing people, but we do not know whether we will celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary, whether our investments will double, whether we will live to be 100. But what believing does is allow us to walk into the future knowing that we do not walk alone and trusting that the same God who guided Abraham will guide our journey of faith as well.
So as people of faith we must live our lives both knowing and believing. We should value and treasure the things we can verify. We should respect the knowledge that come to us from science and from those who will reliably advise us. But at the same time, we must dare to believe. This is what we try to do as we gather every weekend here at the Eucharist. We stand shoulder to shoulder and say to God, “I believe in you. I do not know my future, but you do. So I place my life in your hands. And I believe you will never let me go.”