Death and Rebirth

"You know when you were a little kid and you believed in fairy tales? That fantasy of what your life would be, white dress, prince charming who’d carry you away to a castle on a hill. You’d lie in your bed at night and close your eyes and you had complete and utter faith. Santa clause, the tooth fairy, prince charming, they were so close you could taste them. But eventually you grow up and one day you open your eyes and the fairy tale disappears. Most people turn to the things and people they can trust. But the thing is, it’s hard to let go of that fairy tale entirely, because almost everyone has that smallest bit of hope and faith that one day they would open their eyes and it would all come true.
At the end of the day, faith is a funny thing. It turns up when you don’t really expect it. It’s like one day you realize that the fairy tale is slightly different than your dream. The castle, well it may not be a castle. And it’s not so important that it’s happily ever after, just that it’s happy right now. See, once in a while, once in a blue moon, people will surprise you. And once in a while, people may even take your breath away."

—

From “Save Me,” episode 1x08 of Grey’s Anatomy

Experiencing a loss of faith can be like grief.  Coming to terms with the reality that you don’t believe in God like you used to can feel like losing God entirely.  If I can no longer believe that God is in control of my life, what does that mean? 

Perhaps it can give us the agency to see that we are truly God’s hands and that our lives can have enormous meaning, wonder, and joy even if it isn’t being handed out by God.  We can create these things with God and come to find a life that is seeped in creativity and holy work.  

Life can surprise us and faith can be reborn into something new if we let it.