Missing Piece.

You can’t buy faith. It’s something you have to receive, something that one has to build from scratch.

They couldn’t build her. Faith, that is. We finally had the money, the time and the expertise, but they just couldn’t build her. That morning on our 4am ride, my friends were more excited than me about my getting the new bike. Yet, I couldn’t explain what it was inside me which told me that Faith wouldn’t be ready so soon.

Because my friends had bought me the bicycle frame, donated some of their spare parts and my family were chipping in the rest, we had to build Faith from scratch. Building a bicycle is tricky business- one doesn’t appreciate how beautiful it is till one sees how many parts it is made of. The curve of the wheels, the shapely saddle, the angular handlebars and stem, the sturdy frame, shiny gears and crank, and other accessories make it complete. Or almost.

It made me see, how precious and fragile our faith in life, God and humanity is too, how multi-faceted it is, and how painstaking it can be to bring it to full maturity and completion.

Alas, there was a missing piece, due to be shipped in only in weeks, and so the bike-building was called off.

I was a little disappointed, yet not surprised. Something told me I too was not yet ready.

A tiny part called the adaptor was missing. It is something put inside the gears so the bicycle can function properly. It made me wonder, was there something in my life, a small thing, which was hindering my faith in life, in God, and in myself from being built properly too?

People who’ve trained with me long enough all tell me the same thing- you’ve got to have more faith in yourself, Wai Jia. Push. Very often, my perseverance falls short at the last leg, in the face of trials and difficulties, and I start to slow down, lose hope, due to a lack of faith in my own abilities. Hey, push yourself, I don’t wanna see you drop out of the training pack. Push. Very often, I doubt myself and wonder if I would be a competent and respectable doctor, and start getting discouraged.

So when they told me the adaptor was missing, that they had to wait for weeks before it came in, it made me wonder what it was in my own life which hindered the maturation and completion of my own faith- in life, in God and myself.

Is there something missing in your life hindering the fullness of your faith too?

It could be a small thing, just like the adaptor. But it is enough to stop the entire bicycle from being built.

It reminded me, of the roots of bitterness I had allowed to grow in me, robbing me of the joy that I used to enjoy with certain friends, and spoiling the faith I had in the friendship; It reminded me, of the profound sense of inadequacy I sometimes have in other aspects of my life, which sports, especially cycling, is teaching me to overcome; It reminded me, of how fragile our lives really are, with perfection hanging everything in precarious balance, needing all the threads to work synchronously for the creation of a beautiful tapestry called faith.

Trials will always come our way to destroy what was meant to be built. Faith, can’t be bought off the rack. It is multidimensional, muti-faceted, and one must take care of all aspects of it-spiritual, physical, mental, emotional, to be mature and complete.

“So you’re telling me, that you can’t build Faith today?

” We don’t have the adaptor. It’ll take some weeks to come, I don’t know when either. But there’s another option. If you want the bike to be built now, we can use another gearset. That one doesn’t require an adaptor.”

My friend, Al, an experienced and avid cyclist shot me a look I only knew too well. The gearset we were being offered obviously wasn’t a reliable one. Al and J even asked me, “Do you really wanna get Faith? There’re still other bicycles we can look at, you know.”

But I had made up my mind. Our faith will always be tested. But perhaps, a little perseverance and patience, is all we need to bring it to full completion.

I thought about what happened last Saturday, about how excited and amazed my 7 year-old Sunday School children were when they heard my friends got the bicycle for me, how touched the other teachers were by the story that they asked me to stay back so I could tell the story to the next class, how it was so divine that the lesson for the week was about Praying With Faith (a summary of all the lessons of faith we had gone through in the past month), how ‘coincidental’ that the bible study we had 2 days ago was about God’s faithfulness and the rainbow… and just felt that perhaps, there may be a reason for this all.

“No, it’s okay,” I said. “I’ll wait for the adaptor. I’ll wait for Faith to be built properly. Meanwhile I’ll train on my current bike which is heavy, so it’ll be good for training my legs, ha.”

And so I learnt that day, that no matter how difficult it may be to re-build your faith in life, in certain friendships, in God even, it might just be worth it to exercise a little patience, because perserverance always pays off.

“You made a good choice to wait,” said Al. “You’re gonna face a whole set of problems if you use the gearset he’s offering you. With the adaptor, you can get your Shimano 105, which is far more reliable. And your bike’ll be more complete. “

So I’ll wait. And meanwhile, think about the things in my life which hinder my faith from being built: why is it that when I reach that purifying state of suffering in cycling or running or swimming that I refuse to push myself any further because I think I won’t make it, why is it that I become discouraged and offended when my insecurities are aroused, why is it I’m afraid of not having my prayers answered, afraid of being loved, afraid that I may never become the missionary doctor I dreamed of becoming.

So I’ll wait. Faith, must be built, even if slowly.

What is stopping your faith from being built today?