Tommy asked his mother, “How can I believe in God when I cannot see Him or hear Him talk to me?”
His mother answered by asking him a question. Pointing out the window to the tree with its branches waving in the wind, she asked: “Do you believe there is a wind out there blowing the branches of the tree? You cannot see the wind, but you can see what it does, and so you know it is there. Do you believe that there is air all around you? You cannot see it, but you breathe it in and let it out of your lungs, and it keeps you alive. You know it is there because you know what it does.
“You turn the electrical switch, and the light goes on. You cannot see the electricity, but you know it is there because it makes the light.
Of course, he does not speak to us in words, for if He spoke English, then the boys and girls who know only French or German or Chinese would not understand Him. We do not hear him by our ears but through our spirits.
“So we believe in God because we feel His presence. We know when He tells us that something is wrong for us to do and when He tells us that something is good for us to do.
We can learn to understand Him if we try. As a little baby that cannot talk understands its mothers love and knows when it is doing what its mother wants it to do and when it is not; just as we, even after we learn to talk, can tell without father or mother having to speak to us in words whether we are doing what they want us to do or not. If we try to understand what God wants us to do, we can learn to understand Him just as we understand our parents. When we are troubled and want comfort, we can learn to get help and comfort from God, just as we learn to go to father and mother for comfort and help.
We learn by reading the Bible, which tells us much about how other people have learned to hear Him when He speaks to them and have learned to serve Him. And we learn by talking with our parents about Him and studying about Him.
“How do we learn to hear good when He speaks to us? By prayer—that is, talking to God and telling Him how much we are enjoying the world we live in, and telling Him our troubles and asking Him to help us.
“We can believe in God without hearing Him with our ears. He is always near us and always knows what is in our hearts. He made the wonderful world in which we live, and all the wonderful people and animals and growing things. He wants us to love Him and to treat all the people we come in contact with in that spirit of loving kindness that Jesus taught when he was here on earth.”
by Stephen Leroy Angell.
Illustrated by S.S. Bennell