CHAIRMAN’S MESSAGE
Where is your Faith?
Mark Drabenstott
Faith is the never-ending story of triumph over adversity. Today, adversity seems to be mounting. When storms of adversity come, fear often follows. And fear is the enemy of faith.
Where is your faith? That’s the question Jesus put to his disciples when they were in a storm. They were crossing the Sea of Galilee when a horrific storm came up. They all thought they were about to die. Fear swept through them. Yet our Lord was full of peace, so much so that he was asleep. When the ship was taking on water and in great peril, they woke Jesus and said, “Master, Master, we’re perishing!” He calmly rebuked the wind and waves. All was calm. All danger vanquished. And then he turned to the disciples with the searing question.
Today, storms are brewing. Many pundits now use a four-word phrase to describe current conditions: A world on fire. War in the Middle East. War in Ukraine and Russia. China rattling its growing battery of sabers.
The storms are not all about geopolitics. Some are striking in ways that are more hidden but equally alarming. One that caught my eye this week was a Pew poll with this shocking finding: A third of currently childless 18- to 34-year-olds don’t ever want children. As one member of this cohort puts it: “I want to protect them from suffering.” (Andy Kessler, “Why do the young vote left?,” The Wall Street Journal, October 6, 2024). When young people don’t want kids, you know that faith is waning.
As never before, our challenge is to strengthen our faith in times that try our souls. The challenge is especially urgent in our youth, where the current tide leans heavily toward fear, not faith.
How best to seize this challenge? That’s a question WCF takes up every day. Our team is focused intently on implementing a bevy of programs that provide the inspiration, the tools and the encouragement to replace fear with faith.
A couple programs are especially noteworthy given the fears listed above.
FaithLaunch is an effort WCF started during the pandemic to inspire and prepare young adults (the same age cohort Pew sampled) to live a lifetime sustained by faith. The goal is to provide sound tools (anchored in Scriptural understanding) and a support network of fellow travelers and mentors to put faith at the center of life’s journey. The program has already reached more than 200 young adults around the world. Here’s what one young married couple had to say about it:
”FaithLaunch has helped us gain confidence in some of the big decisions that we have had to make. It’s given us confidence that God will work with us. In short, FaithLaunch is a really big anchor for us.”
In October, nearly 100 youth and WCF team members will come together for a FaithLaunch Conference in Pennsylvania to discuss how faith can create more peace in their lives—an extremely timely topic given the times.
Our media team is rolling out several products to inspire more faith, and many of these will be arriving in the fourth quarter. These products take many forms, but they have one common denominator—Inspiring all of us to strengthen faith in our life journey. Here’s a quick sample:
Faith Journey Stories. These videos represent a powerful chronicle of the quiet examples of faith in our midst, the stories that often go untold. From a brother battling cancer, to a spouse who lost his beloved wife, to a sister who was literally given a new heart—these stories show how faith sustains us in difficult times. And they remind us that it is often those times of trial when faith grows the most.
Roundtable Discussions. Our youth learn faith differently than older generations. They want to discuss, share and explore ideas together. They want to be valued and be a part of the discussion. This video series creates a space for youth to discuss difficult topics—but with the shared expectation that Scripture is the immutable source for answers. The first two roundtables have focused on the Israel-Gaza war and on voting in an election year.
Faith Journey Devotions. This new podcast provides a weekly ‘Faith Oasis’ to pause and reflect on how faith grows. Our frenzied world often keeps our minds reeling and our lives in constant motion. The purpose of this series is to offer an ongoing diet of quiet pauses when contributors can share valuable insights on how faith works best in their lives.
Where is your faith? That question is sometimes hard to answer in what many people now call ‘fearful times.’ But faith is surely the antidote to fear. Jesus put it simply: “Fear not.” When we trust in the Almighty, faith always conquers fears. Here at WCF, we’re doing all we can to make sure these are faith-full times.
Please join us in this urgent cause. We need more volunteers in many of our programs. And we can only do this work through your generous donations. Above all, please pray that faith will continue to grow even as storms mount in the world around us.