Faith is tricky sometimes. In order to be strong, our faith must be built on a solid foundation, just like any house or building. The problem I've seen, and personally experienced, is what happens when we build our foundations on something that's not so solid.

Often times, when we first come into faith with God, one or two people are usually instrumental in introducing us to that faith. The problem often is that we look at those people as a foundation of faith rather than God. I'm not saying there's no foundation of God but that person or people becomes mixed in. It's sort of like concrete. You mix a bunch of different ingredients together and come out with a mixture. We look up to them and admire them, so they become, in essence, a kind of idol. We want to emulate them because of the rose-colored glasses through which we view them.

Why is that a problem?

Let's face it. People aren't perfect. Therefore, you have a perfect God mixed with some imperfect people as a foundation of faith. Those imperfect people will undoubtedly fail you at some point in time. When that happens, the concrete cracks, and the foundation is in serious jeopardy. If you’ve seen a house that has foundation issues, you know what I’m talking about. The entire structure is affected becuase of one small shift in the foundation.

I’ve experienced this in my own life. I’ve had people who were really instrumental in solidifying my faith let me down, which sent me into a downward spiral. I really began to question God: His methods, His ways, everything. I was mad at God for the actions of His people.

Funny.

I’ve heard people who aren't Christians say similar things.

I came away with two major conclusions:

1. You don't build the foundation of your faith on anything other than God.

This is a tough lesson to learn, and may only be something you can learn from experience and heartache, but people should not be the foundation of a person’s faith. It doesn’t matter how “good” a person is, they will still fail at some point. I realized that I had been looking at people as my source of faith rather than Jesus, which was a mistake. Jesus is the only person who ever did it right. Look to him as the example.

2. While God's people do represent Him, they are not Him.

As hard as it is to admit, we do a terrible job of representing what God is. No matter how genuine our intentions may be, we still mess things up. We are an imperfect representation of a perfect being. And if we want an accurate idea of what perfect is, we should look to the perfect being, not the imperfect followers.

Humans still have free will and will make wrong decisions. God cannot be blamed for the actions of His people when His people choose to do the wrong thing. The people should be blamed. And when we are able to look at others, and ourselves, and understand that nobody will ever get it perfectly right, then maybe we can see people as God sees them, through loving eyes, not judgmental ones.