"But believing does not mean steady certainty. Believing means not despairing of the worthiness of the search. Today, God may seem far. The world may seem drained, empty. Faith is the confidence that the search is not futile. An astronomer may scour the night sky not because he believes in the certainty of this or that star, but because he knows that diligent searching will yield something. 'If someone says 'I searched and did not find,' do not believe him,' says the Talmud. Perhaps the Talmud is trying to say that searching is the aim, and to honestly search is to show already that one has faith.
"Rabbi Nachman of Bratzlav said that he was 'a moon man — my faith waxes and wanes.' The moon promises presence, and then days later it is gone. The losses, the valleys in between these peak moments, have to be crossed with the realization that the spiritual ground of life is not even. God sometimes will be inaccessible to us. Yet losing faith can be integral to having faith. Believing entails doubting. The moon waxes and wanes. The systolic/diastolic pattern found in the beating heart is present in the spirit. Without contraction, no expansion. Without loss, no attainment.
"Growing in faith means learning its resiliency and complexity. We hold it before us as a simple, fragile vase that, once dropped, is irretrievably shattered. When faith is placed in the wrong arena, it is indeed fragile. We lose faith in people, in projects, in politicians. These are subsidiary faiths. Their loss is painful but inevitable. Ultimately faith finds its character not in one's trust of another, but in one's attitude toward the universe. Faith is a sinewy, complicated creation, capable of swelling and subsiding. Divine inspiration can pass, but the passing of one moment does not mean the end of the friendship. Deep faith is tough and lasting. It is durable enough to outlast even its own periodic absence."