Faith in who?

As more and more we hear of church splits, people "losing their faith", groups folding and falling apart, and teenagers walking away from 'church', I find myself asking - what is our faith in?

Think about marriage for a minute.  What's your faith in, in regards to your spouse?  Is it in that person, their soul, their very being, who history tells you they really are, or is your faith propped up on who they are treating you in this instant?  If it's the latter, then you should already be perusing the yellow pages for a good divorce lawyer.  If you are married, you know that marriage is not now, has not been, will not ever be, Can Not ever be based on "feelings" and present emotion.  If we only stayed married when it felt good, none of us would make it past the first year.

Transition that same line of thought to the church (the CHURCH - not that brick building with crosses that you go into on Sunday mornings - the PEOPLE the body of believers who are joined together by the 1 overlying all consuming truth that Jesus Christ is LORD, the Son of God, the Savior of the world).  What's your faith in there?  Is it, like marriage should be, based on the promises of your bride/groom (through better or worse, richer or poorer, till death), which is Christ himself, is it held up upon what history tells you about God and his enduring faithfulness as proven and repeated line after line of the 66 books in our Bible?  

Or... is it based on the faith of the failing marriages?  The faith in the present, the emotion, the "feeling"?  

If your "faith" is held up by the assurance that your preacher will never preach a sermon that you will disagree with or that will stomp on your toes, you're in trouble (as an aside - if your preacher never preaches a sermon that stomps on your toes then you need to find a new preacher because they're not doing their job).  If your faith is propped up on that building, it will crumble, if it's supported solely by your Edlers then it will fall, if it's held up solely on the premise of your ministers never faltering moral compass, then you will be disappointed,  if your faith is based only on me, then you will be devastated.  

True "faith" can be grounded ONLY on The Rock, God, the Great I AM, He who was, is, and forever will be, and HIS promises.  Not your preacher's promises, not your pastor's promises, not your steering committee's promises, not your elder's promises, Certainly not my promises - Only God's promises.

And if your faith is held up on Christ alone, then when your preacher fails you, when your church abandons you, when I fall flat, when your Elder's crumble, then you stand.  You stand firm on the Rock which you were planted on, because that Rock didn't crumble, though others around you may have (and they will).

People are devastated, churches split, people walk away, faith is lost only when that faith was propped up on the wrong thing - anything or anyone other than Christ the King.