The Instruments of Faith

This chapter examines the tools and processes of reconciliation brought to bear following the illness and shocking death of a beloved church sister. Church members needed to make sense of death and the seeming absence of divine healing, as well as God’s promise to answer prayer and predestination. Church members regularly utilize physical, intellectual, and spiritual activities—including song, worship, prayer, testimony, and Bible study—in multiple weekly services and in everyday settings to interpret their experiences and grow in Christ. After the death of their sister, they relied on the same tool kit in a directed fashion as they worked to align their inward dispositions with theology and church doctrine.