Walking a mile in their shoes

For over a year I have been working very hard on writing a book about unity in the Body of Christ.

I figured it would be easy.

Easy!

Sure.

I didn't realize that the foundations of everything I ever learned or believed about God would be rocked (again).

I had already questioned and wrestled and doubted.

I had already gone through all of the what ifs and worst case scenarios.

I had already studied the different perspectives outside of the Christian faith...and lived many of them.

So when I started to experience the shaking of my faith in Tsunami wave proportions, I was taken off guard (even though I prayed to be protected).

I started to read and devour anything I could get my hands on from Christians of all different stripes and colors...

and then I started to think like them.

All of them.

As I read their works and commentaries,

I began to see through their eyes (even though I tried not to).

I got them.

I.

Got.

Them.

For a short time I became emergent in my thinking.

A five point Calvinist (with four point leanings).

Legalistic.

All-inclusive.

Traditional.

Progressive.

Reformed.

Kingdom minded.

A cessationist.

A continuationist.

I wrestled.

I questioned.

I doubted.

And finally...

I surrendered.


At this point of the journey, I have to admit that I have more questions than I have answers. However, I do know that these answers can be found in His Word. I can look back and see that those tsunami waves were used to prune away the garbage and faulty thinking I had picked up from a worldy version of Christianity.

For a girl who has spent her whole life looking for concrete answers, I have learned to lean not on my own understanding (or anyone else's, for that matter) and look to His Word when I am in doubt.

I have learned (and am learning) to take nothing as gospel truth...except for the Gospel.

I am learning that at the end of the day, I have to take it to God and His Word.

If what is being said (no matter how respected the person speaking is) does not line up with the Word, I have to disregard it.

I don't know exactly where my theology will end up...

and I don't exactly care.

I just care that it lines up with His Word and that I am held safely in His hands.

If we are not showing more love and compassion for people, maybe we aren't grasping His Word.

If we are not eating, sleeping and breathing the Words of His book, maybe we aren't getting it.

But He does.

He does.

If we keep seeking after Him, He will lead the way.

I am latching onto His coattails.

I am sure there is room for you (if you repent and believe, that is)...

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For the love of a so-called "Jewish Zombie"...

As far back as I can remember, I was always searching for meaning. I wanted to know that there would one day be an end to pain and suffering. As a child, I spent much of my time thinking about topics such as life and death and the existence (or non-existence) of God. Although I would say that I came to the realization that there was a God and that He had a Son named Jesus at the age of 12, I only put half of my trust in Him. Atheism was never an option for me. For many people , the belief in God is foolish. For me, the sum total of all that I had ever learned or experienced pointed me in the direction that there had to be a God. I wasn't yet fully convinced that the Christian faith and the Bible represented Him. So I studied as many world religions as I could. I read about Divination and experimented with Wicca (witchcraft). I went on a spiritual quest to see if the God of the Bible was who He said He was. I traveled the country with Hare Krishnas, Buddhists, Rastafarians, Wiccans, atheists, New Agers, and the list goes on. I participated in peaceful protests with Tibetan Lamas, and Peyote Ceremonies with Shamans and Hopi Indians. I spent some time at Buddhist and Hare Krishna Temples observing their practices and the ways in which they worshipped. It was during this time that I spent homeless or travelling on a school bus (with a lot of hitchhiking along the way). Every single place I tried to run away from the Christian God, there He was. From strip clubs, to Buddhist Temples, to the mountains in Oregon and the caves underneath New York City. There He was, popping up in the most creative and surreptitious ways; but during this time, as the Catholic Mystic Saint John of the Cross would say, I experienced many dark nights of the soul. Quite honestly, those nights stretched into weeks and months...and nip at my heels even to this day.

A few days ago an atheist friend of mine had posted a quote from a Funny Atheism ad onto his facebook. To me, it is not funny on any level. It actually made me angry to see the Creator of the universe reduced to a pile of rubbish with words. This is what it said:

"The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat a magical tree...yeah, makes perfect sense."

You would be hard-pressed to find a Christian who didn't doubt. We all do. This is why we should talk about it more. Fear and doubt is pretty much a given. These rusty old tools won't be retired anytime soon, but this doesn't mean that we have to be consumed by them.

Maybe you have been up close and personal with the great abyss. Maybe you're experiencing a dark night of the soul right now. I don't know. I can't prove to you or write it out in a mathematical equation, but I can tell you that I have seen the hands of this so-called "Jewish Zombie", and He is alive and well.

The problem isn't that we experience a dark night, it's what we do on those nights that define who we really are. What do you do with your fear?

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