What if I'm Wrong?

We've all asked this question (I hope): "What if I'm wrong?" 

Today I watched a video (note: please watch/listen to the video before you continue reading to help you better understand what I'm writing about) on YouTube that my mom recommended to me over Thanksgiving. What the guy says struck me as exactly what the church needs to hear. Can atheists be closer to truth than those who claim to follow The Truth?

I empathize with atheists because I have asked many of the same questions as they have throughout my Christian experience. In fact, one of my friends was actually raised Christian and home-schooled (like me), and is now an atheist. During our conversations, I discovered that the questions that led him to atheism were the very same questions that led me to where I am today (which I cannot define with a singular "-ism" or "-ity").

When you grow up in the Christian community, when bible study is a serious and daily activity, when worship music fills your ears each evening while mom makes dinner, the world feels comfortable and safe and good. Many people never leave the comfort and safety of a theology built using bricks backed by great thinkers (such as Aquinas, Augustine, Calvin, and Luther). Many people never ask the questions that lead them out of the safety of what I call "the Christian Cave" (an allusion to Plato's allegory of the cave). Those who do ask dangerous questions often brush them under a rock or dismiss them. Why? Because they don't want to leave the safety of the cave, of course! People want to be safe, they want to understand things. Inside the cave, everything is simple and comfortable. Asking questions AND following where the answers lead takes us outside where everything is unpredictable and we have to trust completely in God instead of our own understanding.

At this point, you're probably dying to know--what are these questions I'm referring to?

Here are a few of the basic questions that every good philosopher will ask:

1.) If God is good, why does he allow/cause suffering?

2.) If God is love, how can he bear to send people to hell for all eternity?

3.) Jesus came to save us, but from what? 

Here are some examples of answers that mainstream Christianity will provide:

1.) God's ways are higher than ours. He has a purpose in suffering. He is sovereign over all. In our limited view, we cannot see his wisdom and purpose for all things (in other words, the ends justify the means).

2.) God is not just love, but justice also. God is just and demands payment for sins. Also, he will not force people to be with him in heaven if they do not want to. They made their choice on earth. It's their own fault if they didn't trust in Jesus.

3.) Jesus came to take on the punishment for sins on our behalf. He paid the price of death and hell so that those who believe in him don't have to. 


I remember the time when I both heard and repeated those answers. Answers are security, safety, comfort. Questions bring doubt, questions lead to a quest, a journey. Most of us just want to sit in the repose of home.

Anthony DeMello put it like this: People are asleep. Most people spend their entire lives asleep. True spirituality wakes us up. 

...The question is, do you want to wake up?

If the answer is yes, then the three questions I originally asked will lead you on a journey outside of mainstream Christianity. You may have to leave the church. You will have to take a wrecking ball to your theological house, break those bricks, and start from scratch. You might even have to make the bricks from scratch too. 

That's what happened to me. I faced those questions, and I was tired of the cookie-cutter answers that ultimately made absolutely no logical sense (any philosophical atheist can tell you that). So I tore down the house, and started rebuilding. At first, I thought I didn't have to tear down the entire house. I thought maybe replace the roof, a few windows, maybe remodel some rooms and get new siding. Nope. The more questions I asked, the more I began to make out some parts of the answers, the more I realized the whole house has to be destroyed. Everything. Which left me with only the foundation: Love. Intelligence. Beauty. Truth. Life.

God is love. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. That's it. 

From that foundation, I began building again, but progress is much slower because I know how hard it was to tear down the original house. The last thing I want to do is have to tear down and rebuild again. 

This blog is a collection of my thoughts as I rebuild my theological house. Join me, share your thoughts, and let's get building!! 

Belief and Morality

What Difference Does Belief Make?

Song in my head: Nuisance by John Reuben
      
     Imagine two people standing at similar moral crossroads. Take the example of abortion, for example. One of the individuals believes that all human life is precious and that everything happens for a reason, including this unexpected child. The other individual thinks that life is just a jumble of cells and that there is no rhyme or reason to things that happen in life. The decision each person makes in this scenario is dependent on their beliefs. Of course, there could be outside influences trying to change their mind or convince them to do one thing or another. Yet if their beliefs remain the same, they will most likely choose a course of action in line with those beliefs. I'm sure it's easy to figure out which one of them will have an abortion and which one will not.

    Every decision in life is not this straightforward, but I think the same principle applies:

our beliefs directly affect the decisions we make in life. 

   If our beliefs affect our actions, and our actions matter (because sin leads to destruction. See Romans 6), then our beliefs matter as well. This is why I think scripture places so much emphasis on belief. It's not so much that believing itself saves us (some people think they believe in something but their actions prove otherwise), but that our beliefs play a crucial role in every decision we make.

   One thing puzzles me, though:

Why do people say they believe something, but they act as though they do not really believe that? 

Paul writes in Romans 6: "...you must not give sin a vote in the way you conduct your lives. Don't give it the time of day. Don't even run little errands that are connected with that old way of life. Throw yourselves wholeheartedly and full-time—remember, you've been raised from the dead!—into God's way of doing things. Sin can't tell you how to live. After all, you're not living under that old tyranny any longer. You're living in the freedom of God." (The Message)

   Yet many people believe in Christ, yet do not follow him. What good is it to believe in him without following and being His disciple? His command to all who follow him is this in John 13:
"Let me give you a new command: love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples--when they see the love you have for one another." (The Message) 

   Sounds pretty simple, right? Easier said than done! God is love, which means we can never love perfectly until we are raised and glorified. Yet if we believe that God is love and we want to be joined with Him (See John 15:4 ff), then we should be loving one another as He commanded.

   Obviously there will be times that we fail to love one another, but there should be general evidence that we love one another in our day to day actions. Everything that we think, say, and do should flow from love.

   If God is love, isn't HE the source of love?

So it would follow that the only way we can truly love one another is when we are abiding in Him and drinking water from the source of life.

How do we abide in God? Jesus says in John 15: "...make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you..." (The Message)

Let us who profess to believe in Jesus 

make ourselves at home with Him and His words 

so that love may flow into everything we think, say, and do!

What difference does belief make?

What Does Belief DO?

Song in my head: Your Name by Paul Baloche

     I just listened to the first 20 minutes of one of my favorite podcasts, Beyond the Box, and it got me thinking about theology and my journey from Calvinism to ultimate reconciliation. Isn't it scary how we Christians judge each other (and ourselves) based on our beliefs at any given time? Especially because anyone seeking God will "...grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ...", which means beliefs about God and reality in general will change over time. All true learning brings about change.

I think the reason we judge based on belief is that we think beliefs are powerful enough to bring about salvation. You know, "To all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God," (John 1:12)? It seems like believing and accepting certain doctrines is extremely important to our salvation. But what does salvation even mean anyway? What do these beliefs save us from, exactly? And how does it work?  My ideas and beliefs are constantly being renewed and "edited". How can something so inconstant and inconsistent be the "rock" on which my salvation rests? 

      I thought Jesus was the rock, the foundation. 

It seems to me that just as the earth revolves around the sun, whether people believe it or not, Jesus died to save the world from sin and reconcile all people to God, whether people believe it or not. It's a fact, not an opinion, and believing or disbelieving the fact does not make it true or false. So how could believing in something save me from anything? 

     There has to be something more...something deeper that is missing.

...to be continued...