My name is Res Ipsa and I've lost my religion.
I'm not in anyway sad or upset about that at all. Although in some ways its absolutely terrifying. By terrifying I mean in a head spinning, dropped off a cliff, is this parachute ever going to open, sort of way. In another way, its kind of cool and peaceful.
To understand where I'm at, its helpful to know where I've come from. My father grew up in a very bible based church in the 1950's. We're talking KJV only, unless you've got it in Greek, and then, if there is any difference ya'll better error on the side of the KJV. Cause "The Authorized Version" isn't a subtitle, its a fact of divine revelation. If they didn't exactly think that, the basic attitude was there. I know because growing up around the same people in the 1970's I picked up on that attitude and adopted it myself.
Frankly there is a lot of good that comes from knowing (believing) you have the right answer. I'm not knocking someone who has a certainty about knowing why they believe what they believe. Back to my dad. He was one of those rare individuals who decided in his youth that he was going to dedicate himself to a religious life. Not only that, but he did it. Think of Daniel and his friends. That was my dad as a teenager and in his early 20's all the way through the 60's.
I'm not exaggerating. I've never heard my father use any kind of bad language, take the Lord's name in vain or do any of a number minor "sins". If he or my mother ever romantically kissed another person no one has said anything about it in the last half century. He never held me to a standard of behavior that he had not successfully held himself to first. Therein was my problem, the standard was perfection (or Jesus as it was claimed), but it was a Jesus that wasn't kind, or understanding, or forgiving.
Back up the post a bit I said, "there is a lot of good that comes from knowing (believing) you have the right answer". That's true. There is also a danger in believing that you have all the answers and that you got it all figured out, when you don't. It's worse if you can't do the things you know to be true. What happens is you know it all, but can't live it. Being convinced of your self righteousness isn't the same thing as being righteous. Being a hypocrite is even less enjoyable when your own conscience won't let you rationalize away your guilt.
The long and short of it was that I grew up in a religious environment. I learned lots of stuff about religion, but wasn't much on putting it into action. I could tell you all about it, and I could almost do some of it. Well at least I could do some of it in Sunday school and on Wednesday nights for about an hour.
Listening....
ReplyDeleteBrother, I had a similar upbringing and background. I fell away from/rejected it in my teens and early twenties. In no small part because the Christians I was exposed to could not answer my questions or reconcile the contradictions I saw in their theology. My road back was long and indirect but it boils down to this: 1) there is a God-just look at creation and what we can discern about its nature and the only reasonable conclusion is that there is a Creator; 2) the only religion that satisfactorily explains creation and man's nature and role in is Christianity; and 3) salvation does not come through our efforts in leading a "good" or Christian life, nor through any act of our own: by faith alone are we saved (the gift of grace through our faith alone justifies our salvation) and to be saved the bible quite simply tells us that we who have faith and are baptised in His name will be saved. Trying to be "good" and failing, including not trying hard enough, does not cause us to be damned.
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