Losing & Finding My Way - Again (Part Two)

{Continued from "Losing & Finding My Way - Again (Part One)"}

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

I took the one {more} traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

But then something slowly changed.

And I didn't notice it changing.

I think most of us have heard the story about the poor little frog and the boiling water; if he's put in lukewarm water and then it's heated to boiling, he won't jump out and it will kill him - but if you try to plop him into water already boiling he'll jump right out and save his life. Isn't that so true in life? 

Just like I didn't realize how weary I had become when I first tasted true healing, I didn't realize just how much things had changed in the years since I'd turned my life to Jesus. Have you ever been carrying a super heavy backpack and then when you set it down, you immediately feel like you're going to float right off the ground? Isn't that the weirdest feeling?! That's as close as I can explain the feeling when you realize that Jesus has taken your load of bricks off your back - your soul floats and soars. (And if you are where I was, believe me - I understand how hokey that sounds.) 

Well, somewhere along the line I never realized that my yoke was no longer easy and my burden was no longer light. But why? It has taken me years to realize why. 

I'm not here to go into the ins and outs of everything that made me realize what I have come to realize, but I would like to share a few things. First, the most important thing I could stress right now is:

If the yoke is not easy and the burden is not light, then it is not from Jesus. 

There are many, many people who are peddling heavy burdens in the name of God that are not from God. Just like when Jesus walked the earth 2,000 years ago, there are an overwhelming number of people who have changed what God has commanded into their own religion. How could Jesus defy so many Jewish laws and yet claim to be of God, when God Himself established the Jewish religion? Because over the centuries, Jews had added their own stipulations on top of what God had given - and yet they claimed it was all a mandatory part of the faith, and they would harshly judge and condemn anyone who did not keep their religion as they had come to define it. [Sound familiar?] For example, when God told the Jews to observe the Sabbath and keep it holy, the Jews added countless laws down to how many steps could be taken on the day. Did you know they even made a law saying you could not heal someone with mud & spittle on the Sabbath?? So, when Jesus came and healed a man born blind on a Sabbath using mud & spittle, was Jesus breaking the law? Yes. And no. He was breaking the law the Jews had created, but not the law of God. 

I believe if Jesus were to walk the earth in the flesh today, He would make a lot of Christians very mad. Why? Because He would no doubt break many such laws that we have added over 20 centuries in order to show us what God had intended for us all along. Why else does the Christianity we see all around us today look almost nothing like what we read about in the pages of the New Testament? Today we see a multi-billion dollar industry called "religion"; when Jesus walked the earth, helping the orphan and the widow in their affliction was called "true religion." "Organized religion" in their day might've meant multiple followers of Christ working together to feed those orphans; today a majority of Americans say they hate organized religion (for good reason) - because of what it's come to mean in our vocabulary. The differences are endless between how we see early followers of "the Way" acting with each other and their world, and what we see today.

There is one thing I am not interested in doing:

Giving you my conclusions about what those differences are. 

I am on a journey back to the beginning. Back to when the yoke was easy. Sometimes that means taking a turn off the road most traveled and most popular, and onto a road few understand or agree with. For too long I got caught up majoring in the minors and auditing the majors. I've learned there is a monumental difference between intellectually studying about the history of Jesus, and in pursuing a living, breathing, tangible, change-the-way-you-live-your-life relationship with Jesus, by living through the power of His Spirit. Francis Chan said it well when he said that the majority of lives of believers are indistinguishable - they "make sense" - to unbelievers. In what ways am I living by faith in such a way where if God does not come through, I'm hosed?? For years I have sung - and heard crowds singing - words such as, "Living by faith in Jesus alone" .... "Though none go with me, still I will follow" .... "We place You in the highest place, above all else" ......... and frankly, many of us haven't meant it. The first thing many consider when it comes to following Jesus is how popular that move would be with the church. (And if it's not popular, well then.......). And the fact is, in my life and many others', God has been anything but "above all else."

So here's where I am with all of this now. For the first time in my life I truly understand the old cliché about "the more I know, the more I know I don't know." I'm stripping things down to a living, breathing relationship with Jesus and am pursuing knowing Him - not knowing about Him. To the best of my ability I will help anyone I can to draw close to Him as well, but not to hand them my conclusions. I will help show them what I've learned about how to pursue Him so they can get their conclusions from Him, not my feeble little mind. I believe one of the reasons that His way is described as narrow is because it really is very simple. Seek to know Him, and Him crucified. There's so much else we try to add to the path that are distractions at best, detours at worst. Let's stick to the straight and narrow, my friend, and along the way we can help to remind each other that His way is easy and His burden is light. Let's not accept any counterfeits.

Losing & Finding My Way - Again (Part One)

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. 

----Robert Frost

Several years ago ... nearly 10, to be exact ... I turned the direction of my life on its tail and nothing has been the same since. I had been confident in my worldview and more than a bit cocky, because I "knew" what few others seemed to grasp - and yet it was so clear to me: All we are is all we are. There is no magical supernatural being over us or in us; the only part of the Bible I agreed with was some part about coming from dust and ending in dust. Period. End of story. 

Although I had this grasp on a "truth" that seemed to escape the masses, there eventually came a point when I was forced to admit that my life was digging itself deeper into a ditch - a ditch that those masses were seemingly avoiding. What was the difference? In my early 20's I finally took to heart the old maxim, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over & over and expecting different results." I had been making decisions the same way over & over and was getting the same downward-spiraling results over & over. It was time for a change. 

But what needed to change? I wasn't sure - so everything was up for reexamination. Turns out that my entire life was put on an anvil by which I was being forged into something completely different - what I believed, how I thought, who I spent time with, what I did for a living, what I did for recreation - all of these things were up for reevaluation. This was the most important thing I ever did in my life, and I hope that I never take any piece out of the "Able To Be Re-Examined" category again.

By that point in my life I was weary. Weary of running so hard and so fast in one direction only to realize, a hundred miles down that road, that it was the wrong road. I was weary of living according to the way that every logical neuron in my brain said was right, and yet it ended in disaster time and time again. I was weary of having no hope; I was weary of thinking that the here & now was the best it would ever be. "But I am a realist," I continued to tell myself. You don't believe in something that's not true just because you want it to be true; just because it makes you all fuzzy inside. That's the 'opiate of the masses,' right? But I was ... so ... weary.

"Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.

Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me - and you will find rest for your souls.

For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

Have you ever heard something that soothed a nerve deep inside your soul that had been rubbed raw? Maybe a raw nerve you didn't even realize you had? This was it for me. I don't know that I realized at the time just how weary I was, until I tasted of this salve for the first time.  Somewhere in my subconscious - that part where you know it, but you won't admit it to yourself - I had been trying to treat my own raw nerves in several ways for a long time. It was as if deep in my soul I had a bundle of raw nerves - like copper wires stripped of their protective coating - and as painful as each one was, they were outright dangerous if one bare wire touched another. So I would wrap each raw nerve in whatever I had in my tool belt (which, as an atheist, wasn't much), so I wrapped each nerve as if in an Ace bandage of alcohol, or partying, or just the constant noise and busy-ness around me so that I would never be left alone in the [sober] quiet company of my own raw nerves. But what I had come to learn was that these bandages of partying and distraction were actually just as conductive as a bare wire; although it might take a delay of a short amount of time for the electric shock to travel, the punch delivered was sometimes worse than it would've been without the delay. 

But then I started to experience a genuine salve - a true solution for my raw nerves instead of the poor & temporary fixes I'd been attempting. A single drop of hope applied to a raw nerve is more soothing than a hundred bottles of alcohol. The more I sought to learn more about this "easy yoke" and "light burden," the more that one drop of hope turned into a small, steady trickle from a faucet. Each drop peeled back a layer of my own shoddy bandaging and applied a sincere remedy - and unlike my other attempts, this one wasn't wearing off a few hours later to only reveal more corroded wire. Unless I went back in after the salve had been applied and stripped the wire raw again on my own, it stayed healed. I'd never experienced such a thing before -- and it made me crave more of it.

Little by little and day by day I realized that Jesus - yes, this same Jesus whom I had debated endlessly about and whom I had denied my entire life - was standing right in front of me, knocking persistently at my door and imploring that I let Him heal not just one or two of my raw nerves, but every single raw nerve I had. Ones I didn't even know I had. He would gladly take the bag of bricks I'd been accumulating off my back, set them down and forget them, and hand me a yoke that was truly a resting place for my soul. I was finding that Jesus was not some historical event to debate or some overlord desperate to condemn the world -- He was living and breathing and calling me, all in a way I couldn't explain. How could someone who lived 2,000 years ago be active in my life today?? Skeptical, thinking it was too good to be true, I eventually took Him up on His offer. And you know what? Every raw nerve is healing and my soul is at rest. This sure doesn't mean I don't have problems - it simply means that the fountain of hope & living water from which I now freely drink is enough to give me a contentment and a peace that goes well beyond whatever temporal problems I have -- and that, my friends, is rest for my soul.

{But then something changed. Please see Part Two}

The Faith of an Atheist

"Faith, hope and love...

But the dumbest of these is faith."

(Summarizing a common thought of atheists)

Recently I celebrated nine years of being in Christ. Wow! Where did the time go?? In some ways I look back and it seems like it flew by - like maybe it's only been a year or two. Could my life really be that different now? But other times it feels like my life "B.C." (yes, "Before Christ") was another lifetime ... eons ago ... a vague dream that's hard to remember when waking.

So when I look back, what do I see? I can confidently tell you one thing: I have truly learned the meaning of the saying, "The more I know, the more I realize I don't know." Things that used to be so obvious to me - things I accepted about my faith and Christianity as a whole - that seemed rock-solid in my mind have become anything but solid. Now don't get scared - I'm not doubting my faith or Jesus at all. In fact I can easily say my faith and my confidence in Jesus as the Son of God is firmer now than it has ever been. I'm just talking about the application of that faith. But .... I digress. That's not where I'm going today.

I've already written about some of the things that went into my journey from being an atheist to a follower of Jesus, but of course there's no blog post long enough to describe all of it! Right now I want to dive into a topic that to me - when I was an atheist - was the worst "f" word in the world: faith. <<shudder>> What a horrible thing. What a check your brain at the door kind of trait. Who would want to be known by their faith?? It's practically like boasting about how low your IQ is.

Isn't it??

At the ripe ol' age of 24, I began really questioning my beliefs and worldview. At that point I was a "card-carrying atheist" (well, if there had been a card to carry for being an atheist, I would have carried it. I at least had the obligatory "Darwin fish" on my bumper.) I was as far left as you can imagine ... and probably a tad farther. I was convinced that if everyone in the world just put on their thinking caps for 5 solid minutes and were willing to set aside millennia of Dark Ages lore, they'd quickly realize how absurd it is to believe in some big guy in the sky just talking things into existence or destroying them. (Kinda makes you think of Tim from Monty Python's "Holy Grail" movie, doesn't it?) I mean, that's on par with thinking that I can get to heaven because I've eaten some dead guy's flesh and drank his blood, or that a bunch of strong guys from another world come across a rainbow bridge to help us poor little humans by fighting with a super-tough hammer, or that life began on earth by aliens sending tiny bacteria cells hitchhiking on a rock from space to earth ..... oh wait, that last one really is a belief some atheists (like Steven Dawkins) hold. Never mind that one.

Aren't we supposed to be in the age of science by now? Isn't it time we all give up on these crazy "grown-up Santa Claus" fantasies of God and bite down on the cold, hard truth that there is no meaning to life and that we are just one big cosmic accident?? Wanting something to be true doesn't make it true. If it did, I wouldn't have to be going to the gym to trim my rumpus; because I want it thinner it would be.

But I soon had to come to grips with my own cold, hard truth: The fact that I had come to the point of wanting there to be no God - then I wouldn't be accountable to anything beyond my own selfish agenda - didn't mean that there wasn't a God. I had been living in a way that was consistent with my world view: nothing's wrong if everyone involved consents; survival of the fittest meant I should be concerned with "me and mine" only. But yet ..... in the still, dark quiet of the night .... there was always something eating away at me. Some deep voice inside me kept reminding me that no matter how I justified it, I knew that living like this wasn't right. I knew it. But that doesn't mean I'd admit it. So I tried to drown out that voice - literally. I poured enough alcohol over that voice to drown an elephant - yet it kept whispering. And despite an ever-increasing amount of numbing self-medicating, that voice grew steadily louder. And louder. And louder. It about drove me mad. Finally I came to a breaking point - quite literally. SOMEthing wasn't adding up in my life - but I didn't know what that was. All I knew is that what I rationalized in my mind did not jive with what my heart screamed. Finally, I caved. I decided to reexamine everything. And I mean everything. What I did for a living, where I lived, who I spent my time with, my politics, my worldview, my opinions on life and death and God and afterlife and faith and all that. Everything was on the chopping block. I made a wholehearted decision that I would examine everything with as little bias as I could manage. If after investigation I concluded my previous belief, then so be it. I'd stick with it. But if I came to a different conclusion ..... then everything would change. And I mean everything.

There was one thing above everything else that was the nail in the coffin of my atheism. Once I jumped this obstacle, I had to look at everything differently. Nothing was the same. "What's the difference," I asked myself, "between me reading my science textbooks and believing it, and me listening to my biology professors and believing them -- and a Christian who reads their Bible and listens to their preacher and believes them?" At first all the justifications flooded my brain, like "My textbooks are based on fact. There are proofs. There are experiments that prove the conclusions. There's physical evidence. A Bible is just written by a bunch of guys who didn't even know each other over thousands of years. And it's full of contradictions." However, in an effort to be true to my resolve to give everything a fair shake, I kept thinking it out. Soon I realized that my Biology textbook is in its 7th edition. Why do they revise science books? It's not just for updated graphics. It's because they've proven some things and disproven others, and new theories have come out. After all, isn't it called the Theory of Evolution? The plain fact of the matter is that when I read my textbook, I believe that those experiments actually happened as they were reported. I believe that the author wouldn't lie to me and publish bogus stuff. I believe that my professor teaches me what s/he has personally seen proven. But I never saw those things. I never saw that fossil. I take what I read and hear on faith. WHOA!!!!! Did I just say I had FAITH!?!?!! YIKES!!!!! If anyone ever hears me say that, they'll revoke my atheist card!!!!

But it made sense. And I couldn't shake that thought. I walked around all day thinking, "I have faith. I've had to have faith to believe in science. That just doesn't make sense. Yet it makes perfect sense." When it really comes down to it, doesn't everything we believe in take faith? Even what we see with our own eyes and touch with our own fingers takes faith that it is real - that we aren't hallucinating - that we're not out of our minds.

The moment I realized that I've had faith all along, suddenly Christians didn't seem so dumb. (Well ok, they were still pretty dumb but not totally dumb.) After all, isn't it all just a matter of where you place your faith? Not whether or not you have faith?

So at that moment I decided to give the Bible a fair chance. I would read it from cover to cover, without going on a witch hunt or with an agenda to prove it wrong -- simply just to read it and see what all the fuss was about. After all, I'd never read it. I'd made a lifetime of arguing against its validity, yet I'd never read it. The closest I'd come was to hearing the same chapter from the gospel of Luke recited every Christmas Eve service I was forced to go to, and in printing off lists from the internet about all the contradictions. But even that I took on faith, that someone was representing it truthfully. If I read the Bible and it was a bunch of hocus-pocus, then I'd set it back down and have even more ammunition for future debates. But if not ..... if it wasn't a bunch of hooey ...... then everything would change.

And believe me, it has. Oh how it's changed. And it keeps changing .......

"Faith, fact and proof...

But the cornerstone of these is faith."

More on the most important transitions in my life:

Epiphany #1

Epiphany #2

Epiphany #3

Why People Say, "I Don't Know How to Share My Faith" -- and Why I Don't Believe Them

In the eight years (almost 9!) I have been a follower of Jesus, I have heard many, many people say that they just don't know how to share their faith. In a nutshell, I just have to say that I don't believe that for a minute. Now, if you were to say that you don't know how to lead someone through the scriptures in order to teach them about Jesus and the impact He should have on our daily life, I might believe you a smidgen more - but even with that I think there are too many holes. For starters, do you have a biblical basis for your hope of eternal life? Have you studied the Bible enough to have a simple understanding of what you believe? Well, why couldn't you share that with someone?

Let me start by saying this: I am not judging anyone's heart or saying that they are liars or anything like that. I promise. I am simply saying that too many people have been convinced that sharing Jesus is for a 'select few' people who have a 'special calling' from God and even fewer who have the special pedigree or training in order to follow out their calling. Frankly, that's hooey. There is no biblical basis for those beliefs. "But wait!" you say. "What about the verse that says 'He gave a few to be evangelists'??" Well .... biblically speaking, what is an evangelist? It's someone like the apostle Paul, whose full-time vocation was to travel around doing what we today might call "church planting." (However, I hate to use that term. Our goal is not to plant churches -- our charge is to sow the seed of Jesus, and then God would cause the increase, and to those who turn their lives to God, Jesus would add them to His church. So a church is not the goal - it is a byproduct.) Paul travelled around speaking the Word of God wherever he went. He would sometimes accept money from Christians to support himself, but many times he would work in his tent-making trade so as not to be a burden where he was. I believe the longest he was in one spot was 2-3 years. Hardly what we have today with lifetime professional preachers staying in one spot preaching to believers. But we have accepted this professional clergy mindset, believing that it takes some seminary degree in order to preach. What a divergence with what we see in scripture!! In the New Testament we see that those who stuck by Jesus and learned from Him went everywhere speaking in His Name!!  In fact, when everyday people spoke with the wisdom of Christ, it astonished the hearers. We read, "Now as [the Jewish leaders] observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus." When you talk, can people recognize that you have been with Jesus? Do we still trust that God's word is our power? "I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes!" We can too often rely on our own wisdom and strength and forget that it is only the gospel & power of God that will convict people's hearts. Not doctorates of theology. Not masters of divinity. The gospel, the whole gospel, and nothing but the gospel.

So if our first hang-up is that we have accepted the false idea of the professional clergy mindset, the second mistake we make is believing that only certain, specially-called people need to be sharing their faith. Yet the NT says, "You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light." If we understand that every Christian is a priest and every Christian is part of God's holy people, then we have to also understand that we were each saved in order to proclaim His excellencies. And again, "As for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all Your works." And what about what we all call "The Great Commission?" Do we really believe that is our commission - individually? Do we live our lives and view every interaction with every person in our lives as our opportunity to "go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation?"

Related to the "experienced only need apply" mindset, what about this: do you know someone personally whom you would describe as a person dedicated to sharing Christ & has produced fruit from it? Do you know someone who has a passion for sharing a relationship with Jesus? Would you say they are "good at it?" Well then, have you asked them to teach you how they do it? There is a very real reason I ask this. My husband is known by virtually everyone as a passionate sharer of Christ. He has sown the seed of the kingdom countless times & in countless ways. He lives & breathes to speak of the love of Jesus. Many, many people are now children of God as a direct result of what he has shared with them. Yet, of all the people who have said, "I can't share Christ like you can. I'm no good at it - I just don't know how" -- not one of them have ever asked Danny personally to help them learn. And even those who claim that their one special gift is hospitality (which I still have yet to find in scripture) and that Danny's gift must be teaching, not one of them have come to him and said, "I'm not good at teaching, but I'm good at hosting. So would you mind if I host the people and you come over and teach? Oh, and also, while I'm there with you while you teach, I desire to learn to teach also. Will you help?" If you defined the word "gift" by most people's usage of it, you'd come to see that it's really just a synonym for "comfort zone."

Besides all of that, here is the #1 reason I don't truly believe people who say, "I don't know how to share Christ":

Guys: if you were driving past a car lot and saw this:

What would you do? How excited would you be?? Say you assume (as most of us would) that it was a scam - there's no way something that good would be available that cheap. But you stop in to talk to the salesman anyway. That's when you find out that for only $1 period -- no strings attached -- you can hand over four quarters and drive home a Dodge Viper in mint condition. But then you learn that there is a whole FLEET of these Vipers available -- you can call everyone you know and they too can get a new Viper for only $1!! Let me ask you this, would you know how to tell your friends about this UNBELIEVABLE opportunity??? My guess is, you would. You don't have to have a degree from MIT in mechanics to explain to your friend how awesome this car is. On the odd chance that your friend has never heard of a Dodge Viper, don't you think you'd be able to explain the pure awesomeness of this vehicle??

Now, ladies - (and yes, I realize I am being totally stereotypical here) .... imagine you saw the following advertisement:

Imagine that you hear of a company that provides:

• The planning, prep & clean-up of 3 meals a day, from a custom-made menu of your choice
• Full-service professional house cleaning, done at least once a week
• Professional landscaping and yard maintenance, including fresh-cut flowers & home-grown vegetables on your table daily
• On-call masseuse to relieve the stresses of your day

All of this for the total cost of $1 a year. Period. Would you snatch it up?? What if you then kept reading and saw that the company employs hundreds of workers and can service thousands of homes for the same low price? Would you know how to get every one of your friends on the phone and tell them about this??

Now, guys and gals, imagine that you saw on these advertisements that although there's no limit to how many people can take advantage of this offer -- the offer could cease to be available at any moment. Without notice, the company could stop advertising and the sports car and household services would go back to their regular price, which is way more than you could ever afford. How would you describe your level of urgency to get this message across to all of your friends? How would you tell them not to put off looking into this? Wouldn't you want to tell everyone you could, as fast as you could?

How much more urgency should we have in sharing the Way to receive eternal life? Although Jesus is offering the free gift of His grace, without any notice at all we could be at the end of our life and standing before the Judge, and we will have to explain to Him why His unbelievably good offer was not worth our consideration. And, I also believe that we will have to give an account to Jesus why we were excited to tell our friends about a good sale on laundry detergent at WalMart, but we never told that friend about the free gift of eternal life.

I hope if you're reading this and you too have said, "I don't know how to share my faith," that you don't feel like I'm beating you up or calling you a liar. I really am not. I'm simply trying to help us all take a step back and look at the situation logically. Our job is not to "convince" someone to believe what we believe - our charge is simply to share with them why we believe what we believe. Do you have a reason for your hope? Do you have a changed life? That is what we are supposed to share! Jesus once healed a demon-possessed man and then told the man, "Go and tell what great things the Lord has done for you, and how the Lord had mercy on you." That's all the man knew. Isn't that enough?

My Three Epiphanies - #3

I hope that before you read the rest of this post, you've read Epiphany #1 and Epiphany #2 first. Then this will make a lot more sense. Just to recap, what I am listing in these three posts are the three most important "revelations" in my life. I don't at all mean that these are anything special or unique to me - these truths have been around for thousands of years. Not exactly ground-breaking stuff. But to me, coming to understand these three things have changed everything about my life - and have become much of the foundation upon which everything else in my life is being built.

With my first post, I imagine much of the world agreed with me. The vast majority of this world believes that there is something higher than us - something supernatural going on in the universe. Most people, in fact, probably don't remember a time where they didn't believe that, or where they had to prove that to themselves. Most people have just taken it as a given that there is a god. With my second post I imagine that although many people would agree with me, the number is considerably less than the first post. While most people believe there is some sort of higher power or god, substantially less believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Now, with my third post, I imagine the audience will narrow even more. But here we go anyway.

#3. There is a big difference between a Christian and a Churchan.
As I write this, there is a video going virally around the internet in which a young man explains why he "loves Jesus but hates religion." Frankly, I don't really like the video or agree with it. According to the Bible, you cannot have Jesus without having true religion. That being said, I would wholeheartedly agree that much of what man has turned religion into - even Christianity - does not at all resemble the Christianity that Christ designed. Ironic, huh? So, how do we tell the difference? If it was up to my opinions vs. your opinions, there could and would be endless debate. Thank God we have a definitive source on the topic - the Bible. In the book of James we read, "Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world." We also read that is why Sodom was judged so harshly - because they did not do those things! But alas, I am getting sidetracked a bit. (I do that from time to time.) ;-)

So, what is the difference between a Christian and a Churchan, you ask? How can I tell the two apart? Let me give a couple of examples. Be honest as you answer the questions to yourself. If you, being a believer, are having a conversation with another person, which of the following questions are you more likely to ask?

• "What church do you go to?"  -or-
• "Do you know Jesus?"

If you were going to take the conversation to the next level, would you ask:

• "Would you like to come to church with me?" -or-
• "Can I tell you about how Jesus has changed my life?"

Which of the following have you used to 'advertise' your faith:

• "You should come to my church. We are a really loving group of people and have a very active youth group. Our preacher gives really encouraging sermons and we have good, upbeat music." -or-
• "Man, I sure made a mess out of my life and had really hit rock bottom. I can sure relate with where you're at. But thankfully God loves me so much that He sacrificed His own Son, Jesus, so that I could be reconciled to Him. My life has never been better! I sure don't mean that I don't have any problems - I still have all kinds of things I struggle with - but since I have His Spirit in me, I know that Jesus is helping me to change, and I have a promise of a home in heaven with Him."

Be honest. Which of these two options sounds like your conversations? By and large, Christians today preach the church and not Jesus. So why is that a big deal? Jesus said, "If I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men to Myself." Not only was Jesus talking about being lifted off the ground on a cross, He was talking about what the draw would be: Himself. Jesus is supposed to be who we flock to - not something He created. The church is something Jesus built -- it is a by-product of being in Him. What's an analogy I might use? Maybe marriage. Did you get married because you were in love with the idea of being married, or because you were in love with your spouse? Was being married your goal, or was spending the rest of your life with that special person your goal, and so you got married? The church is no different. Obviously I'm not against marriage - I am married. But that's not why I got married. Similarly, I am in the church [ie the kingdom, not a certain denomination] because I am in love with Jesus. Would I talk to a single person about the benefits of tax exemption and cheaper bills because you can split them with someone, therefore you should get married? Of course not. So why do we skip over Jesus and talk about the church? What has become the draw?

There are many scary consequences of lifting up the church instead of Jesus. For one, we would be guilty of worshiping the created thing instead of the Creator - and we know that doesn't go over well with God. We should be like the apostles and early followers of Christ - we should preach Jesus also. Think about Peter's famous sermon on the day of Pentecost after the ascension of Jesus: did Peter preach the church? Did he preach any of the benefits of the church? Did he ever even talk about the church? No. Through Peter, the Holy Spirit convicted the thousands of listening Jews of their sin and where they stood in relation to God because of it. Once their hearts had been cut because of that, it was the hearers that asked, "Brethren, what shall we do?" Can you hear the pleading in their voice? I can - I've been in the same place! It was only then that Peter told them to repent of their sinful life, be baptized for the forgiveness of their sin, and then he promised they would receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. That's what should be our draw!! Only after we see the 3,000 people obeying the gospel that day is it mentioned that "God was adding daily to the church those who were being saved." Then we see what the church was busy doing.

Here's my final, probably most important thought on this. When we lift up the church instead of lifting up Jesus, we tend to forget who our Master is. We forget who was given ALL authority on heaven and on earth. We can easily start making spiritual decisions based on the will of the church, and not of the will of Jesus. "Well I would never do that," you think. "My allegiance is to Christ." Let me challenge you to really examine that. When faced with a decision of which path you will take, do you first think, "What about the congregation? - The elders would/n't want me to do that. - That decision might alienate some people. - If I do this, not everyone would understand and I'd be on my own."  To whom do we look for guidance? It is easy to start weighing spiritual decisions based on how many people agree and would also do, instead of simply asking, "Is this what Jesus wants me to do?" What if we see a conflict between what elders teach and what Jesus teaches? When elders, for example, teach that sharing our faith is only for a "select few that have a special calling" yet we hear Jesus saying that the entire reason we were saved is to proclaim Him to the world, with whom do we side? Even if the elders aren't corrupt, do you think the Son of God wants to share His glory and authority with another?? (I'm not trying to undermine the guidance of biblical elders - I'm simply trying to ask whether or not we've looked to them to legislate our spiritual decisions.) What if you're faced with the decision on whether or not you will pursue true, biblical worship instead of calling the traditions of man the doctrine of God, and you know that many (most?) will not agree or understand. Some will even dislike you for it. What do you do?

A true disciple of Jesus never considers the consequences before he/she decides whether or not they will obey Jesus.

Through the Spirit my senses are being trained to discern a Christian from a Churchan, and it has become amazingly easy to do so - it's as if a foreign language is interjected in conversations. Listen closely to the content of your spiritual discussions; do you speak of the immeasurable riches of the grace given to you by Jesus, or do you talk about the activities of your church?

More:

Epiphany #1

Epiphany #2

The Faith of an Atheist

Author's note: I sure pray that I can continually add epiphanies to my list. I by no means consider that I "have arrived" or have figured everything out. Far, far from it!! If you know anything about my life, or have even read a few of my posts, you see that the whole point of me listing these epiphanies is to show that I have - and will - change everything in my life if I become convinced I should do so. I am sure not afraid to admit I've been wrong and change course. I pray that God continues to show His truth to me, and that I grow in His wisdom. :-) 

My Three Epiphanies - #2

Welcome back! First of all, I hope you've read Epiphany #1. If not, then #2 won't make as much sense. As I said in the intro to #1, in my life I have had three major epiphanies - major breakthroughs in my thinking and understanding that have changed everything in my life. And I really do mean everything. My first epiphany at the ripe ol' age of 24 was that there is a god. And then ......

Epiphany #2 - Jesus is the Son of God
For many people, they assume that #1 is the same as #2. But let me assure you, there is a wide chasm of understanding between knowing there is a god - some kind of higher power or something supernatural in the universe - and putting a name and character traits to that God. Billions of people in this world believe #1 without believing #2. Many people believe that there are just vague forces of good and evil, that Allah is their god, or they believe in Buddhism, etc etc etc. without that higher power being the man, Jesus Christ. So how did I get from #1 to #2? A lot of research. And an open, seeking heart.

I would say that one of the hardest things when doing any kind of research is to put aside our own preconceived ideas and preferences. At the point in my life where I was between #1 and #2, I was still in much of my old mindset - namely, that religious people had swallowed "the opiate of the masses" and that in order to believe anything as antiquated as the Bible, you had to check all intellect and critical thinking at the door. I mean, that book is a few thousand years old! How in the world could it possibly relate to my life today? And besides, I'd made quite a habit of printing off lists from the internet of "Contradictions in the Bible" and using them to debate people. So don't think for a minute that I had any slant towards the Bible or Christianity! In fact, I think at that point I had given more credence to eastern religions and mysticism. (Which, it's so funny to me what we call an "eastern" religion or a "western" religion. Christianity is seen as a western religion - but why, I have no idea. It was born in Iraq and fulfilled in Israel. Not really what I think of as western society.) Anyway - I at least decided to look into Christianity. While you might hear of people who denounce particular denominations, you very rarely hear of people who turned to Jehovah (the God of the Bible) and regretted it later.

So, I set out to study. I had studied the Book of Mormon (some people very close to me were Mormon). I looked into Buddhism, as well as the native American ideas, etc.. I also decided to read the Bible, just to see what all the fuss was about. While grocery shopping in a superstore, I grabbed a Bible. It was the "So That's Why! Bible" - one that's very textbook-like. I wanted my quest to be intellectual research, and I liked how this particular book tied biblical events and times into "the real world." But, while shopping, I was afraid that people would get the wrong impression of me if they saw me buying a Bible, so I hid it under a case of beer. Every night after work I would crack a beer and crack the Bible. That particular book is laid out chronologically. Soon I would really look forward to my reading time - it was fascinating to me. I would have all my old art history books out, and when I would read about things like the apostle Paul dealing with people who were making shrines to the goddess Artemis, I would flip open my art books and look at photos of the temple of Artemis. Since my background was in art, it helped me make "real-world" correlations, which validated what the Bible was saying. There are other books that claim to be from God that do not have any such validations. The people and places mentioned have never been verified - but not so with the Bible.

The only way I can describe my experience with slowly coming to believe the Bible is that you have to read it to believe it. There's nothing I can say to convince you. And when I say "read it", I mean READ IT. I don't mean to read commentaries on it or summaries of it, or to read bits and portions of it. I mean dedicate to sit down and read it. After all, if it's false, then by reading it you'll only have more ammo against believers, right? (But again, I wholeheartedly believe in "seek and ye shall find" - or in other words, you will find what you look for. If you are only looking for things that don't make sense or things you don't agree with, you'll find plenty. If you are looking objectively at it, you will find an objective truth.) Once I had been reading the Bible for a little while, I easily came to see that the vast majority of so-called contradictions of the Bible were simply misunderstandings or things taken out of context. For example, on many lists of contradictions, you'll see things like "in Genesis 1 it says God was pleased with creation, but in Gen 6 it says He was not pleased. That's a contradiction." Really? First of all, you have to notice that there is quite a difference in the point in time these two comments were made. Most people say over 1,600 years difference. God was pleased with what He had done, but was not pleased with what man had turned His creation into. Big difference. But you'd never get that by reading two verses out of context. When you study the explanations, the contradictions seem trivial at best.

So, now that I had come to believe the Bible, I had to believe what the Bible said about things like the afterlife, the purpose of my life now, what happens to those who follow Christ and those who don't, and whether or not we have an excuse for not believing. I remember as I read the Bible for the first time, I thought, "Well even if I died now I'd be ok, because surely God wouldn't hold me accountable for something I didn't know." Right? Wow, I still remember (almost 9 years later) exactly where I was sitting when I first read, "Since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse." It goes on to talk about no person will ever be able to say that they didn't have enough evidence to believe in God, and we will all be held accountable for that. That's sobering stuff. No wonder I remember that moment 9 years later. We all understand these concepts in ordinary life, but for some reason we won't translate the logic to faith. If I was driving down the freeway doing 90mph and the cop pulled me over, could I get away with telling her that because I didn't read the speed limit sign, I shouldn't get a ticket? Of course not! Yet we act like ignorance of God's Word will somehow be a free pass on the day of judgment.

So where did this all leave me? I now believed there was a higher power at work in the universe. I now knew that higher power was Jehovah, and His Son was Jesus. Not only did Jesus come down from heaven, take the form of a man, live a perfect life to show us the will of God, but he was crucified because of *my* sin and then God raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in heaven. So what? What does that mean for my life? Well, that means everything. Everything changes. My life is no longer under my own control. The only logical thing to do was to submit myself to the God that not only has the power to create everything that has ever been created, but who has the love for me to give His Son as a sacrifice for me. He loved me enough that He would provide a way for me to be forgiven of my sin, be reconciled into a right relationship with Him, and teach me day by day how to live for Him. He would give me His Spirit to dwell inside of me to help me! He knows I am incapable of living holy on my own!! The kindness of God led me to repent of my selfish lifestyle, be baptized for the forgiveness of my sins so that I could be born to a new life full of purpose and hope. Everything changed, and I would never, ever go back to the way things were. Praise God that He has the power - and the love - to change me one day at a time.

to be continued.....

Epiphany #1

Epiphany #3

The Faith of an Atheist

Author's note: I am not trying in one blog entry to convince you that there is a god and that He is Jesus. That's not my job. All I am trying to do is to tell a tiny bit of what happened in my life that led me from being an atheist to where I am now. While I can - and should - give you all the reasons for the hope within me, unless you are willing to seek Him (on His terms), dedicate yourself to the study of His Word and to live whatever is in it, then no little blog entry will change anything. 


Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He exists, and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
Heb 11:6

My Three Epiphanies - #1

In the 33 years that I have been alive, I would say that there have been three "discoveries" in my life that have changed everything. I don't mean discoveries in terms of penicillin, space shuttles or the internet (although Facebook comes close to qualifying) - I mean truths that I have discovered for myself that changed my life. Not only did my beliefs about things change, but my entire way of thinking had to change, as well as every thing about my life. I also don't mean that these truths are special or independent to me - as if I received a revelation unknown to mankind. In fact, these epiphanies are probably millennia old to the world; just new to me. But I don't use the term "epiphany" lightly.  So here they are:

1. There is a god.
More on this transition here: "The Faith of an Atheist"
The majority of people in the world accepted that there was at least some kind of higher power at work in the universe pretty much from the day they were born. But I didn't. This one took me 25 years to get. Although I grew up in a family that believed this, I never did. I was definitely a "5 senses" kind of person - if I couldn't see it, touch it, taste it, hear it or feel it (in the way I had defined), then it didn't exist. Oh now plenty of people would say "What about electricity? You can't see that, yet when you flip a switch the lights come on." -or- "What about the wind? You can't see the wind, you only see the effects of the wind." And frankly, I think those questions were just so cliché that I didn't really pay any attention to them. In fact I've never known of an atheist that was swayed in any way by them - even though they are good questions. I believe my atheism started out for two main reasons - the first was that there was no god standing in front of me face-to-face that I could ask questions of. (I mean really, people doubted Santa Claus, but at least he was at the mall once a year.)

The second was that my kid-brain way of testing the hypothesis of whether there was a god bore no fruit. I remember sitting on my bed at the ripe old age of 7, staring up at the white wood shutters over my window. I remember telling God that I would believe in Him all my life and do whatever He wanted me to do if only He would move my shutters. Just a little. He didn't have to unhinge them and make them float around the room or anything, just wiggle them a little. Then I'd be all His. I mean, surely a god that could create the universe could wiggle a kid's shutters, right? And surely He would want me to believe in Him, right? Well, my shutters never moved (as you might have guessed) and I went to bed disappointed. It wouldn't be until years later ... probably 20 ... that I would read how many people (and Satan) are recorded in the Bible asking God to do the same type things. I would never have guessed how many times people have said, "IF you are the Son of God..... command these stones to be turned to bread .... throw yourself off the temple and let the angels heal you ... take yourself down from the cross." And then what do they say? Then "we will believe in You!" And even while Jesus was on [mock] trial, the Jews again gave Jesus an "if" statement. But Jesus answered, "If I tell you, you won't believe." And guess what? They didn't.

So why do I bring these up? For one, to prove that I'm not the first person in history to tell God to prove Himself to me (and I know I won't be the last). And to prove that I'm not the first one God said no to. But why? Shouldn't He have given me every reason to believe? It's not like I was asking Him to destroy a race of people, and when Satan asked Him to turn those desert stones to bread, it's not like Jesus was taking those rocks out of the mouths of hungry people. So why not? Simply, we don't make the conditions by which God proves Himself. Try to think about this from God's point of view: if His claims are true, then He created the entire universe. He created planets and stars that we haven't even found yet. He created sea monkeys and T-Rex and hydrogen. He gives me life & breath. Yet I'm telling God that none of that is enough for me; that I will determine the evidence I need to believe. (i.e., "Thanks, God, for creating me - you just don't know what makes me tick and how I think.") Frankly I don't blame Him for telling us that creation alone give us every bit of evidence we need to believe in Him. If we choose not to, we can never look to God and say, "I know you created the cosmos for me, but since You didn't move my shutters when I asked, I didn't believe in You. Basically it's Your fault."

But for me, when life was fine and I was healthy and everything was going swimmingly, I really didn't see a need to look for a god. It wasn't until I was knocked flat on my back from the dumb choices I repeatedly made that I came to the conclusion there MUST be another way. That's when I decided to really check into matters of faith - not just from an unbeliever's standpoint (i.e., printing out lists of 'contradictions' in the Bible from the internet to debate with), but I needed to start reading stuff that claimed to be from God. It was only through that process that God opened my heart to see Him. I had to quit setting my own terms and approach Him on His terms. Have you tried that? Or are you still where I was? Frankly it's worth a shot and you have nothing to lose. But I will warn you, you have to be absolutely prepared for whatever you might find. If you go into any research with a slanted view, that's all you'll find (either way - religious or not.) We have to somehow get to the point where we go to the evidence with a mind that says, "If the evidence doesn't prove there is a god, then I won't believe and nothing changes. But if the evidence does point to God, then I have to be prepared for what that means for my life." If we don't plan on at least the possibility of change, then it's useless to research it. I now believe the promise that if we do not have a love of the truth, then we will not find the truth. That's pretty scary, huh?

to be continued.....
Epiphany #2
Epiphany #3
The Faith of an Atheist

Author's note: I hope it's obvious that it would be impossible for me to include everything that went into the process of going from not believing in anything beyond the chemistry of the earth to accepting the supernatural to believing there is a god. There's countless ways I could've talked about this part of my life and thousands of examples. This post just reveals the way my brain wrapped around the topic today. It's quite possible (and likely, even) that this wasn't the best or most understandable way. If you have any other questions or are interested in more of the story, please feel free to contact me. Thank you.

Rewind #17: Blessing the Broken Road

Original air date: 17Feb2010

Every long-lost dream
Led me to where you are.
Others who broke my heart,
They were like northern stars
Pointing me on my way
Into your loving arms.
This much I know is true:
That God blessed the broken road
That led me straight to you ....

"God Bless the Broken Road" --Rascal Flatts 

Just ask my husband - I cannot watch a movie without guessing a hundred times how the movie’s going to end. I am constantly saying things like, “Watch out behind that door! There’s a bad guy waiting!” or, “Ohh I don’t trust that guy. They’re only making us like him because he’s gonna turn out to be a terrorist.” or, “I’m tellin’ ya, this girl helped plant the bomb.” .... you know, stuff like that. (Did I just give away what kind of movies we watch most?? OK, so we watch WAY too much “24,” what’s your point?) ;-) I guess I’m kinda like Dr. House - I get enough of my guesses right that Danny threatens to not watch with me anymore ... but for each correct guess I have, I have 99 wrong guesses.

Ain’t that life?? I tell ya, I could never have guessed the path of my life. I would never have believed you if you came up to me 10 years ago and said simple truths from my life. I would never have believed that not only would I be a Christian, but I would have SUCH a fire for Christ that I would give anything to be able to share with any person that would listen for 5 minutes the unbelievable change that Christ has made in my life. I would have pointed to the little “Darwin fish” decal on my truck bumper back then and snidely said, “Yeah right.” If you would have told me that by the age of 25 I would have a college degree, two divorces, and a life-changing autoimmune disease that would force me to work my last day on the job less than two years later, I would have told you that you were off your rocker. I would also never have believed that one day I would have the kind of husband that makes me feel like I will NEVER be able to repay the love and the dedication that he shows to me on a daily basis, having stood with me through thick and thin, high and low - and that I would feel humbled nearly every time I looked at him. I wouldn’t have believed that I would find and marry a man of such worth.

Believe me, before I was a Christian I looked for love in all the wrong places - and not surprisingly, I found the fish native to the ponds in which I was trolling. It took changing the fishing pond, the bait and the standards for what was a keeper and what was strictly catch-n-release before I found the man that is the catch of a lifetime. Danny and I have never hidden that we have had our ups and downs since we were married in January of 2005, but I can say easily that we have never been stronger than we are now. God has blessed me beyond measure with my husband, and I am humbled and inspired by the kind of agape-love he shows for me. 

Both Danny and I admit that we each came into this marriage with no small amount of baggage. I like to think I simply had a carry-on while he was hauling his Air Force duffel bag, (which is NO small bag) ... but I know that’s simply not true. I practically had to have a bellhop follow me around the first years of our marriage just to make sure I wouldn’t lose track of any of my baggage. Well, item by item and prayer by prayer, Danny and I continue to set down that baggage and determine together never to pick it back up again. As painful as creating that baggage was, I *know* that it was exactly those experiences that built Danny and me into the people we are today. Without those experiences, we wouldn’t have the depth of relationship we have today. As this song truly says, I wholeheartedly believe that every thing along my broken road was leading me and preparing me for Danny -- and so wishing away any part of my past would wish away my present.

So here’s the real sticking point to that train of thought -- if I say that I trust that the Lord was always looking out for me, preparing me and discipling me for the blessings of my life now, knowing that without those difficult experiences I would not be the person I am today .... then wouldn’t the same hold true for my present and my future? Isn’t the God I serve today the same God that loved me back then, even before I loved Him? Why would I ever think, then, that my current trials aren’t all the more preparation for blessings I can not imagine and would not believe anyway awaiting me in my future?? I desire a faith that not only looks back and gives thanks, but one that looks forward and trusts.

Now I’m just rolling home, into my lover’s arms ....

This much I know is true, that God blessed the broken road that led me straight to you

Rewind#2: Name, Rank & Serial Number

(Original air date: 25Jan10) The basics. Some would call that the “who, what, when, where and how” of a situation. Other times it’s called the jist. Some people simply say it’s an introduction.

But you’re reading my blog. Surely you’re not a stranger to me, right? I guess this IS posted on the “world wide web” ... but some random web surfer in Russia is NOT my target audience. This is geared towards my family and my friends ... so why would I be introducing myself? There’s several reasons .... for one, I just feel it’s a good starting place for this blog ... but more so, I guess it’s because we often take for granted how much we really know about our friends. A little while ago a line of quizzes went around Facebook that people made about themselves, and were called, “How well do you know ____ [insert your name here]?” Each person would make 5 or maybe 10 trivia questions about themselves that they considered to be basic info ... so why were so many of the average scores by even close friends less than 50%? Because what we think of as “basic info” about ourselves really hardly ever comes up in casual conversation. How many of you know where I went to college? What about what my major was? My favorite pet? Some people might know this, but most of you probably don’t. So here goes .... what I consider the basic cliff notes of “ME” .... what someone in the military might understand as just my “name, rank and serial number” - (which is what a soldier is trained to say when captured.)

I was born September 24, 1978 in Reno, NV. I lived in that same house til I moved away to college ... my parents still live there. I graduated from Galena High School in Reno in '96, and from there I went on to graduate from Boise State University with a bachelor's in Metal and Ceramics. I worked for several years as a goldsmith, and loved every minute of it! Up til that point in my life, I had always been an atheist and lived truly for the moment. A year after graduating, I then lived in Atlanta, Georgia, and was in the middle of my second divorce. My life was crumbling, and everything in my life was up for re-evaluation. For the first time ever, I decided to look into all the “hype” about God and the Bible - which I had always denounced fiercely, yet never actually read. Once I opened the pages of the Word, my life immediately came into clear view and I realized what I needed to do. On March 16, 2003, I was baptized into Christ and began an entirely new life, raised as a new creature. Praise God! I was then (& still now) living in Yuba City, CA, where I worked as a goldsmith an had a nice little life with my own apartment and being very active with the church. Well, God had better plans for me, and soon introduced me to the man who is now my husband - Danny - a Master Sergeant in the Air Force - and we were married on Jan 8, 2005. Well, another big surprise was brewing, and soon I was diagnosed with Behcet's Disease. Within a couple short years I was forced to quit working due to my health struggles. (We never can plan our lives, can we??) Danny retired from the AF in early 2008, and started his own photography business - McNeal Photography.

Now we spend all of our time together, working our best for the Lord and simply enjoying life. My most recent "adventure" is having been diagnosed with Endometriosis, and so now we are pursuing the treatments for it. These are big decisions that are literally going to affect the rest of my life. Right now much of my focus is on trying to decide which way to go -- which are some big factors that aren’t easy to weigh ... but there will be much more on that in other posts, I’m sure. 

So, I guess that's me in a nutshell! Now you at least know the cliff notes. :)