Almost thirty-five years ago I discovered Christianity, or
perhaps I should say that Christianity discovered me. In essence, I had an experience
in which I encountered something of the love of God expressed towards me
through his Son Jesus Christ. It completely changed my life and having accepted
Christ, my life was set on a course which would impact on every aspect of my
being thereafter and very much still does to this day.
Following this experience, I began attending a church which
expressed Christianity in a particular way. It was an evangelical charismatic church,
and through my involvement with that church and the passion and enthusiasm for
Christianity that was manifest there, I quickly grew in my knowledge of, and
understanding of the bible as they interpreted it. I read through the entire
bible in various English translations numerous times and in due course I was
preaching, leading study groups and fronting the worship band with my guitar.
It was also in the church that I met my beautiful wife to whom, at the date of
writing I have been married for over 25 years.
As much as I value very highly a great deal of what I
received through that period, as time progressed, I found myself becoming
increasingly uncomfortable with some of the basic tenets of faith which found
expression in that particular interpretation of ‘what it means to be a
Christian’. In essence, anyone who didn’t accept and embrace certain doctrines
were ‘unsaved’ and were destined for eternal damnation. Think about that for a
moment! In my case this meant members of my own family, friends, neighbours,
work colleagues – jolly nice people, the lot of them and yet according to the
faith that I had been taught, and sought to embrace, they were all going to
hell. This is clearly horrific and for a time, I took this on board and became
fervent in my efforts to ‘convert’ people and preach the gospel as I understood
it. In addition to this, I couldn’t understand why all the people who professed
to be Christians weren’t out there, banging on doors, preaching in the streets
and relentlessly telling others of their need to be ‘saved’. If they really
believed this stuff, then surely the effort to rescue as many as humanly
possible from eternal torment should take total precedence over absolutely
everything else! Instead, what I saw was Christians bolstering each other up
with bible study meetings, conferences, lively services etc. Great fun much of
it, but very insular.
This created a tension within me. What if we were wrong? How
could I claim to be a spokesperson for a God of love and yet proclaim a message
that had such a dark side to it, a message that sought to bring about change
through a fearful threat of eternal punishment? I couldn’t do it. I had decided
in my mind to believe certain doctrines, but in my heart of hearts, I couldn’t
accept the horror of it. I believe that this is the same reason why many
‘evangelical Christians’ are not more actively engaged in mission, in
proclaiming this message of an angry and judgemental God. They, in their heart
of hearts cannot accept the notion and the contradictory nature of a God who is
both loving and vengeful.
There are huge problems with this particular expression of
Christianity. Among these are the fact that it tries to impose upon people who
neither accept, nor understand, the concept of biblical authority. Quoting
bible verses to prove an argument is counter-productive in trying to voice a
message to people who have no comprehension or understanding of what some
Christians claim the bible to be. Many people who hear such a message, will at
best simply close their ears to it, and at worst, heap derision on those who
are using the bible in this way. I speak from experience! Also problematic are those
who never have, and never will have the opportunity to hear and experience the
preaching of the ‘gospel’. How can Christians, in all good conscience, worship
a God who breathed life into people and yet placed them in geographical
locations and contexts where they will never get the opportunity to hear the
‘message of salvation’?
Another difficulty with certain expressions of evangelical
Christianity is that it has boundaries. There are those who are walled in, and
there are those who are walled out. If you are on the inside of the wall, all
is hunky dory, and conversely if you are on the outside, then you are in a
perilous position. Certain people, by default appear to have been placed on the
‘outside’ for the simple reason that by matters over which they have little or
no choice, they are excluded by narrow doctrine, and it seems perfectly ok for
those who are on the inside to lob stones over the walls at them! I’m thinking
at the moment of LGBTQ people. Those who hold such excluding views seem to
apply different standards when it comes to things within their own hearts and
lives that are contrary to the doctrines they hold to. It is undisguised
hypocrisy.
So where do we go from here? Well in my case, I reject a
faith in a psychotic God who embraces some, and casts the vast majority into
eternal torment for the fickle reason of not believing the correct theology and
aligning their lives with it as such.
This will create enormous problems for some of my Christian
friends. Doubtless the charge of ‘heretic’ and ‘backslider’ will be levelled at
me, if it isn’t already. The thing is, I don’t consider myself to be a heretic,
nor a backslider. I absolutely believe in a God of love, the source of
everything, Trinitarian in nature, who physically extended himself into the
physical universe in the person of Jesus Christ, and who continues to work in
all of creation through the Holy Spirit.
I absolutely believe in transforming love that challenges
and changes human beings, and that through our relationship with God, we can
find fulfilment, and journey towards becoming everything that we are created to
be.
I believe that through the suffering of the cross, Jesus
Christ draws alongside us and alongside the suffering of the world, and that
through the resurrection, we too can be raised up with him into a new
beginning. The gospel is a wonderful message of God’s love for human beings,
for you and for me, and for everything that he has made.
These thoughts are embryonic, and it is difficult to capture
in words all that is in my heart, but I believe these things are better
understood intuitively rather than with our minds. Love cannot be analysed but
it can be experienced, it can be given and it can be received. I am aware too
that there is much that I haven’t addressed in my words above. What about
suffering for example? I don’t have a simple answer that a few theological
words and bible verses can satisfactorily address, but I do believe that we are
not alone in our brokenness. God experienced it too in the brutal murder of
Jesus Christ, and in the context of eternity, God still experiences and shares
in our brokenness. The heart of God is always inclined towards that which he
has made. He never rejects it, after all, everything that he has made has come
out of his own heart of love and self-expressive creativity and carries the
mark of his image. For us, we can trust, and we can say ‘thank you’.
Love and peace.
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