Realizing I needed a Savior at the tender age of 7, I began my now lifelong journey of faith. 35 years later, my faith doesn't look like I ever thought it would or could. Other people's faith's don't look like I thought. Our personal faith's come in all different sizes, shapes & colors. Some people get to live in (as a friend called it) the pretty little thatched roof bungalow of faith...like a Thomas Kincaid painting...inviting, full of light, and cozy. Deep doubts over the Truth are almost non-existant. Their faith is still very real and deep and beautiful, but it's not hard for them to believe. Other people's faith is like an endless desert or wilderness...stark but still full of life; also full of depth and beauty yet often a struggle for survival. Other people live somewhere in between. I've spent a lot of my life thinking that eventually everyone who professed Christ should end up in the bungalow. I don't believe that anymore.
I don't know about you, but I often doubt my faith. I doubt the validity of the claims of Christ, I doubt that the Bible is really the Word of God. I doubt there's a God. I doubt just about everything related to this "faith" we call Christianity. Why do I doubt? Partly because it's who I am to question. Partly because I confuse religion for faith. And partly because the claims of Christianity seem ludicris...I mean One God becoming man to save us?? A being beyond us, controlling the universe? C'mon.
But amid all the doubts, I still believe. Why do I still believe? Is it habit? Superstition? Fear? Lack of reflection? Lack of reason? Laziness? Because Christianity "works"? Because I see evidence of God in nature, humanity, the universe, even myself?
The simple, truthful answer is, I don't have a choice but to believe.
There have been times in my life when I wanted to stop believing; wanted to embrace secular humanism, existentialism or rationalism.
Those times have indeed led me to searching the Bible and asking other's what and why they believe.
But ultimately, it's not reading the Bible more, or praying more, or seeing God in people around me, or remembering His faithfulness that keeps me believing.
It's this abstract, absolutely uncontainable, indescribable, very real Thing that goes beyond my reason and beyond my feeling and beyond the definable that keeps holding on to me.
So even when I try to let go, I can't. It's got me. I cannot not believe.
Even with my doubts and inability to live in the tidy little bungalow, I still believe.
I know that by merely expressing my thoughts, doubts and questions, many of you may doubt me and be very uncomfortable with this entry. But my hope is, that others who aren't sure will continue searching and may be taken captive by this utterly unbelievable God.
Creed by Rich Mullins track #13 on player
I believe in God the Father almighty Maker of Heaven and Maker of Earth
And in Jesus Christ His only begotten Son, our Lord
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit
Born of the virgin Mary
Suffered under Pontius Pilate
He was crucified and dead and buried
And I believe what I believe
It's what makes me what I am
I did not make it, no it is making me
It is the very truth of God and not
The invention of any man
I believe that He who suffered
Was crucified, buried, and dead
He descended into hell and
On the third day, rose again
He ascended into Heaven where
He sits at God's mighty right hand
I believe that He's returning to
Judge the quick and the dead
Of the sons of men
I believe it, I believe it I believe it I believe it, I believe it
I believe in God the Father almighty
Maker of Heaven and Maker of Earth
And in Jesus Christ His only begotten Son,
Our Lord I believe in the Holy Spirit
One Holy Church, the communion of Saints
The forgiveness of sin
I believe in the resurrection
I believe in a life that never ends
And I believe what I believe
It's what makes me what I am
I did not make it, no it is making me
It is the very truth of God and not
The invention of any man
