I can't afford not to.

Hey everyone,

Thank you for your prayers and emails over the last week. They have been incredibly encouraging. I truly appreciate the prayers, especially when I cannot find the strength to pray myself.

As I mentioned in my last blog, this week has been emotionally, mentally, and spiritually exhausting. I have been in one of the toughest spiritual battles that I have encountered thus far in my life. This week has been full of really hard questions: Is God real? How do I know I know that my religion is the right one? Does God really live inside of me? Am I just brainwashed? What gives me hope in my life?

I would love to tell you all that I have totally figured it out and that this spiritual crisis is resolved. But then I’d be lying. What I can tell you, though, is that God has been faithful to me. Let me try to briefly explain where I am right now. Okay, your right…it’s probably not going to be that brief :)

How do I know that the God I have been taught is the real God? Honestly, I do not know how I can know without a shadow of a doubt that my God is real and living. I am a skeptical person. I am very hesitant to trust or believe anything. I don’t like this about myself, but it is true. Therefore, it is very difficult for me to say right now that I am 100% confident that my God is the “right” God. However, I am learning that my skepticism is two-fold. This means that it is also very difficult for me to say right now that I am 100% confident that my God is NOT real.

The past few days, I have really considered what it would mean for my life if my faith really was fake…if I really had just been brainwashed my whole life into thinking that there is a God who is real and who loves me. When I honestly consider the option of a fake God, I’m not content sitting there. If my God is not real, I have no reason to keep going. I have no hope for the future. I have nothing to look forward to. I have no hope for peace or contentment. I have no way of coping with the things that come up in my life. I have to rely on my own strength (which seems non-existent right now). I have to start over. I have to completely redefine my life. I have to completely shift my way of thinking. I cannot pray before meals. I cannot go to church. I cannot journal to God. I cannot sit with God. Everything that has been so integrated into my life would have to be scratched, and I would have to redefine my life. Are you starting to understand why I was having a tough week?!

As I sat with those questions throughout the week, there were 2 things that really kind of touched me. First of all, the indigenous lady that we met (who got this all started!) said something very profound that really made sense to me. She said that religion is not something you can just change. It is part of you. You cannot just chose to change your religion and stop believing what you believe. In the same way, I cannot just decide to stop believing in God anymore than I can just decide to stop being a female. That is part of who I am. It defines me. I realize there may be some flawed Christian theology in this (after all, we believe that God can convert people and so forth…) The point is that this really hit me and I think God really used her words to encourage me.

I cannot just decide to stop believing in Jesus. I can’t do it. I have seen that this week. As I tried to consider my life without God, I was depressed, sad, scared, restless, tense, and stressed. That doesn’t’ exactly sound like a good alternative to me. I am realizing that Jesus is so ingrained into the depth of my being that I cannot just decide that he is not real. It is not something I can just deny. It is part of me. Jesus and Christianity are part of me, even if I don’t understand it all. Right now, there are a lot of things I do not understand, but I am learning that Christ is deeply imprinted on my soul. I may not know all the right answers right now, and I may have a lot of questions. Nonetheless, I do not have to have it all figured out before I start believing. There are always going to be questions and issues and problems in my life. I do not have to know the solutions before I believe in God.

The 2^nd thing that really touched me this week was an article I read entitled “Wrestling with Scripture.” How fitting. Well, I picked up the article, and it was incredibly intriguing. I’m not saying I agree with everything she said, but she definitely got me thinking. I also think God used her words to speak to me, even if I am twisting what she intended to say. In the first section, the lady (probably in her 60s by the looks of the picture attached) talked about how she continually wrestles with Scripture in her life.

This really made me realize that the Bible is not something I’m just going to get and then the wrestling part is over. Because of the way my mind works, I know that I am going to continually wrestle with God on different issues. Actually, my entire life thus far has consisted of wrestling with God on various issues. Instead of letting this frustrate me and make me throw in the towel, I need to realize that it is okay. It is something that will make me stronger in the end. Everyone’s journey with God is personal and different. My journey might be filled with a lot more wrestling than yours, but my journey in life is supposed to be unique. God is using my mind and my struggles with him to prepare me for something in the future…even if I can’t see what that is.

The woman in the article also talked about the Bible being a myth. She said that a myth doesn’t mean that it is not true, but she believes the Bible is a myth in the sense that it is a story by which you live. It is a worldview. She argues that everyone lives by a myth, and she has chosen the Bible to be the myth that guides her life. She can’t get away from it.

This was really intriguing for me because it just kind of made me see that my life has to be guided by something. Everyone lives their life by something. Something has to drive my life. Something has to give me purpose, passion, and meaning in life. Something needs to give me hope. If I decide that the Bible is not going to be that for me, then I have to replace the Bible with something else. Well, I really cannot think of something else that would be able to legitimately take that place in my life.

My life is going to be governed by something, so it might as well be the Bible. At this point in my life, it is the thing that makes the most sense to me. It doesn’t make sense for me to be an atheist. It doesn’t make sense for me to be a pantheist. It doesn’t make sense for me to be a Buddhist. I don’t understand Islam. Since I have to be governed by something, I’ve decided that I want to be governed by God. Now, I honestly do not know with 100% certainty that the God I believe in the real, true, living God. Nonetheless, I think God is developing that faith in me. That’s why it is called faith anyway: It is being certain of what I do not see. I cannot see God and I cannot know with scientific proof that he is real. However, I do know that I cannot find justification for NOT believing in God either. My life has to be ruled by something. I have to have hope in something. I want that hope to be Christ.

Final thoughts: I am also encouraged that the God that I believe in is true because of what I have seen in the lives of other people. There are amazing people in my life, but the ones who are the most loving and genuine are the ones who have a deep relationship with God. They have a peace and a passion for God. They convince me that God is real. When I see their lives, I cannot deny that they have something real. I cannot deny that they have something I deeply desire. They tell me they have Jesus. I have to believe that. With their lives, they convince me that I want their God too. I want to know that God. I want what they have.

I hope this all kind of makes sense. I know it is a lot of babbling, and I debated whether or not to include this in my blog. After all, this is personal and deep. However, I decided to include it because it is who I am. This is me. This is what I’m struggling with right now, and I am a big supporter in telling my story if that may help someone else who reads this.

So I know that right now, I have to believe in God and trust him to get me through these questions I have right now. Even if I do not understand everything, I first have to start with God. I have to believe he exists. I have to believe he is real. I have to believe he is worth fighting for. I have to believe that he is worth living my life for. I have to find hope in him. I have to believe that he is shaping me and changing me I have to trust that he will continue to reveal truth to me in the future, but for now, I need to be content just knowing that I’m on the right path. He is the right path. I have to believe this. I can’t afford not to.