(This is the part two of my discussion of the article found here: http://sojo.net/blogs/2014/08/18/what-saved-my-faith
You can read part one >here<
From the Article:
“My
faith was threatened as I began to question what else had been wrong
about what I had been taught. As I edged closer to the perimeters of
the church, all the time being drawn and inspired by the beauty and
unconditional love (which I was told only existed within
Christianity) I saw outside of her, the light from beyond cast even
more shadows on the church. Darkness existed in the forms of
misogyny, empire-building, anti-intellectualism, and systematic
marginalization of GLBT persons; they were injustices coated with
spiritual language — wolves in sheep’s clothing. I suffered
through severe storms of righteous rage. I wept with the pain of
marginalized peoples against the church’s exclusion”
I'm bothered by the phrase “what I had been taught.”
A Christian is taught things, of course, but we come to know more as
we commune with God in His Word. I can't really know, but it just
doesn't feel like the author has a relationship with God. The
language of the article speaks as if Christianity was simply an
organization or a movement (She even calls it a movement at one
point). Everything we see, every feeling we have, every idea that is
presented to us or pops into our minds needs to be taken to Scripture
and analyzed. The author constantly refers to “the church,” but
doesn't ever mention the Word or God. The church, its membership,
and its activities are not what we reference for truth and they are
not what we hold up as our standard. God has revealed in Scripture
and through His Son what we are to be. It is through that light that
we look upon the world.
“The light from beyond cast even more shadows on the
church.” Satan was an angel of light, and he works in distractions
and misinformation. He deals in lies and untruths. That light may
cast shadows but it's a pale sickly light when understood. You say
you see misogyny? The Bible speaks against that. You see
'empire-building' and 'anti-intellectualism'? God tells us to love
Him with all of our mind, soul, and strength and think of others more
than ourselves. You see the church marginalize the 'GLBT' folks?
Well what do you mean by that? Do you mean that we exclude them from
church? Do you mean that we refuse to allow what is clearly a sinful
life, one repeatedly denounced by God in His word into the body of
Christ? Then yes, that is there and it will remain for everyone who
holds the Bible to be true. We must love these people, they are no
different and no more fallen than any others but sin is sin and we do
no one any favors by playing nice and trying to 'reinterpret' the
Bible.
From the Article:
“You
see, I want all of the beauty. I want the irreverent, gritty honesty
out there AND the deeply mystical sacred prayers in here. I want the
pragmatic, scientific solutions for the world’s problems out there
AND the earnest faith for the impossible in here. I want the big,
huge tent that welcomes everyone out there AND the narrow road of
life giving sacrifice in here. I want to glean the wisdom of the
world AND own Jesus’ beautiful vision.”
Do
not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the
world, the love of the Father is not in him.
(1
John 2:15)
“Adulterers
and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is
enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world
makes himself an enemy of God.”
(James
4:4)
"The
fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, And the knowledge of the
Holy One is understanding.”
(Proverbs
9:10)
Co
1:20 Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer
of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
What honesty does the author think she'll find in a
world of lies? Not that everyone is constantly telling lies but the
prince of this world is the father of lies and humans speak his
native language! Furthermore that 'big, huge tent that welcomes
everyone' does not welcome true Christianity, it never has. Try it,
go to that tent -so to speak- join in the hand holding and smiling,
and then tell everyone that there is ONE way and one way ONLY that
man can be saved from his sin. Tell them that the ONE true God
CONDEMNS their sin and is right to PUNISH them. Tell them that
despite that He sent His Son to die on their behalf and all we need
to do to enjoy His grace is repent and OBEY. See how long they
welcome you. This world hates us, some more than others, but all of
it the same. We are not of this world and should not seek inclusion
in it. We desire a oneness, we desire unity, but unity in Christ and
oneness of Spirit. The kingdom of God is not one that exists on
earth, at least not yet. The kingdom is not one we bring about, it is
not one we help at all. God will do His work and we have the
privilege of coming along for the ride. We do not seek a “better
world” or a utopia, we seek Christ and Christ alone.
From the Article:
“The
paradox in my spiritual journey is that beautiful people, ones who
are overly kind, extravagantly generous, yet remain unassuming and
humble — they threaten my faith and simultaneously save it. My
faith, it teeters on again and off again, never secure, keeping me on
my toes.
I
will never stop being drawn outside of the faith circle, because
selfish person that I am: I need to have all of the beauty. I can’t
ever go back to the safe kind of faith, the one that is full of
certainty and claims beauty only for itself. I want my faith to be
fragile and vulnerable and dangerous, because without the risk of
losing my faith, there would cease to be any need to save it.”
The beauty she claimed to see outside, as if it only
exists out there, is a facade. It's a remnant of the fact that as
God's creation we can never be fully removed from the evidence of His
work. I would ask why seeing people do good threatens her faith?
Why does an atheist at a soup kitchen drive her to doubt? Is it
because they're not a Christian? Is it because they're doing things
she, for some reason, thought only Christians could do? The Bible
tells us that all of our righteousnesses (apart from Him) are as
filthy rags. It does not say we have no 'goodness', it only says
that our 'goodness' is not ultimately good and by comparison is not
very good at all. Frankly I'm concerned for her, with her faith so
fragile as she says. We should not allow doubts to linger. When we
doubt we need to use that doubt to drive us to deeper understanding.
We need to strive for the death of doubts, not hold to them as some
sort of indicator of higher truth. Our faith does not require
saving. We do. I feel as if the author needs to be reminded that we
hold to a faith that is sure in the storm, steady on the sea, and
firm as a house built upon stone rather than sand. We cannot be led
astray by the beauty of this world; a lost man can be confident but
following him still gets you nowhere.
“For
if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the
knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again
entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than
the beginning.”
(2
Peter 2:20)
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