Dear Christian,
Can we just be honest with each other? No one has it all figured out. Objectively, I think we all know that. But do we truly believe that? We are all broken and scarred by life. No one makes it through unscathed. But I don’t think that applies only to life. I think it applies to faith as well. We listen to messages/sermons/lessons/whatever and we heed that advice. In my experience, usually it’s because I think that teacher has it more figured out than I do. So I give up my hermeneutics and ignore my experience to try to fit my life in to the box that’s being taught.
Eventually it all breaks. Or at least it’s breaking for me. I don’t really like the term ‘deconstruction’ when it comes to faith. But I do think that’s kind of where I am in my life right now. I’m at a point in life where I’m having to re-evaluate the truth that I’ve always held to be pointing me in the right direction.
Life is messy. Faith is a whirlwind. And I think we do everyone a disservice when we put on a facade that ‘I’m holding it together’ So I just want to break that, and I want to share some of the questions that I’m wrestling through. More than anything, I want you to know that it’s okay to question and it’s okay to not have all the answers. I certainly don’t.
I grew up believing in an inerrant bible. Put simply, that means that the Bible is without fault or error in all of its teaching. This line of thinking comes from scriptures like 2 Timmothy 3:16-17 – “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” In John 10:35 Jesus says “If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be set aside—“ (note: this is only a phrase of a larger quote from Jesus)
Put aside the fact that Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 have two different creation stories and each of the gospels contain slightly different versions of Jesus’ life and ministry. If the Bible is inerrant it means we are stuck in history (more to come on this later).
And don’t ignore the fact that the Genesis creation story mirrors Babylon’s creation story and we’re not off to a great start in the inerrancy debate. Which leads me to my next struggle. If the Bible isn’t inerrant and it isn’t a screen shot of history two thousand years ago then what else may the Bible have misrepresented or just gotten wrong? (Think Jesus). If Jesus didn’t exist (which pretty much all scholars believe he at least existed and was crucified) and didn’t raise again – then the rest of the book doesn’t even matter. AND, if the rest of the book doesn’t matter does any faith matter at all?
People are selfish and egotistical. I think my biggest fear is that humanity can’t imagine a world in which they don’t exist in some way, so they created a story that lets them believe they will live forever. Even if in a lake of fire. And if that’s the case – are we missing out on ‘truly living’ by clinging on to a hope that doesn’t even exist?
Honestly,
Ashley
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