Who’s on your list?
Updating…
Benjamin Ady is a Recycle Your Faith regular and has his own blog called OXYMORONREDUNDANCYPARADOXTRAP.
Updating…Updating…
Who’s on your list?
Updating…
Benjamin Ady is a Recycle Your Faith regular and has his own blog called OXYMORONREDUNDANCYPARADOXTRAP.
I’ll start:
Kathy Escobar because she’s the best example I’ve got for walking in Jesus’ footsteps.
Dan Patten because he challenges my thinking without making me feel like a heretic.
Sara Spinks because she’s able to hold faith’s simplicities and complexities in tension without getting stuck in philosophical loops.
Kathy Escobar: She’s honest, insightful, warm, creative, and inspiring.
Peter Rollins: Provides bread crumbs of thought for this stage of my journey.
Anne Lamott: Demonstrates “irreverent” reverence.
N.T. Wright: His words are transforming the foundation of my faith.
Brian McLaren: Helped destroy my religion that I might find faith.
Teresa of Avila: Taught me that prayer does not have to go to the other side of the universe.
Erin Word: Helped me know that I am not alone or totally crazy.
Frederick Buechner: Humbly presents a faith for human beings.
David Johnson: Facing the uncertainties of life and exploring the mysteries of faith and God with me.
Amber Buriff: Loving people sacrificially.
i posted this list over at my blog:
Laura Sheppard – i met her just a few days before i came to logan. she was wearing a cross, i inquired. how can she be in hippie land (we met at a workshop at the lost valley educational center outside of eugene, ore.) and be a christian? boggled my mind.
My grandmother: she loved pat robertson – but loved me more.
Mother Teresa: because of both the heroic things she did AND her struggles
Pastor Paul Heins: my pastor who preaches about being a devoted christian AND an activist for gay rights – sometime in the same sentence. yes! i can be me and a christian. pat robertson lies.
the folks at the Christian Peacemaker Teams
my friends Virginia, JaNiel, Preston, and Matt.
Shane Claiborne
Thich Nhat Hahn (his book “Living Buddha, Living Christ” reminds me why I am a Christian).
My doc.
Jesus (he’s the reason why I kept coming back!)
Pastor Dan Bryant
Pastor Pieter Niemeyer
Wow Benjamin, you’re famous – you’ve been featured on RYF! You rock!!
I don’t want to imagine myself a Christian BUT I also admire the people you mentioned and have things I can learn from all of them. My list of people like that includes people who aren’t necessarily Christians too – like you: your friendliness and curiosity inspires me and your concern about the world challenges me to care about people around the world much worse off than I am.
Other people listed here are on my list too. Also, Pam Hogeweide is on my list because of her honest, open, authentic approach to being a Jesus Follower and her involvement with a really cool church that helps people without houses.
And Claudio Oliver is on my list too because he’s so passionate about what he does and he’s focused on helping people also. And he’s super-friendly!
Craig is on my list too because he cares about following Jesus with integrity and creates spaces like this for honest exploration of ‘real’ issues in Christianity.
yeah, so i guess my question is why??? what’s the point??? I get why christians would like to see this video (cuz they’re making an impact, got it) But I guess the ‘why?’ would be for Benjamin… I’m actually in a place where I’m questioning everything about my faith, and this video from a de-converted (or -ing?) christian about people who make it possible for him to really ‘imagine’ himself back into the faith… it just doesn’t make sense to me… i’ve read a bunch of Benjamin’s comments and posts on his blog (so many that i’ve been gun shy to leave any comments of my own for fear of having to respond to his questions) and i guess i just want to know why he’s so active here? as well as others who don’t seem to want to necessarily ‘recycle’ their faith but still engage here… why? motive, point, agenda…?????
thanks
Wow, great comment Derek! I’m interested to hear Benjamin’s response. For what it’s worth I’ll share my perspective. I barely claim the Christian label for reasons probably similar to why you’ve been de-converting. The ONLY reason I still call myself a Christian is because a few people have demonstrated to me that the Christian label doesn’t have to mean what it currently does in America (that’s how this video is relevant to me). I’d be happy enough to ditch the label, but the stubborn part of me thinks “why the hell should I have to stop calling myself a Christian just because my views don’t line up with those currently associated with Christianity?” Truth is, most Christians probably wouldn’t consider me a Christian anyway after hearing what I believe. If I stopped associating myself with Christianity I’d still be hanging out at places like this because I consider myself to be spiritual and have faith in something bigger than me. Notice the site is called recycle your faith, not recycle your christianity. But if I didn’t have any interest in spirituality I probably wouldn’t be here.Can I flip the question back at you? If you are de-converting, why are you hanging out here?So glad you posted a comment, Derek. I’d be interested to hear more about how Benjamin’s comments have made you hesitant to post. How can we make it safer here to post comments?
People who make me imagine not being a Christian (not to be confused with not being a follower of Jesus)
Helen Mildenhall – She is smarter and kinder than most Cs I have ever met
Pema Chodrin – As a buddhist nun she makes so much practical sense
My Mom – has stedfastly refused to become a C but practices a faith a rarely see with Cs
John Rogers – Someone I helped de covert from being a C in high school and is now a buddhist of some type- his openess,curiosity and willingness to truly interact with ideas he probably finds repugnant in order to stay in a relationship are very impressive
My Wife – she has never really been a C but she is one of the wisest people on the planet and she trusts Jesus on a very personal level
Derek,
I must confess I’m delighted that in spite of the fact that you’ve been shy to leave comments out of fear of having to respond to my questions, you left one anyway. You rock.
Why do you fear that?
You ask a really interesting question yourself. My initial answer goes like this: In the book “The Life of Pi” by Yann Martel, the main character, Pi, is brought up Hindu. As a young man, he embraces both Islam and Christianity, while continuing to practice Hinduism as well. This creates an interesting dynamic and some funny situations for Pi. Later in his life, he goes to univeristy in Canada and studies zoology and comparative religions. It becomes somewhat true for him to say he’s no longer a Hindu, at least in the sense that he was a Hindu when he was growing up. At one point, he’s being interviewed and he says this thing that has really stuck with me. He says that because He grew up Hindu, that Hinduism colors the landscape of his imagination. Here’s the whole quote:
“First wonder goes deepest; wonder after that fits in the impression made by the first. I owe to Hinduism the original landscape of my religious imagination, where those towns and rivers, battlefields and forests, holy mountains and deep seas where gods, saints, villains and ordinary people rub shoulders, and, in doing so, define who and why we are.”
That comment really spoke to me. I owe to Christianity the original landscape of my religious imagination. It means that in a sense I can’t altogether escape Christianity. So while I am/have been in the process of “deconverting”, I’m still seeking, I suppose, a way to … integrate that into my current totality/story. I think that touches on why I hang out here.
Hope that makes some sense. Thank you for asking.
Benjamin
Jim,
Your list of people who make you imagine not being a Christian–I mean the fact that you responded with such a list–is a brilliant demonstration of why you are so awesome. Thank you!
Thank you – same to you
I loved this phrase
“I owe to Christianity the original landscape of my religious imagination”
Owning who we are while not being held captive by it is what I consider to be an attempt to truly grow. So much of being able to truly live has so mcuh to do with learning how to practice a non reactive presence. What Brian says more beautifully in his phrase ” lets stop comparing thier worst woth our best”
Craig,
Thanks for responding to me. i came across you site through a ‘christian’ video distribution site. There were a couple of comments calling these videos sacrilegious so i was intrigued… Then by an act of divine intervention, satanic attack or just shear human interest, i became hooked to the conversations going on… my personal story is long and legalistic – right now i’m at a point where i don’t want to be a seeker anymore… i want to be a finder… or at least a forgetter… one of the two… i caught hold of this site at a very weird time in my life.
Benjamin,
Thank you for responding back as well… i appreciate your context and i appreciate that you clarified ‘process of de-converting’ (very helpful)… oh, and thanks for asking me a question! answer being, you make me think too much and right now, i just want to be plugged back into the matrix
Derek,
Wow I am *so* curious to hear your story.
I was going to back off a bit, but instead, I think:
I dare you to tell us more.
Yes, that works nicely for me.
Ha! oh that i could go into it right now… here’s the short story… raised in a ‘plastic’ independent fundamental baptist home… 12 years of fundamentalist private school… got out and questioned all sorts of ways – came back to the church through a good ole fashioned revival at 23 – right back into the crap i ran from… then into ministry work – went through the motions, trying to make religion work – marital junk – loss of everything – time in ‘wilderness’ – worked out marital junk – at 32 found ‘relationship vs. religion’ – back into ministry work… got really ‘cool’ jobs in really crappy churches… etc.. etc… waiting for the rapture… that’s all i can do for right now – hope that satisfies your hunger a bit…
nice and succint
Derek,
thank you!
what does “plactic” in quotes mean here?
when you say you are “waiting for the rapture”, does that mean you still definitely believe in “the rapture”, and/or more specifically in “the rapture” as described in American style eschatological eisogesis (HA! I love it that I just coined the phrase “American style eschatological eisegesis”, as google returns zero results) Also–are you serious when you say that, or are you joking/mocking?
Have you read any Brian D. McLaren? If so, your reactions/thoughts?
Hey Benjamin,
‘plastic’ is fake, manufactured… live one way at church, another at home… ‘do as i say not as i do’ kinda stuff… my ‘rapture’ comment is really my childhood/faith/landscaped religious imagination in a nutshell… it definitely was meant more tongue and cheek… allow me to explain a bit further… when i was 5, i was permitted/made to watch ‘a thief in the night’ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6lKVtfyUAw) at our sunday evening service – from that point on, i was scared to death about the 2nd coming… i ended up sleeping with my parents until i was 12… i couldn’t be left alone for any period of time or i’d freak out… if i saw an old person, i was cool, cuz all old people were mature christians! i ended up getting ‘saved’ every sunday… i was in a church that loved to preach about hell and the 2nd coming, tattoos of 666 on your forehead and all that great stuff, this all while they made it fun for the kids by giving them patches for memorizing scripture and letting them run relay races around colored circles… my childhood was constant terror… so now, while that defined me for years and really lead to me leaving the faith when i was 18, i’ve pushed away from end time prophecy stuff and concentrated on what i’ve been taught as the true message of Christ… grace and life… i have found a lot of people that grew up in the 80′s in the baptist church who had very similar experiences… honestly i decided that for me, this subject was nothing that i need to concern myself about… that ‘if’ Christ is coming back, or ‘has’ come back already, it’s not going to have as huge of an impact on my life as other christians seem to want it to have… i have to continue to live my life one day at a time anyway… i now view end time prophecy as just another tool of manipulation… i do believe that there are a lot of folks out there that honestly feel that by concentrating on delivering this message that they are doing what God has called them to do… i have a great friend of mine that can bring up end times stuff in a conversation about a peanut butter and jelly sandwhich… it’s life for him… it’s fantastical… and i can’t get fantastical when it comes to my faith… wish i could sometimes… it seems like a lot more fun! healings, speaking in tongues, levitation… alright, levitation is not a Biblical spiritual gift… But i think if it were, i would have definitely invited my friends to church…
and lastly, sorry, i have not read any of Brian McLaren’s books…
thanks for the questions… i’ve wasted a good hour of my work day…lol…
Derek,
Can I just say OMFG? Showing a thief in the night to a 5 year old is just wrong. wrong wrong wrong and unkind and unkind and unkind.
Wow. I guess maybe I had a strong reaction to that.
Oh–I had that reaction before I read the rest. I mean I stopped reading after you said you were made to watch it at 5, and then I wrote this, and then I went back up and saw the rest of what you were saying, and I see that my initial reaction is a very reasonable reaction.
I think you nailed with “end times prophecy stuff” = “tool of manipulation”. Couldn’t have said it better myself.
I am so sorry that you were terrified and manipulated by people calling themselves Christians. I have very similar experiences. As in growing up in a fundamentalist Baptist church in the 80′s. Yep. I love it that you have apparently found a lot of freedom from that terror and manipulation. Rock on. Me too.
So how did you find that freedom?
I think you might like McLaren’s writings. He has been very helpful for me: see http://www.brianmclaren.net/ also he’s written a bunch of books. I also found George Macdonald super helpful. Have you found anyone’s writings to be really helpful? Whose?
Derek, thanks for jumping into the conversation and sharing your story, even at the risk of having Benjamin respond with lots of questions
.
I’m sorry to hear that the form of Christianity you were raised in terrorized you. I’m not against Christianity per se but I am against forms of it that mess people up. Which I suppose means that the people on my list are Christians who promote forms of Christianity that don’t mess people up.
You’re lovely Bens! I love this video of you! I am very proud of you – you are authentically yourself, embracing and being wonderful you!
Love,
Meg
Craig,
WOW! Makes me want to be on people’s lists. Thanks for reminding me again what it’s all about!
Keep these videos coming!!
Pace e bene,
Rick
Rick – I’m sure you’re on a bunch of people’s lists, I know you’re on mine!
Rick Knable – was the first person to give me permission to think for myself and stuck with me no matter how big the questions got.
Malina Knable – has been a mother to me in times when I’ve needed one the most, her love and compassion challenges me to be a better person.
Hmmm…
About my own “first landscape”— explains so much… Amazing stuff here. Amazing.
Tami
I love the way this site makes people feel comfortable sharing their uncomfortable stories. Derek, my hat is off to you for surviving, and adding one more story to the ones I have read of people whose faith is not what it once was, all thanks to what some of us have done to mess you up. Thanks for the generosity to still be a part of the conversation.
Benjamin, I admit I watched your list looking at the reason more than the names. I think what I hope beyond anything else is that I fit some of those positive qualities.
Jesus…I know how that might sound to some, but I have had personal encounters with God, not at any single church or around any single person, but experiences that have pushed my faith from trusting to knowing on many levels.
Rich Mullins…for living and speaking in a way that few do and still admitting grace is required.
Rick Knable…for teaching me the difference between religion and relationship.
Kent Mattox…for being the most transparent preacher I have ever seen, with fiery faith and unbounding grace.
Hey–I like Rich Mullins too. I really like his music. I really love it that he was about to convert to Roman Catholicism just before he died.
When I was a kid, I wondered how Catholicism got anyone anything. It was so boring sitting in mass. After growing older and watching my mother, and learning a little patience of my own, I am amazed out how much can be learned from nearly every walk of life.
Can I ask something that has been bugging me? Well, since no one spoke up, I suppose I will. I don’t want to hurt any feelings, but it kinda seems to me like Christianity is being spoken about, on this blog and possibly elsewhere, as if it is some kind of club or group to join. It sort of sounds like we are evaluating its pros and cons or worse, basing it upon certain people who claim to be Christian. Democrats get a bad name from far left liberals and Republicans get a bad rap from greedy capitalists. That doesn’t mean that to claim views of either party means you agree with every action and condone every action of all those who claim the same affiliation. To me, Christianity is positioning your heart toward God and the things you, yourself, know that he wants for you. To me, it is striving toward a fulfilled life by gleaning from the Bible and a personal relationship with Jesus, and I mean talking to him and listening to him.
Dan,
I was really excited thinking you were going to ask something, per your introductory sentence, but then I couldn’t find a question =).
I love the first part of your definition of Christianity: “Positioning your heart toward God and the things you, yourself, know that he wants for you.” Rock on.
Here’s a question for you: What do you mean by talking and listening to Jesus? Can you describe that and/or give a specific example of that happening for you?
I guess I get like that sometimes, lost in my own tracks. Often, usually in solitude but not always, I will speak to God. Sometimes I speak in my heart but usually it is out loud (I find it is really helpful to speak out loud). Sometimes I’m complaining, worried, asking questions or just need to talk. Often, again not always, once I am quiet and allow God to speak, I hear him. A few times I have heard him speak audibly, but mostly I hear him within my heart.
For me, a conversation with God is similar to a conversation within another person. When I started approaching it that way, I began to have a different perspective on prayer. It might sound irreverent to some, and at times, my language does sound more reverent, but lately I find this normal style dialogue really making a difference. It takes away many of the traditional things I’ve been taught and allows me to be honest.
Oh, and as to my question from earlier, I guess it is, what does Christianity mean to those on this website? I am not sure I see it the same way.
Dan,
That’s so kewl that a few times you’ve heard God speaking audibly. I think a lot of people wish for such a thing. I know I used to.
I like your question–I think it’s an interesting question. And I rather suspect that no one on this web site sees Christianity the same way as anyone else on this web site. My guess is that each of us has our own unique view of Christianity.
I’ve already kind of covered a wee bit of what Christianity means to me, above. I’d love to hear others’ answers to your question.
The list: Jesus Christ. Should there really be any others since there is no other way to be a Christian…doesn’t matter what or who makes us feel like one. We may admire people and respect others for certain things but when we lift up man we have to be careful that idolatry doesn’t set in. Invariably in our fallenness we favor folks that agree with us or meet our “ideology” and divisiveness can ensue….go to a Reformed blog or Catholic blog and see a completely different list of folks. We are all finite beings and by His Grace alone any man or woman can be used of Him to encourage, challenge, mentor, and love on people but everyone on these lists including us will fail at some point…only the sinless life of Christ alone has the power to give us undeserved acceptance.
Jeff,
what do you mean when you say that only the sinless life of Christ alone has the power to give us undeserved acceptance?
Benj, What I meant was that Christ has lived the only sinless life as a man (and yet still God) yet willingly died on the cross in our place for our sins so we could be found righteous or blameless (accepted) in the presence of a Holy God. So it’s really not about religion or human acceptance or who inspires us or what works for me or how much I give to humanity–I get so weary of that. We want in our nature so much to feel like it’s about “me” and “my way” or this is what being a “Christian” means to me by getting off on ansillary trails of seeking people who accept us or identify with the way someone is living their life. That’s not the Gospel. We can’t be trusted. Only He is trustworthy.
We can serve only one Master..Jesus said himself that he is the only way, the only truth, the only life. I’m sorry but Buddism, Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others do not hold the Cross as the pivotal point in history…not matter how much we can learn from our fellow man. He is either our Savior or not and it’s all thanks to him. Holy Spirit initiated faith is the only part we have. What incredible undeserved mercy and grace he has shown to those for whom he has saved. We all choose hell and deserve hell and unthinkably in his Sovereignty he sends some to heaven. That is just crazy! Agape love…by the author of it! As a result and out of thanksgiving I want my life to make Him look glorious by living for Him with reckless abandon within his boundaries–by knowing and learning him more by being in the Word and living it our by serving Him through loving and serving of others.
I admire McLaren in some ways but I have read him and listened to him over the years and just like a fundemental legalist on the other end, I fear he could error on the opposite end of the extreme spectrum by not balancing “deed” with “creed”. I think he misses some huge opportunities not to stand up for the doctrines of the Gospel…if you have no doctrine, our Gospel way of life will turn into sentimentalism at best. We need a beautiful balance by loving the doctrine of the Scriptures but also living and loving and serving that out in real everyday life for sure.
Thoughts?
Jeff,
In response to your “thoughts?”, I mostly only have more questions =)
In fact I typed up a whole list of them, but then I thought that perhaps it would be more interesting to only ask a couple of them around a specific idea.
What do you mean when you say “we can’t be trusted”? Do you mean you don’t trust yourself? If so, how do you feel about not trusting yourself?
Everyone equal in our finiteness–our hearts are desperately wicked at best would you agree? There is zero good in us…only through the blood of Christ do we have the power to be good and do good things. Yes there is general good because of general grace available for all (i.e. the oxygen we breath is a shared general grace and you don’t necessarily have to have Christ in your life to help an elderly person across the street).
I’m not trusting in myself if and when things that seem “good” happen…it’s identifying that it’s all about Christ and keeping him high and exalted..if he uses me for good then I’m humbled.
Even if we are “Christians” we really haven’t “arrived” because we are still in this life a saint and a sinner. The Apostle Paul after doing some marvelous things for the Gospel still considered himself the chief of sinners. So can we really trust ourselves or do we trust and pray that God is in what we do. And if our hearts are transformed by the cross and we live broken and spilled out continually I’m trusting him to let him decide what is done for good? That’s the difference I see. I don’t want to trust me because I know where it can lead…it becomes about me.
It doesn’t matter how I “feel” about trusting myself because feelings come and go but his Truth remains…it’s a constant battle I fight with myself everday. Let me know your thoughts.
Jeff,
You asked “would you agree?”. I have to say I wouldn’t agree, and in fact in my story being taught that I was wicked and there was no good in me was very damaging to me.
So when you said “It doesn’t matter how I feel”, did you mean that you believe your emotions are unimportant?
Would you mind saying how you feel about not trusting yourself, even though you think it’s not important?
Ben, emotions are imortant…he gave us emotions…but at the end of the day…me by myself can’t be totally trusted and I am fine with that…Christ didn’t come to make us independent but to put our complete dependancy on Him so that we may truly live. Why would I need Christ? If he’s just an example of how to live then I would see why the pressures of digging deep in my own power would make this a really tough subject to deal with. But he’s not just our example…he’s our Savior.
Leaning on him completely is a lifelong sanctifying process…I believe Scripture when it says among other things we can experience the most satisfying and comforting Joy when he is in control and at the center of our lives.
Can you explain what happened and why you believe it wasn’t good for you to be told that we are naturally “wicked” and explain your take on trusting yourself?
Jeff,
what a delightully curious question! Thank you. =)
There’s a lot of stuff on my blog about bits and pieces of my story. Just so ya know.
I think for me what happened was that I was told I was wicked, and so I believed it. Growing up I was never taught how to take care of myself, how to be responsible for my own feelings and beliefs, how to be able to relate to other people safely–that is, knowing that I didn’t have to believe and feel what they believed and felt, and vice versa. I was told verbally and relationally that I didn’t deserve to be listened to, that my needs weren’t important, that my feelings were not real. Lots of really toxic stuff. All this came in the same context as being told I was wicked. What it led to was extremely high levels of self fear, self loathing, self hatred–what Dan Allender calls self contempt. Self contempt led to contempt toward others, and I mostly ended up alone in a rather dark place contempting myself and others, while more or less still seeming to function at some level, so that basically no one even knew I was in that dark place–in a sense even I didn’t know–I had never developed any place to stand where I could safely observe myself.
Wow–there’s a mouthful.
I trust myself a lot more than I used to, and am learning to trust myself more and more. By that I mean that I trust myself to provide for what I need, or to get the help I need if I can’t provide it, and to not be really mean to myself, but rather to be kind to myself. I trust that my best instincts are right and good, and that I can go with them, and I trust myself to be able to learn/change/grow if/when/as I need to. I am able to tell myself, now, “Benjamin, I’m here for you, and I’m going to take the best possible care of you, and you’re safe with me.”, and know from experience that I’m being truthful with myself when I say that.
Ben, I feel some of your pain. I grew up in a very fundamental Bible-thumping turn or burn church but as much as I have been disenchanted with that type of church over the years…It turned into a positive–by God’s Grace it never made me loathe myself or become overly bitter because many of those people meant well and a lot of what they said was dead-on but they got too caught up in Creed without Deed…that’s what balancing the Christian life is all about and what makes it messy and beautiful at the same time. Christ fills that void and still can…not me in my own power.
Last question…you say that you have de-converted from Christianity currently or you feel you are a still a Christian? We all need to remember that “Chrisianity” is not a religion like we talk about other religions of the world. Christianity (the word) is not found in the Bible…and it’s not a private thing where whatever is good for me is good for me and whatever works for you works for you. It’s a public love affair with our Savior and we should live it loud! So when you say “de-convert” I immediately thought NO it’s not a religion you can just decide to come and go…I firmly believe Christians can have doubts and struggle along the way but God cannot lose you out of his mighty hand. Either what he has done is insufficient or we were never his child in the first place. Only the God of the universe truly knows our hearts but what are your thoughts on that?
Jeff,
I do not currently call myself a Christian. I have no idea what people are talking about when they say that they love Jesus as a person presently alive and in relationship with them. That seems strange to me. I can see saying one wanted to follow the teachings of Jesus as recorded in the various gospels, although some of those are a bit strange too, it seems to me.
I’ve been realizing very recently that I can choose to believe anything. This has been very liberating for me. I don’t currently choose to believe much of anything at all about God. It’s not super important to me to believe stuff about God. I think people are way more interesting and real than God.
It’s interesting that you posit this either/or–either what God did was insufficient, or we were never his child in the first place. Often this days when I hear either/or statements, my immediate thought is “Well, I wonder what other possibilities there are which lie outside this position?”
I believed I was God’s child for a long time. I no longer believe that. It’s not so much that I don’t currently believe it–it’s more that I don’t understand it anymore–it just doesn’t make sense to me.
Thank you for asking really interesting questions. You rock.
Ben,
Hey brother…hope you don’t mind but in my times of questioning and doubt there’s nothing more that I would want than people praying for me…you may see no connection there or see it as anything special but why not have a hope that if God is real then let other’s pray on your behalf to make it become evident in your heart…what’s there to lose? God bless you
Jeff,
It feels like you really want me to believe that God is real. Am I hearing you correctly? Why do you want that?
My experience with people wanting to pray for me and telling me so is often that they wanted to change me in some way, and instead of just saying that they wished I would change in that way, they instead offered to pray for me. I’m not saying you are doing that. I’m just saying that I shy away a bit at offers of prayer because of that experience. Such offers feel like an unlistening, in a sense. I mean to say it seems to me that everyone has hopes/dreams/wishes/wants/needs/ways-in-which-they-want-to-change. Listening means to some extent beginning to get a sense about all that stuff. Offers to pray for that stuff because one has listened and found out what it was are different from offers to pray for someone regarding my own hopes/dreams/wants etc. regarding them. Does that make sense?
By which I mean to say that hoping God is real is not very high on my own radar. I can’t really see any reasons to hope for that. It doesn’t motivate me. Do you hope for it? Do you want to hope for it? If so, why?
There are so many good people in the world. I don’t single them out and decide whether or not to look to them as models based on their religion.
Kerry–that rocks! me neither =)
My pastor Rod Haleckey, The River Christian Church, Reno, NV–His preaching that challenges me weekly and in particular a series on social justice that finally made me see that my heart was breaking over injustice to the gay community.
Bill Hyatt, Austin TX, Director of Outreach to the homeless and is the man I love–I have never been near a more gently giant who gives till it hurts him and loves till it heals others.
Maria Caruana, pastor of Freedom in Christ Evangelical Church, SF-an openly gay church. She loves without any judgment and guide a hurting people back to a loving God. She is the sister I never had.
Michelle Morandi-Sacramento. She mentored me in the years of greatest challenge in a marriage with a bipolar man. She help me love him till God said it was time to let go–12 years later.
Justin Lee-founder and President of the online community of 11K gay Christians worldwide who has created a safe place for gay Christians to find the way back to God when a mostly condemning church has told them they cannot be both gay and Christian.
Doug Shaffer, pastor of White Rock Community Church in Dallas, TX who calls himself the “Clorax Man”. He is a recovered meth addict and living with HIV/AIDS and has over 900 people on his monthly rolls that get clothes (both sexes-many are trans), cleaning supplies so that they can stay healthy and dog and cat food, knowing that many only gt out of bed each day to tend to their pets. I have only felt this for one person–when I look in Doug’s face, I see Jesus.
Todd Ferrell, President of the The Evangelical Network a group of evangelical churches and supporters to the gay community. Todd, a gay man with an unmatched sense of God/wicked/social humor has included me in the many political/social justice/Biblical discussions btwn church and gay community. I heard the sides from the most intimate of levels.
My Mom, Roberta McCormack, Surprise AZ who got saved at 74 after mocking me for decades. She so completely changed that I know God never gives up.
and me, Kathy Baldock, REno, NV. I know who I am and what I have done and who I SHOULD be . He healed me and it is overwleming that someone could change so much.
Reno Nevada
Me—Kathy Baldock
I think the Apostle Paul put it well when he said “follow my example as I follow the example of Christ (1Corinthians11:1). Any other example is a very risky gamble. We as humans can not be like Christ by our own effort however the Holy Spirit works in us throughout our lives changing, pruning, and refining us to become more like Him. (Note: Only if we allow Him to and dont just resort to looking to other human’s standards so that we might find ourselves feeling comfortable in our continuing to stay in our sin). This lifelong process of being made holy by the work of the Holy Spirit is called sanctification. 1Peter1:13. You see a good example of before and after in Galations5:19-26. It’s weeding out sin and replacing it with Christlike attributes. Something we must as Christians desire and strive for. Read and I mean really read 1John. It’s a great test to see how healthy our “Christian” walk truly is. I praise God for the genuine Christians that He has put into my path that have shown what a person striving to live like Christ looks like.
Hi everyone. I am a long time Mission field friend of Pam Hogeweide. She has been a “godsent” from the very beginning of my de-convertion! I had lost touch with Pam after she left her work with the Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong in the mid 1980s, only to reconnect again via internet (Facebook) again 27 – 28 years later.
I said to my good friend a few years ago, who had then resigned his pastorship soon after reading “Pagan Christianity,” that I would have to renounce my faith to hopefully find it again somewhere, somehow. Then Pam showed up with her godmessedupmyreligion blog and asked me if I believed in hell. And over time introduced me to fellow aberrants, namely the likes of some of you here. I am so glad there is a growing number of sincere Off-the-wall spiritual writers, Jesus followers, philosophers out there. The pagans have been telling of a global paradigm shift in spirituality at end of the age of the Pisces, an age of chaos from the time of Christ to the new age of enlightenment. And now I am also seeing it happening in post Bush/Blair’s fundamentalist horse-shit in the West. I am thrilled!
The intellectuals insist that there is no God. I disagree. The problem for me has always been, how badly have we misrepresented Her ! Happy trails everybody!