Once upon a time in a place far far away from where I now reside, and in a steepled church of such magnificance, I learned what WAS and what WAS NOT as it applies to Christianity. I was a good student. I was an obedient servant. Therefore I rose from once who experienced salvation at 17, the role of a deacon at 21, and a trustee at 23. But!
I moved from the North to the South (same nation of course) and found that there were "differences" in my denominational ilk even though only the adjective in front of the denomination changed. I discovered that not everyone was a post tribulation convert. Not everyone believed the rapture would happen soon, and very soon. Worst of all, not everyone thought that the King James version of the Bible was the best one.
And that"s just the beginning as I sought intellectual honesty in my beliefs.
I slowly began to lose my CERTITUDE on so many things, but in the process I found Jesus, who"s last name was not Christ. You can read forever on this web site and a couple dozen others of the many things that I"ve lost- and found. I found Godly men and women who held differing views than mine and they were far more Christ-like than I. How could I reconcile all this? My JUDGMENTS needed to be re-evaluated.
As Richard Rohr wrote, "When we lead off with our judgments, love will seldom happen. If the mind that needs to make moral judgements about everything is the master instead of the servant, religion is almost always corrupted. Some would think that is the whole meaning of Christianity, to be able to decide who"s going to heaven and who isn"t. This is much more a search for control than it is a search for truth, love or God."
Would that he wasn"t right on, but I"m afraid he is.
This of course flies in the face of an addage that I grew up with which says, "Tell me your certainties, I have enough doubts of my own." But in reality they aren"t that separate. It"s just that I have fewer certainties whereas I used to think I "knew-it-all". Silly me!
So many religious traps!
But, just knowing that GOD IS LOVE sure can replace a lot of things that I thought I used to know that I"ve really no need for. My ego loved to speak of that which I knew, but my heart does such a better job of telling people of my experiences with God. And after all, a person with an experience is never at the mercy of a person with an intellectual and dogmatic argument.
I"ll take spiritual experiences over religious doctrines any day!