(This is the second part in a series. Click the links to read the rest of the series: One – Going Back to the Beginning, Three – The Wrong God, Four – Stepping Stones and a Crossroads, Five – Of Simmering, Resting, and Labels, Six – He Is Not a Tame Lion, and Seven – Letters to the Wounded from the Wounded.)
The rodeo cowgirl enters the ring, levitating between two horses gliding around the ring. Her left foot in the left horse’s right stirrup and right foot in the right horse’s left stirrup, at full gallop, somehow she leaps…the audience holds their breath… and lands, one foot on each horse’s back. The horses’ feet pump in perfect rhythm, backs rising and falling in sync with one another, as the acrobat stands, perfectly balanced..
As I have written previously, after throwing everything in my faith out and starting over, I eventually settled in my mind that a Divine Being, a Prime Mover, a First Cause is the best explanation for the origin, beauty, and function of the world and the universe around it.
But once there, I discovered I had a long way to go to get to the God of the Bible.
I’m stuck between two horses,one foot in the stirrup of each. But I’m no cowgirl. And these horses run at different paces and sometimes in different directions. I’m clinging tightly to anything I can grab hold of, stretched to the breaking point at times, sometimes dangling upside down choking on dust with my head dangerously close to the dirt.
One horse is the comfortable religious faith and practice I’ve always found myself in, and in which our family is now: reformed, Calvinist-ish, full confidence in the Bible as inspired by God, etc. This horse is mostly predictable, but not completely.
And one horse is the uncomfortable not knowing anything for sure beyond the existence of God. It is wild at one moment and almost still the next.
I ride them both, waiting for enough something to guide me to commit to one horse or the other. Or maybe to another mount altogether.
How do you learn about a Divine Being, exactly? I am convinced a Prime Mover or a First Cause exists, but is he/she/it knowable?
I can deduce a few things by observation. This being can create and design intricate systems from beyond the largest scale we can imagine down to a smaller scale than we can imagine. A universe and a virus — what complex and fascinating things!
This being loves beauty. And sees beauty in variety, not in sameness. Why else would we see hundreds or thousands of varieties of tree, flower, animal, and persons?
But that kind of being, while intimately acquainted with everything, seems rather too large and truly awesome to actually know.
So how can so many people seem to know God? How do they know they know God, the real and true Divine Being, not one of their own imagination?
So, I’ve placed my foot in the stirrup of this horse of not knowing but searching for answers to the question, “What do we know about God, and how do we know it?” I have read spiritual memoirs, talked with friends of many spiritual stripes, studied theologies, studied criticisms of those theologies, and tried to sift through the myriad interpretations and personifications of the divine.
Some are beautiful. Some are bizarre. Some are approachable. Some are frightening.
But I have not yet found for myself the quiet confidence I admire in so many.
At the same time, my other foot is firmly fastened into the other horse’s stirrup. I am a wife and mother in a practicing Christian (Protestant) family. When all this started, my husband was a leader in our church, and we both had many responsibilities. Having a Type A (uber-responsible) personality, I couldn’t possibly walk away from that and leave people hanging. And I couldn’t tell anyone.
Today, we attend a new church, and I don’t feel so much pressure to hide behind a mask of complete confidence. I’m listening, asking questions, talking to women who I respect.
But my kids are also listening, asking questions, and watching. I often hear myself answering questions the way I’m supposed to but without confidence in the answers. Some day, maybe already, they will hear that.
It really does feel like I’m in a rodeo. I’m riding two horses that sometimes try to head in two very different directions. I’m trying to avoid being thrown, trampled, breaking my neck, while looking for the stepping stones, the missing links between a Divine Being I don’t know much about and a God who revealed himself in the Bible. I hope it exists. I think I have pieces of it… but not enough to hold together on their own yet.
Have you found the stepping stones? How did you do it?
Available for RSS readers and email
We've shared e-mails about this, Joy. Read some of the same books together. I still struggle with many of the same questions and issues myself. For personal reasons, I'm posting anonymously…
I think part of my struggle is the lack of seeing the miraculous in my life. Having been raised in a Christian heritage that ignored and suppressed the Holy Spirit, there were no miracles, no on-our-faces-crying-out-to-God church experiences. Instead there was rote memorization and rote behaviors and rote answers and rote church attendance, which led to living life in a nice rote spiritual rut.
I grew up in a Christian home and have been a Christian since I was very young. My husband became a Christian as a young adult after living a very wayward life. His faith struggles and doubts have been different from mine because he can always come back to, "Who changed my life?" He can't attribute the very dramatic change–change that he was resisting–to Anyone but God. I don't have that, having always been a good Christian girl. It makes it harder for me to see God active in my own life.
I guess I am at a point where I rely somewhat on the faith of my friends–people who HAVE seen the miraculous, whether in changed lives or miraculous healings or being filled with the Spirit. Their faith and confidence in God–the intimacy with which they seem to know Him–makes me want the same thing and keeps me from abandoning the rote…
It's hard to have a real genuine faith without a step of action that accompanies it. Faith without works is "dead."
And without faith, how can anyone ever know God? How do they learn the "Provider" aspect of the God of the Bible if they can always fall back on a credit card? How can they learn the goodness of God if they're afraid to submit to the suffering that might bring about good in their life? Etc.
I think so much of Christianity today is affected by the surrounding culture that desperately seeks to avoid discomfort and pain. I've never met anyone who wanted to hurt (myself definitely included!) But whenever I've attempted to creep out from under the bed to try to make a tiny step of faith (tiny steps being all that my present maturity allows!), my faith does grow- a faith that concludes that the God of the Bible CAN be known in life.
Dear Joy,
I was encouraged to see you reading and memorizing the Word again. How is it going?
You asked about finding stepping stones. Faith requires the Word of God – it comes by hearing (or, reading with understanding and humility). This you know. I wonder if the second horse would not seem so energetic if the first horse were better fed. Please do not be angry with me for suggesting that. It just that some of what you have read during this dark period has not been faith building and I think you know that also. From some of your reviews I'd say you are wise enough to have seen the answerlessness of some of those writers. Keep reading the Word and thinking about what you are reading. That is one certain stepping stone. The examples of other saints (think those Piper books we gave you) can be another stepping stone.
The girl taking the ride may need to learn some new riding skills as well. It will take some time and there may be some spills. Your Mom and I have ridden some rough trails, and spent more than a few nights in the deep. I'd say more but not in a public forum. Riding along side of you this last year has been one of those paths. You may not have seen us, but we were there. Still are in fact. If you'd like to talk, we'd like to listen.
Praying for the health of your soul has been very difficult while we've watched you go to the edge of the cliff and pull back in the nick of time.
Spend some time with us and share your thoughts and fears and even your anger at God. Maybe we can find a few more stepping stones in time. Sometimes we see the stone in front of us, but we want a different one than the one provided. I do believe God is serious when he makes us pass through the fire and the flood. I believe the words in Psalms 146 and 147 are true, and they may bring some comfort in the long view.
Love,
Dad for us both