Why believe?

Posted on April 12, 2010 by elizabeth

"And then I found I could not reject God. I could not. I cannot explain this. One discovers one cannot move a boulder by trying with all one's strength to do it. I discovered–without any sudden influx of love or faith–that I could not reject Christianity. Why I don't know. There it was. I could not. That was an end to it."                                                  –Sheldon Vanauken, A Severe Mercy

"I've never really had the crisis of faith you've had in these last few years," my husband remarked recently. "I never doubted I was saved or that God loved me. But then again, I wasn't raised how you were."

Perhaps that's why belief is such a struggle for me. I was raised from birth in an abusive fundamentalist church. He joined as a believing adult. His faith was a pre-existing condition. Mine wasn't.

He didn't have a lot to undo when we left. I had everything to undo.

And then I've had to rebuild.IMG_0065  

The result is not very pretty. In fact, it's really sorta a mess.

I don't make for a good Christian, see. I cuss. I gripe about having to go to church. I fail. I end up in the confessional, choking on my pride, barely able to admit to those failures. I hedge those mea culpas with rationalizations. I despise tithing.

Most days I don't even know why I believe. I've tried rejecting God and walking away from Christianity. But I can't. It's just there–an ever fixed mark.

God is stitched into the very fabric of my DNA. I believe because I can't not believe. 

This frustrates me. I would like to be master of my own fate, Captain of my destiny. And yet, that strikes me as a peculiarly narcissistic endeavor. I can scarcely control my own self, let alone the forces outside myself.

Still, belief doesn't come easily. I'm afraid it might always be this way. And what a ridiculously meager offering to give back to God. I am not exactly the most cheerful giver. My offerings of praise are fraught with caveats and complications, wrenched from cloying fingertips.

Ichabod, the glory has departed. I am lukewarm.

I can only imagine having my husband's constancy, his fortitude of faith. The storms and trials of life beat down on him and he just digs in deeper, shoulders the load and presses onward, believing. Singing, even!

Meanwhile, I flail and flounder, collapse and resurrect. "Am I tiresome?" I ask. After all, I'm tiresome to myself.

"No," he says. "I just want you to have sustainable expectations for yourself. Don't overdo it."

Maybe that's where I need to start. I overdo almost everything.

Maybe my ugly, lukewarm offering is enough. For now.

This entry was posted in Liturgy & Sacrament, RecoveringEvangelicalsAnonymous, RecoveringFundamentalist, Religion. Bookmark the permalink.
  • http://www.updatemystatus.blogspot.com Mama Bean

    I also cannot not believe. It was wonderful to read your words and know I am not alone. My only comfort, when I let myself feel it, is that even the faith of a mustard seed can move mountains. Or something like that :) Anyway, I think God honours the faith we have. I think he honours it extravagantly.

  • http://thejcrew-kj.blogspot.com/ kathy

    I to cannot not believe. I feel so jaded though. You articulated many of my own feelings and struggles. Thank you for sharing. Some days I still feel on auto-pilot.

    I sit..a lukewarm sister tonight.

    Laughing at the tithing comment. Me too girl. Me. too.

  • Rachel

    Oh, yes. I totally know what you’re talking about! In the Orthodox church, this past Sunday was the Sunday of St. Thomas, who I always think of as my guy in the apostles. Sort of grumpy, but he never gave up.

    I’ve always struggled with faith. Maybe the struggle is another kind of faith?

  • Rachel

    I love that your husband said “don’t overdo it.” Sound like the kind of thing my husband would say to me. I, too, overdo almost everything, overcommit, back-pedal, feel so free, then sit with this kind of worrying space in my life which I fill with over-doing etc…

    It’s so refreshing to read your blog! I love it.

  • http://thefrahmfam.blogspot.com april

    I find a lot of comfort in the words of Jeremiah, who basically told God off one day and wanted to quit but ended up saying your word is a fire in my bones and I can’t leave even if I wanted to. Also, Gideon basically asked God why should I do this for you when you have been absent for the last so and so years. God is faithful to those who seek, even when we are lukewarm, it is a greater testimony to those who struggle to know that we aren’t supposed to be Jesus, we are supposed to follow him. Taking up the cross is heavy and burdensome and sometimes we want to put it down. In Hebrews it says God is the author and finisher of our Faith. He promises not to start something and not finish it. I believe you do have faith, and a strong one, it is just buried beneath hurt and expectations right now, God is chipping it away, one hurt at a time. By the way, I love your honesty and love your blog. Thanks for sharing.

  • http://ifmeadowsspeak.blogspot.com/ Tammy@If Meadows Speak….

    Elizabeth, He doesn’t want all those things you mentioned. He just wants your heart! It’s not about how good you can be, or how feverent you feel something, just give Him, you, with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind. Leave the other stuff to Him. It’s not the doing, but the giving of us, our total hearts in His hand. Simple really, with a big dose of trust. Keep looking for Him and He’ll get you there. To a place of trusting and healing those broken places from your fundamental background.

  • Kat

    I came out of an abusive church, and I can’t tell you how many times I have dearly wished that I could be an atheist. Or a Buddhist, or a Wiccan. I believe even though I find mostly pain in believing. There is nothing about God that isn’t barbed wire to me, but I hold on anyway. It’s horrible.

  • http://livingonpeanutbutter.blogspot.com Tylaine

    I just found your blog about a few days ago and I absolutely love it! This post was just beautiful….so from the heart…I love that. And I can so relate to how you feel. Wonderful blog….I’m glad I found it!

  • http://www.constantrecourse.com jessica mell

    <3

    [thinking about what a wise mercy to have you and your husband complement each other so. can see Jesus in the midst!]

  • http://www.constantrecourse.com jessica mell

    also…i’m compelled to check out that book you quoted! thanks.

  • Cheryl

    I have a question for you…not a hands on my hips, demanding, “just try to answer THIS one, will you!!” type of question; but a sincere, “I don’t get it” inquiry:

    You mentioned being in a confessional. I’ve never had the guts to ask my real life Catholic friends this question, so I’ll ask you…How does the Catholic church handle the verse, “There is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus?” (I Timothy 2:5). Where does confession to a priest (as opposed to directly confessing our sins to God) fit into that?

  • Gabriel

    God is wonderful to us even when we don’t deserve it. I think that God looks at us with mercy when He sees us struggling this hard. It is a real, deep and unrelenting struggle to know in our deepest soul that God is real but we want to let it go. Not because we don’t love Him but because I think that we feel so worthless and can’t see the mountain because we are buried beneath the soil. God is real though, I can’t deny that. Last year when I was in a very dark place I sat in a parking lot and told God I was going to kill myself. I needed to know that He loved me and accepted me where I was at. A couple hours later I got a call from a women I had not spoken to in a long time. She said that she felt God telling her to call. The beauty of that call, the message directly from God saved my life. I still struggle but I believe this struggle that some of us go through will be for Gods’ good in the future. I also think that God wants us to struggle in our faith for Him because it grounds us. It does us no good to not be tested because in the last moments of our lives our pseudo faith means nothing – it is real faith that saves us. This struggle that we have though, that means a lot. God is not letting us go and He is screaming that the devil can’t have us. That means the world to me. This journey is all about God and what Jesus done on the cross but it helps when we see that God loves us so much that even in our deepest pain He will NOT LET US GO. God is so very good. My mind can not comprehend it.

  • http://papuagirlindallas.blogspot.com/ Kacie

    I agree. People ask me why I believe, and I can give reasons, but even when I’ve really struggling with those reasons, I still believe. I would like to think it was built into me, but it could also be what my agnostic friends say… I was simply raised with it.

    Reading Van Auken brought me to tears at a very angry point in my spiritual life. Not the romance, though that was teary at parts too. The conversion. Hearing the honest story of someone who did not believe and then did…. that tore at my doubting heart in a very poignant way.

  • Gail Brightbill

    Your “ugly, lukewarm offering is enough.” There is great peace in that. Christ loved us while we were yet sinners and chose us, not because of our offerings, but because of His love. Salvation isn’t about you/us; it’s about Jesus Christ and his death, burial and resurrection. A book that freed me from the doubts about my salvation is “All of Grace,” a short compilation of sermons by Spurgeon. Faith is the conduit through which God pours his grace and even that faith we have is His gift to us. It doesn’t depend on us! It depends on him and he’s done it all! G

  • http://theweitzels.wordpress.com Erin

    You quoted one of my most favorite books. “A Severe Mercy” has moved me many times.

    “My offerings of praise are fraught with caveats and complications, wrenched from cloying fingertips.” Yes. Yes.

  • http://thewilcoxes.blogspot.com/ Cara

    Whether I feel it or not, the offering that I bring God each day is ugly and lukewarm, as you say. Only in Jesus is it made beautiful. Ever. No matter how good I might feel about it.

    I think I begin to understand dimly that God is as honored by the honest struggles of some–the foot-dragger, the soldier who gets lost on the march but at least has the courage to admit he is lost–as by the unflagging cheerfulness of others. Don’t get me wrong; I know that joy and cheerfulness and steadfast faith are gifts from God and greatly glorifying to Him. But at times when we seem to lack these gifts, we are still in Christ, hidden and loved and made pure. And kept from running away. Thank God, because I know if He did not keep me, I would leave Him.

    I respect you so much for your openness. It continues to provoke me.

  • http://www.suburbansaga.blogspot.com Ellen

    Hey! I remember you commented on my blog many moons ago, but I didn’t find you again until recently. And how I can relate… I grew up in a wonderful, loving, pretty balanced Christian home. I was zealous for God all through high school and college and beyond. But then God hit me with infertility and miscarriage… and my faith hasn’t been the same since, and that was about 4 years ago. I am very tired of the struggle, and I want to quiet those little doubting voices that come to me against my will. But it’s hard. And I get so angry and want to go back to the days when I just trusted automatically and it was easy. I get really frustrated that my faith wasn’t the strong thing I thought it was, and I see so clearly how weak it really was all those years. And I worry that I’m going to have a pathetic, lousy heritage to pass on my kids, and I’ll fail them with my doubts. But… I’ve never been more humble. At least there’s one up side, huh? Hang in there… and thanks for sharing. You’re not alone.

  • Maggie Dee

    I wanted to walk away from God too. But I could never quite do it.

    I know it’s hard not to be super hard on ourselves when we’ve been raised with a fundie twist. But I think your husband is right to tell you not to overdue it. We wouldn’t expect someone in a body cast to get up and walk in a day. Emotional healing takes time. Give yourself permission to heal. It’s OK to be mad at God. (He already knows you’re pissed off anyway.)God loves YOU. All of you, not just the pretty parts we show the world but all of you, the brokeness, the heartache,the doubts, the fears,all of you. People will fail us time and time again. But God’s steadfast love is neverending.

    For years I felt like the woman in the Bible who knew if she could just touch Jesus’ garment she would be healed. I wanted so much to touch his garment and be healed but he seemed like he was just one step too far away and I just couldn’t catch up to him. Well, it took a long time but I finally caught up. And what I realized is that he was there all along but I just couldn’t see him through my cloud of pain. Healing will come. It will come.

  • http://colleenspiro.blogspot.com colleen

    Beautiful post.
    St Therese said that a small thimble that is full of water and a large bucket that is full of water are both full. One is not fuller than another.
    If you are giving all you can give right now, it may seem meager to you, but to the Lord it is a full offering! Like the widow’s mite. She gave all she had. Seems to me like you give all you have.
    God bless.

  • http://shadowspring-lovelearningliberty.blogspot.com/ shadowspring

    Ack! I LOVE YOU Elizabeth Esther! You are so not alone.

    AS a member of The Fellowship of Cussing Luterhans (a facebook page started by a fellow from our congregation) I am right there with you in many ways.

    I am loving the writing of Gregory Boyd right now, Christus Victor view of the atonement, open view of the future. It restores my faith in a loving God, inspires my prayers because God really does love and it really does matter to him what I have to say, makes sense out of the Bible in a way no other theological view has done before (and trust me I have been studying theology a long time). Skip over to his website http://www.gregboyd.org/ and see if it does anything good for you.

    Like you, even though I have often found religion very frustrating, dissatisfying, and even excruciatingly, painfully messed up sometimes, I really do love God!

    Sort of like the line from that gay cowboy movie “I just can’t quit you.” LOL I just can’t let Jesus go.

    (Now that comment no doubt set off some religious alarms somewhere! =)

  • deb

    This actually brought tears to my eyes. I am a Catholic Christian and I struggle constantly with my faith. I can’t not believe, but I constantly try to find way to do just that. My faith is paltry at best, but I won’t give up. Sometimes I’m afraid I will though. I’m afraid I will just quit. I overthink everything and I just want to be one of those people who just believes and does it well and without all the questioning. I love your blog.

  • Michelle Hart

    I thank God for this blog and being able to read your words and know that there are others out there who struggle just like I do.

  • Pat

    so well said, so well said.

  • http://profile.typepad.com/ricardosilva Ricardo Silva

    This is only a thought, a question to yourself:
    Aren’t you exhausted simply because you can’t do it alone? Because you are trying to rebuild through your own effort?

    Perhaps one of the most difficult things about rebuilding your faith is rebuilding the communitary aspect of your faith. Given your past with an “abusive cult” (your own words), I imagine you might be tempted to escape the influence of the community.
    But God calls us not as individuals, but as people, each of us has a unique and individual relationship with God, but we all depend on each other during this earthly pilgrimage of ours.

    So, who is your community now?

  • http://profile.typepad.com/ricardosilva Ricardo Silva

    Just a few afterthoughts…

    I apologise if I will be annoying.

    a)

    It is not about you. It is not about you. It is not about you.
    Why do you want to be a glorious, excellent worshipper? Vanity? Pride?
    Faith’s first movement is from God. Your first main role is to receive. To let yourself remain in His presence. To receive His love. To accept to remain in His presence until you can start seeing yourself through His eyes. Everything else about you is ephemeral and transitory: your deep identity is to be a beloved daughter of God. And this bit is pure grace, there is nothing you can do but receive.
    After that, once you are filled, there can be an overflow of joy and faith and love and peace from yourself towards God and towards those around you.
    And a sense of the magnitude of what is at stake: that the whole world is a huge battlefield, where in the inside of billions of souls a fight is going on, with consequences for eternity. Happening right now and here, in the midst of our daily realities.
    And after a while you realize that the only really important thing is whether you and I and everybody else will get to spend eternity in an immense joy, or in an immense despair.
    And you may find joy then, as you realize that the meaning of “Thy will be done” is “May every single person on earth spend eternity in a never-ending happiness”. Starting today in your street.
    And you will know it is not about you. It is about the whole world. And you will not stop to judge whether your offer is “ridiculously meager” or not. You will offer yourself, as you are, because that is what you can offer, and that is what God wants.

    b)

    Do you know it is ok to be mad at God?
    (otherwise how could you ever be His friend?)

    c)

    What has cussing to do with anything else? You should read some of St. Thomas More’s apologetics. :-)

  • Alysa

    Dear Esther, that fixed mark that is just there, that won’t let you walk away from God, away from Christianity?

    That’s not you. That’s God. Because He loves you, He won’t let you go.

    Look up the song, “Mercy Said No.” And be blessed :)

  • http://www.walkingtochina.blogspot.com Sandy Fox

    Wholeness is about owning your brokenness! I think you are remarkably whole and that God is pleased with your broken offerings!

  • http://www.smoochagator.com Smoochagator

    Man, can I relate. I have no choice but to believe. Christianity is something I cannot shake. Sometimes I’m grateful for that, other times… NOT SO MUCH.

  • http://www.joyinthisjourney.com Joy

    It’s like you’re my twin or something. Maybe I’ll just redirect my blog to yours and say “Here! Read this!”

    Praying for you today. “Please God, let it just be fat.”

  • http://heart-and-home.net Ashleigh (Heart and Home)

    You and Matt are me and John. Exactly. I love you… love your heart that mirrors my own. And I so long for a good long talk. June can’t come fast enough.

  • http://lauriemo.blogspot.com laurie

    Funny I should read this today, the day I told my husband, “I wish I could just pull a William Lobdell and turn my back on the whole thing…but I can’t. I can’t not be a Christian. I can’t not hope in the Gospel. But that’s the only thing Christian about me.”

    If the Gospel is true, then that should be enough. But, in church I get the strong sense that it’s not enough. Though I don’t live a lifestyle which would invoke church discipline – not even close – I’m never “Christian” enough for those around me. Oh how I long to be able to say, “We are saved by grace alone, not by works” without the person I’m speaking to immediately saying, “Yes, but….”

  • http://turquoisegates.blogspot.com Genevieve Thul

    Yes, yes, yes. Also raised in a fundamentalist church (are there any that AREN’T abusive??). And experience this dichotomy of experience with husband and friends and even some family.