I like the words one nearby church uses to describe the Bible: “the very Word of God to man through men.” As God walked with believers through the ages, these believers told their stories of God’s impact on their lives, and we have their stories, written down and translated into our language, in our Bibles. However, God is still walking with believers, and God is still speaking to us and urging us to listen with our hearts and minds. So don’t be confused, my fellow faith walkers: God’s Word includes the words that God has given and is still giving to us now. When we read the Bible in the way God intends, we are opening ourselves to accept what God is saying uniquely to each one of us now.
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God is Love
I believe God is pure love, the kind described by the Greek word agape, meaning an unconditional, selfless dedication to what is best for the one who is loved. This kind of love is not merely a feeling, but an intentional commitment. I believe that I am a recipient of God’s love, as are you. I believe this because when I have sensed God’s presence, I have sensed a love for me that urged me to be better and be more of who God sees that I can be. I have read and heard from many others about their experiences with God, and I hear the same descriptions of God’s love, so I am encouraged that what I have felt is not my wishful thinking but God’s care shown for me.
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God Is BIG!
One of the fundamentals of my faith is that God is much bigger than any of us can imagine. By thinking of God as unimaginably huge, I discover a healthy humility about myself, a sense of the impermanence for our earthly journey, and a justification for an immense faith in God.
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Why I Believe in God
Photo by Ash Amplifies on Unsplash I believe in God because I have experienced God in my life. Full stop.
I’ve found encouragement for this simple answer about this foundation of my faith in the story of a blind man in John 9. When challenged by the religious leaders about Jesus, this man gave an irrefutable response: “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”
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Hi.
I’ve been writing meditations based on Bible passages for many years, but I’m sensing that I need to do something different now. What Iintend to do on this blog site is talk about what I believe, why I believe it, and why I have dismissed a swirling tempest of others’ beliefs I have heard or been taught over the years. Unlike my earlier meditations, my intent is not to give you carefully crafted instruction, but instead be open with my thoughts, questions, and doubts, so that we together might share our faith walk.
There are many social media accounts discussing “deconstruction,” and I feel it is important to encourage anyone who is sharing their faith journeys, particularly those trying to shed damage they feel in their lives by hurtful instruction. I don’t consider myself a “deconstructionist” because I haven’t experienced the kind of faith-shattering shock and ugly break-up with the church that has led others to deconstruct their faith. However, I’ve been a long-time cynic of weak, compromising study materials that maintain convenient beliefs at the expense of what God has called us to do. I’ve been blessed with a strong cynical nature, and while this has gotten me in trouble with others many times, my cynicism has served me well in clarifying foolish thoughts and pushing back against wayward beliefs and harmful practices. If that makes me a “deconstructionist” to you, I’ll wear that label.
On this site, I’ll not spend so much time on “wrong” beliefs and focus more on what I do believe. Let me be very clear from this first post: I have no objections to people believing differently than I do. As complicated as each individual person is, I would be foolish to think we can all be shoved into the same doctrinal mold. Of even greater significance to me is how insulting we are to our infinitely gigantic Creator to think that all of us observe God in the same way. (But I need to stop now because I want that topic to be the focus of my next post!)
So, thank you for hanging around all the way to the end of my introductory post, and thank you for joining me on our faith walk!
JM