Belief

Being a Christian is an interesting experience, for lack of a better word.  Interesting...difficult in unexpected ways, often counter-intuitive, confusing, yet at moments so clear.  I've felt all those things--the questioning, understanding--in a recurring pattern over the years, even while still believing in the basic Christian shebang and trying to "live it."  But I guess I never seriously noticed how unique (ah, there's the word) my place in the world is--as someone who has deeply-held beliefs--until I thought about it from the perspective of someone who doesn't share those beliefs.

If you think about it, the vast majority of the world disagrees with your beliefs, dear reader.  I mean, don't quote me on that, but it just seems to me that even though you can find them, you're more likely--probability-wise--to bump up against people who are not of one mind with you at the religious and philosophical level.  And, to me, that is the level of life that is the most real.  Belief, influenced by this, that, and the other, is the deepest part of a person.  And it is therefore the most personal and fragile.  Yet people see evidence of your belief every day, because it also happens to be the strongest influence on a person's character and actions.  Whether you realize it or not.

Admittedly, my beliefs typically sit comfortably and out of the way on the back burner, in a file cabinet in some corner of my mind.  Life has the potential of getting a little messy when they're brought up to the front.  But what happens when they are dredged up?  I like sharing my beliefs, despite the fact that they are so personal and thinking hard about them frequently launches me into perplexity.  The truth is, I hate the thought that I could turn into a close-minded, brainwashed, ultra-religious busybody, so I use my own and other people's tough questions to force me to test my beliefs and the actions that stem from them.  I mean, if we're ultimately searching for the Truth rather than support for some pet religion, that serious testing and sharpening can only get us closer to it.  Difficult questions are disconcerting but necessary.  That being said, if you ever want to challenge to something I believe or do, dear reader, please do not hold back.  (If you're a Bible-reader, glance at Proverbs 27:17.)  [A small note on Truth: I suppose that the existence of only one Truth is a belief in itself.  I'd address this more in depth, except for the fact that it's ridiculously difficult to do any kind of philosophizing following the assumption that Truth is relative.  Here's an excellent example of a hole in my beliefs--meaning that I believe something that I can't necessarily explain.]

Living in this way--which results in flux of belief and more often in flux of how to reconcile belief and action--gives me a singular position and perspective.  As an academically-minded human being, I sift through the theologies and philosophies of my friends, church leaders, professors, the Bible itself, and anything else I can get from God himself.  More intuition0based people look at experiences of life and heart.  And because I'm on my own trajectory, doing everything I can to find what's really good and real and how I should live after knowing that--well, I'm unique.  I'm unique because (moment of obvious truth) no one has experienced quite what I have.  And the same is true for you, dear reader (I hope you saw that coming).  It's sort of unnerving to be on your own like that, but that's life.  I mean, it's impossible to really know someone else's mind, so we have to make up our own minds.  And besides, isn't it pretty shallow to believe something just because someone else does and you don't want to be alone?  (Aha!  Another tenet of mine, one that stems from my belief in the value of YOU as an individual who can think for yourself.  If you believe that, you've got to believe in the above idea, too.)

The point of all this is, it's one of the very healthy things in life to know what you believe and why you believe, and what makes you act and think the way you do.  At any rate, I hope for me and for you that, in the midst of all the crazy and equally sane beliefs out there, we all get closer to knowing what's really real, whatever that may be, and have the guts to stick up for our own beliefs and actions.

In case you're wondering, my recent deep-thinking reflections (if my blog serves as any indication of my thoughts--don't worry, though, I'm sure I'll snap out of it soon) have been influenced by several recent theological discussions as well as reading the book Blue Like Jazz (most of which I strongly agree and identify with) and articles in the magazine Relevant, including this one I looked at today.