Extreme Faith is Dangerous

I never thought I'd be this guy.  To proclaim my faith publicly to anyone who will listen.  Well, I am and that is a miracle.

Beyond the miracle of my faith, I have experienced other miracles, too numerous to recount.  If you ever talk to me about them, I will be so animated that it will be hard to shut me up and if you want to hear the full story it will be a very long conversation.  I will talk about my faith with anyone who will listen, I just need to find listeners!  With all my enthusiasm, I always find it strange that I notice some doubt in the listener or at a minimum a lack of enthusiasm as I’m presenting “proof” of our salvation and giving the answer to attaining it in formulaic form!  Just have faith!  You can stop reading now!  

If you didn’t stop reading, why isn’t it that simple?  Because we want tangible proof, we need to see water turn into wine!  Maybe more than once!  When we see it, when we get the proof, the first thing we do is to come up with a non-spiritual explanation for it, that is what it is to be human.  To be human is to have an explanation for everything, understand it completely, prove it, disprove it, control it, and judge it.  Or at least know that someone has found an explanation or will find one at some point.  That way, we can then rest in the idea that everything is explainable, that nothing is outside of our control.  That little voice in our head telling us not to believe, that is our ego.  I love talking about the unexplainable in my first-hand experiences, but it is often met with at least a tinge of doubt.  I understand this, I do it too when listening to others who share the unexplainable that invariably comes when we walk with Christ.  I just don't like it when people doubt me!  When I'm talking about stuff outside the realm of human understanding you must believe, because it is coming from me!  It is funny when I write it, but it is so hypocritical.  Our egos, the source of sin, simply cannot accept this lack of control.  The ego cannot accept this failure to understand everything in our world around us.

I suppose this may be why I have found it impossible to talk non-believers into action by making logical arguments.  Which to be honest don’t go over very well.  Trials and tribulations aren’t really the best selling point.  However, we must choose our faith as it is clear to me that God never forces us into it.  That said, I know from experience as a previous non-believer, if the door to Christianity is cracked open ever so slightly, God will make his presence known and this is the ego's biggest fear.  I’m guessing this is why many people won't even objectively entertain examining the possibility that Christianity holds some truths for them.  To be clear, what I’m referring to is simply looking into what it means to be a Christian it even if the goal is to prove that it is folly.  Why?  What is this about?  The ego knows that it will lose any battle with the creator if this quest is undertaken in earnest.  The ego also knows that there is no going back once touched by God and that is scary.  Being able to reset, start over, get another chance is fundamental to almost everything we do.  Ironically, that is the chance given to us when we find God later in life.  However, this doesn't mean that people aren't tricked into leaving their faith, but that is far tougher than just maintaining a safe distance from the ego's point-of-view.  Hearts do harden, I’ve seen it firsthand.

The argument goes like this: If you are not a Christian, what is the downside of proving to yourself (and others) that it isn't for you?  Why not just take an objective examination of what it means to be Christian?  Why not reexamine what is contained in the Bible?  Document it, refute it, demonstrate you are correct in your belief around what it really is, regardless.  That’s what I set out to do as a non-believer 14 years ago.  I was going to prove my hypothesis by studying Christianity and other religions to find holes in the logical fabric underpinning them.  I knew I would find them…. I say study, but what I really was going to do is just some casual reading and go to church a few times, but I was confident, that would be plenty to prove my point.  It seems so simple, so easy to do, the challenge even seemed fun to me at the time.  But the ego is a cunning control freak and this is risky to its comfortable, controlling existence.  You see the ego is very insecure, so even an outside chance that it could be wrong is too dangerous.  This is ironic, because what bigger ego boost can there be than proving that 30% of the world is wrong in choosing Christianity?  This is where the confusion comes in.  Why don’t more non-believers entertain such a project?  I’m guessing it is fear of what might be found.  I have heard multiple reasons, but the most common one I hear is, “I have already done that, and it isn’t for me.”  My retort is that then you haven’t already done it and that is a universal truth.  Truthfully, if you are in this camp of “already have done that”, then ask in your heart when the last time you truly prayed.  I mean, actually spent time with God?  Even if you don’t open your heart up, tell him that and why.  Tell him you don’t believe in him, meditate on how much you don’t believe in him or even say it to him as many times as you need and then ask for him to show up in your life.  I don’t know, I’m no expert on proper prayer technique, but what I do know is that if you ask him to show up, he does.  Try it, trust me.  This is how I was caught by Christ so I want to pass it along.  Remember my goal was going to disprove that Christianity.  To show that like other religions, is just an elaborate long-term human-created optimization project designed to invent a way to extend our mortal selves.

I was so convinced; but I guarantee you that my ego would like another shot to keep me away from this supposed exercise in futility!  My poor ego today, it is the perpetual punching bag of my prayers….  My belief was something like this: As animals we inherently don’t want to die.  We have a survival instinct.  But animals do not have our ability to formulate plans, to think critically, etc.  In a brilliant bit of innovation, the human mind invented religion, including Christianity to garner solace in an afterlife.  That way, we don’t just die, and it all goes black.  Humans are smart, we figured out a plan to just get on with our lives, because what does it matter if our conscience goes black anyway?  We cease to exist, so why not make up something to bring meaning to our lives instead of living a life of meaningless desperation.  It is tough to constructively march on if our lives are pointless.  We aren’t just animals after all.  So I thought.  The problem that I didn't understand, or should I say my ego didn't understand is how dangerous it is for the ego (dangerous to its existence) to come up with "evidence" of this or some other theory around Christianity.  Remember what happens when you crack the door open, even just a little?

Cracking the door just a little can bring any man to his knees.  Quite literally.  And then what?  Well, I wouldn’t want to be any place else.  How do we stay here?  How do we keep Faith.  Maintaining Faith is tough as Peter found out, even amid the presence of God.  Faith is a Christian’s daily companion and our egos hate it.  Over and over, that voice in our heads tries to talk us out of having faith, talk us into taking control, turn us away from God.  Often it succeeds.  It succeeded when Peter stepped out of the boat...

What is Faith?  Paul has that one covered (Heb 11:1-3).  "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  For by it the people of old received their commendation.  By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible."

You don’t believe me?  Explain time, if you can do that and you truly believe and understand it, well then, I would love to talk to you.  Beginning to end, that’s how we live.  But how can there be a beginning and end?  Oh it’s a circle.  Wait, what?  I think God is outside time, in the eternal, the place we are trying to get to, the place that we would already be if our egos hadn’t taken a pitstop to try and replace God by separating from him through sin.  The day our ego awoke…. Dang it.  But that is me speculating, the point is to live with faith and your life will change not reverse engineer God’s creation.  Paul said it, we never will.

You said Faith was dangerous?  I did, it is extremely dangerous for “you”.  By "you", I mean your ego.  The egoic mind that has to have an explanation for everything and total control.  The ego knows that once God has a hold of you, life will no longer be that easy walk in the park, and this is scary for your ego, but a small price to pay for eternal life in perfect peace.  I guess I did figure out something 14 years ago when I set out to explain why not being a Christian is intellectually the right answer to living life.  Oh that girl that asked me to go to church...

The devil can’t do much, but he loves to whisper in your ear all day long.  Feel free to quiet that guy down with some prayer.  Wait, I thought that was my ego…

Oops I wrote too much!  Once I get going, I can’t stop.  This was going to be a single small paragraph.  God is so good!!!