There is sometimes a lot of fear in leaving (or in having left) that we will leave God. We may not go to church as often, may not want to read our Bibles or pray or do other things that our former churches told were signs that we were Christians. However, no matter where we are or what questions we’re asking, we’re being honest for asking rather than pretending we don’t. It takes a lot of faith sometimes to doubt or question. And it takes a lot of guts, after what we’ve been taught, to be honest enough to admit we have questions.
Asking questions and suddenly not having definitive answers for all things God-related is scary. “I don’t know” wasn’t an acceptable answer to Bible or theology questions in many of our former churches. But in reality, “I don’t know” may be the honest answer to a lot of things. I don’t know much about God. I don’t know what certain passages mean in the Bible. I don’t know what might happen in the end times or even if there will be an end of time. I don’t know (or don’t care) if there is a hell or what it is like. I don’t know. I don’t know for sure that there is a God or that he is actively involved in the minutia of my life. I don’t know a whole lot of things. And that’s scary. It’s scary for me and it’s scary for others who know me, and it’s scary for others who are in the same boat.
Today I watched a caterpillar form it’s chrysalis. And… this is the unscientific version, but to do so, the caterpillar eats and eats. Then it goes and hangs upside down by it’s hind feet. And then it starts to convulse, to shake and it’s insides start to expand and contract oddly. That caterpillar separates from it’s outer skin and bunches up small inside. It’s skin then splits and everything — antennae, face, everything is separated off and shed away. What is left is an extremely soft, extremely vulnerable inner part hanging from a reed or a wall. Then the new outer part starts to harden and form a chrysalis.
This can’t be easy for the caterpillar. I’m sure it doesn’t feel good. To us it would feel lonely, possibly painful, and very scary. But for the caterpillar to survive and for it to be what it is meant to be, it has to go through this. And I think maybe sometimes we have to go through something similar spiritually — shed old ways, old thoughts, old ideas, and become very vulnerable and lonely for awhile.
The crazy thing is, the poor monarch has to do it all over again to come out of the chrysalis, just a couple weeks later. But the result is beautiful.
Maybe in being taught that we should hold onto the faith we had at one point in our lives we are inadvertently being taught not to grow and become what God himself intends. Maybe holding onto what we thought we had at one particular moment actually prevents us from growing as we should and becoming what God designed us to be.
I’ve heard so much preaching on childlike faith and would think back to my faith at this or that time growing up. I’d pray in those times that I’d get that innocent faith back. But I don’t think that’s what Jesus meant. The one constant about my childhood faith wasn’t that it was perfect or strong or mature. It was that no matter how big or small, it was never hampered by fears that it wasn’t as good as it had been at some there point in my life. And it was growing and changing. As a child, I lived more day to day, not worrying about whether I had enough faith but simply accepting whatever faith I had at the moment. Perhaps childlike faith isn’t childish or childhood faith, but faith that simply is faith, not a ‘faith’ that worries about all it isn’t, but just is what it is.
