It was six or seven years ago that I woke up on New Year’s Eve day or New Year’s morning loudly humming a hymn. I sat up on the edge of my bed, somewhat confused but realizing what I was doing. Tom was looking at me rather stunned. I turned to him and said, “I have the strangest feeling I am supposed to get to know the bible. Not get to know it like I should recite scripture, but get to know it on a deeper level.” It was since that day I have had this inner sense that I had to start reading the bible, taking bible study and going to Sunday school. I had to do something to draw closer to God. My Walk has been trying to find my way.
This may not sound like a shock to some people, because you have met me since this journey started. To others, this is NOT the Angie you know and remember. I was the ‘normal’ child and teenager.
To put some understanding on this, I did not grow up going to church. My mother was Catholic and my father southern Methodist. As you can imagine, church was NOT a very happy or approachable subject in our house. What I do remember about church was that my parents fought quite hard for which religion we (me, sister and brother) would be brought up in. Eventually a consensus, verbal or non-verbal, between my parents was that we would not be brought up attending church.
Don’t get me wrong. We did learn about God from two Christian perspectives. Theologically different as the two perspectives were, there was one common factor, God in the fullest (Father, Son and Holy Spirit). From my recollection, that was the only thing that each religion agreed upon. God was enough. Just the knowledge, that there was something bigger than family, and myself made a child yearn to get to know God more.
Despite my own family’s attempts to attend church on several occasions (may be 5-10 times while I was really young) I had friends of various faith traditions that at times I went with to church. Growing up I couldn’t help but feel guilty that I did not belong to a faith community. I felt guilty that I was not baptized. I had heard that those who were not baptized and accepted Christ would burn in hell. To a child this scared the ‘bejessus’ out of me. I remember praying silently that I did believe in Jesus just to avoid what fate may come to me for not being baptized. However, this knowledge conflicted with inside me. How could God send people to hell who possibly had never heard of Him? And what about all the children? Didn’t God love the children? I kept thinking of myself, my siblings and other children around the world.
As God would have it, in High School I spoke with one of my friends about this struggle about not being baptized and my fear of being sent to hell. She had a different perspective on God. She told me about a loving God who sent His son here to reconcile ALL people to Him. She told me that I would NOT burn in hell and that I was greatly loved by the Creator. I was very precious in his eyes and that I need not worry about going to hell. I could not get past the fact that I had to be baptized. She then began to tell me that she could even baptize me if that was what I wanted, but it was the belief that there is a God so great that really mattered. She did NOT go into scripture versus. She told me the effect God had had on her life and the great hope God brought her in her times of trouble and how He helped her go about her daily life.
Now I am sure what she told me was not exactly theologically sound, by possibly any religious traditions, BUT it resonated with me. Before, my internal struggle and the lack of adult or any ‘religious community’ support telling me about a Loving God who did not hate, who was not out to punish people, especially those that are the most neglected and innocent in our world gave me hope. Hope that no matter how sinful I was I was loved unconditionally and no matter how many times I turned away from God he would love me anyway. I needed to have faith that God is so great He did and does not have limitations on His love. I really had thought I was sinful beyond God’s limits. God could and would never want to love someone like myself. How could He? I was not baptized and did not go to church. I was just a plain bad person with a blackened soul, marked for hell. Only a few were chosen by God and I was not one of those chosen people to be loved by Him. It is what I had been taught, heard and validated through the community at large. Now because of ONE person telling me about God’s love, I had a freedom I had not felt in years or ever. This freedom allowed me to live.
Last night many of us stayed awake to ring in a new year, 2011, with hopes that this new year will bring us a better life in the forms finances, social status, improved health, looks and body. I challenge us on an individual basis to take this new year down a little different path. Instead of focusing on ourselves, why not focus on getting to know God a little better. Not learning about him in an intellectual sense, but getting to ‘know’ Him they way God wanted us to know Him and how he created us (body, mind spirit).
From an institutional standpoint, that is those working within the ‘religious’ communities, the churches, synagogues, temples and mosques, I challenge you to spread the ‘Good News’ about God. Leave your buildings and interact within your communities at large. Do not preach the Good News. Do not talk the good news. Behave the good news. Remember I didn’t go to a church or a building where someone told me about God. It was within my own home. It was where I was at.
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