So you can fully understand where I am in my spiritual journey, I thought I should share with you my background. I was born into a family that believed in God in some sense, but was not very active in church. My mother was raised as a Catholic and made sure that I was baptized. My father was just not around much. It's funny, I remember my mother seldom went to church, but made sure I went to catechism once a week after school!
I was somewhat of a sickly child with asthma before there was much medicine to help it. Maybe this is why I can remember having a great interest in God. It made sense to my childish mind that if God is all-powerful, then I would do well to get to know him.
Throughout my teen years, I didn't have much use for God. That soon changed when I met my high school sweetheart and later wife. She was a committed Christian and as our relationship grew, it was apparent that my lack of religion was a concern to her. She invited me to attend her Southern Baptist church. It was a very small church that had fewer than 100 attenders on a typical Sunday. I was not against going and rather enjoyed the experience. After having talks of religion with her and attending her church for sometime, I have to admit it was the first time I had ever heard or understood the need for salvation. I was instructed that I needed a personal relationship with Christ to be saved. I remember being alone in my bed the night that I decided to ask for forgiveness of my sins and for Jesus to save me.
I continued to attend this church, as well as study my Bible. I really began to enjoy learning more about the Bible and doing more in depth Bible studies under the tutelage of our pastor. After several years we were married at that church. I felt that we really were a part of the Church family. We would attend Sunday mornings, then go back for Sunday evenings service. We would also usually attend on Wednesday nights for prayer and Bible study. Often on Sunday nights we would have a pot luck dinner at the church and enjoy a time of fellowship. I have to say that I loved it. I felt confident that what we believed was "right", and that every one else was simply wrong. I felt that we were in the place that God would have us in, and that we were following the teachings of the pastor that God had placed in our church. My faith continued to grow over the 10 years we were members.
This confidence was forcefully stripped away when our pastor, whom I was very fond of and so very trusted, was accused and later convicted of felony sexual crimes. The man that I had felt was God's man. The man that I had so naively, but whole heatedly trusted for 10 years was nothing but a fraud. I learned from this that one can never know, truly know another person from just being around them or listening to them. However, I was careful to limit the blame to the man, the pastor, and not blame God.
After this, we moved away from the area and tried several new churches over the next fifteen years. I would typically do a cycle where I would be desiring God, then not wanting to do much with God. I would go from being involved in church, to just sporadic attendance. I went from trying to get my friends and neighbors to church, to the past year I have only attended church on Christmas. It has been 28 years since I accepted Christ as my personal savior. Twenty eight years since I asked Jesus to save me. I have went from feeling I knew all the answers to now thinking I do not know anything.
So this is a brief sketch of my spiritual journey. Over the next several posts I will fill in more of my beliefs and experiences. I will share why, although I still call myself a Christian, I certainly have some doubts. I would love to hear from you about your beliefs. Do you ever have any doubts?
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