R is for Religion

eligion is perhaps the most difficult thing to write about because it means so many things to different people. For some, it cannot be separated from the trappings and traditions which are part of the ritual of religion. For others, religion is completely amorphous, a communion with God or gods which can take place anywhere at any time. For many people it is about love, a desire to be loved by someone more intimately than ever, and in this way religion echoes human relationships. It can also be about power or money, manipulation, influence, adulation, exploitation. For me, I think, it is about love most of all.

Full disclosure means that I should mention that I didn't care a jot for religion up until I was about 18 years old. It made Sunday mornings very boring because there would only be religious programming on the television. Then my life changed as I started associating myself with Christians and Christianity, never really having come into contact with them before. Whilst that association waxed and waned over the period of 14 years or so, and even through life in several different countries, it has now come to a defined conclusion, and I currently consider myself agnostic.

It's a shame in some ways because I really want to be a Christian, I really want to have a living, breathing relationship with the author of Creation, the Ancient of Days, the Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace and all those other amazing titles for God, the Christian god (and just saying those titles still gives me a great buzz). But for some reason, it seems that God hasn't chosen me. There's a widespread and firmly-established doctrine called predestination, which states that you're chosen, by God, before time, to become a Christian. So all of those people get an invite, as it were, at some point in their lives, to boogie on down at the best party going. And the other people, well, they can just stand with their noses pressed against the windows of Heaven. And that's me.

I thought, once upon a time, that I was one of those lucky partygoers. I felt the call, I prayed the prayer, I went to church, excuse the pun, religiously. I went to Bible Study, even when it was rainy; I went to conferences and worship meetings and sang on stage and I was even leader of the Christian Union at my university for a year. I walked like a Christian and talked like a Christian. I felt like a Christian and identified with it; many, if not all, of my friends were Christians.

There was no dramatic conversion. I fell in with a bunch of Christians because they were kind and caring when everyone else around me was definitely unkind and uncaring. They accepted me, and accepted my atheism. They didn't try to convert me at all, although I knew that they prayed for my conversion to faith. It was my love of Christmas carols that probably did me in, for soon I was asking them if I could tag along to church with them to sing those rousing and evocative hymns that reminded me of warmth and power and delicacy and were familiar. My leap of faith was really just an acceptance of facts. There was a guy called Jesus who was the son of God, he was born to a virgin, he did miracles which were witnessed and recorded by many, he was crucified, died and was buried. On the third day he rose again, and appeared to witnesses. He then ascended into heaven, where he sits until he will return again in triumph and glory at the last trumpet call. It sounds so fanciful when you look at all the unusual events: ...son of God...born to a virgin...did miracles...died...rose again...ascended into heaven. But, y'know, if there was a God, then he would be able to do all of those things, right? Nothing would be beyond him. So, I accepted and I believed. I was happy. For weeks. I felt a belonging that I hadn't really encountered before in my life. I could define what I was: I was a Christian, and Evangelical, even. And although I didn't go around telling everyone, I had a label for myself.

The Bible doesn't really set out an entrance exam for Christianity. It doesn't say, "You have to do this, this, this, and believe that". However, at various points in the New Testament there are qualifiers; a Christian looks like this, this and this.  There are five indicators that can give you "assurance of faith":
1) Believing in the Gospel, and admitting it openly. I was doing this, certainly amongst my Christian friends, sometimes among my non-Christian friends, and not really at all with my family, although eventually with my brother.
2) Being changed. This happened to some degree with me. I never really had a crazy and radical life. But, of course, I started going to church, I stopped swearing, I took down the couple of pictures of hot women I had on my dorm-room wall (one was of Gillian Anderson... go me), I was more helpful and less self-serving. It wasn't like I changed from being a Nicky Cruz-type gangster into a choirboy or anything, though.
3) Repenting from sin. I don't think I ever understood this really, but I felt like I was doing my best. Repentence, which involves dual "saying sorry" and "turning away" phases, never came naturally. I never really did anything that "bad" that I needed to apologise for, I felt. Sure, I wasn't living up to God's expectation of what the perfect life is, but, as is drilled into us during the Christian life, no-one can expect to live the perfect life apart from God's son, Jesus. Of course, some of my "sins" did have negative consequences, and when I could see those, of course I had remorse and repented. I felt that was enough.
4) Good works, and 5) the "Fruits of the Spirit". The Fruits are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Although these are all distinct individual qualities, and many sermons have been given on each individual aspect, what they all boil down to is "being a good person". And, hopefully without boasting, I've always been a good person. Not perfect, of course, and not "sinless", but always moral, and disciplined. So there wasn't a great change when I accepted Christianity, and I wasn't particularly bothered about this, because good people must become Christians all the time, right? This was normal.

So throughout my fourteen years of faith, as it were, I kept seeking what's called "an assurance of faith". I wanted to know that my God was real, and that He loved me. But it never really came. I'd had friends that had seen miracles, who had seen people healed, who had seen amazing things, who had touched the divine. But it was never me. I never really felt loved, I never belonged. And this is not to say that it didn't have its moments. I've felt so overcome with joy when I've gone into churches as a stranger and come out as someone's (potential) friend. I've met so many genuinely nice people and had so many great experiences. It's just they've all been human experiences. My attempts at getting to know God have resulted in getting to know people.

I finally accepted that Jesus hadn't wanted me for a sunbeam just before Easter 2010. There's a verse in Matthew where Jesus says, "Many will say to Me [...] 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'" This verse had come back to me over and over, and I found myself, as I was contemplating leaving my church (because I felt very strongly that I didn't belong there), mulling over it again. And, in many ways similarly to first accepting the facts of Christianity, it just dawned on me that this verse, too, was fact... and it was perhaps the most relevant verse to me in the entire Bible. I had (metaphorically) cast out demons and prophesied in Jesus' name, and yet I wasn't His. I never had been. To save myself the ignominy of rocking up to the doors of heaven and claiming entry under the banner of Jesus, only to be told "I never knew you", I jumped ship. And rather than walked on the water, sank into agnosticism. I still believe those facts of Christianity, although perhaps with less conviction than I once did; I still want to love and be loved by God. But Jesus hasn't chosen me as a sunbeam, I didn't get the invite. Someone once said that Hell was just eternity without God, and if that's the case, then I'm thinking it really won't be that bad... His friends are great, but his party food could do with some improvement.