circle

I think sometimes when you question, and struggle with faith, there's this expectation that after all of it, that you will come back to where you started. Almost every Christian apologist I've read calls himself a former atheist. There is almost an unspoken understanding that the logical end to a faith crisis is back to the beginning. Back to the basics. Back to believing everything you once used to, but with even more fervor and devotion now.

I don't think that's in the cards for me. I'm not going to come full circle. I'm okay with that. I'm starting to understand the fact that my faith will never be a clearly laid out, unchanging and unchallenged list of absolutes ... and that I don't desire that kind of faith.

But I do desire a faith that is real. Active. Purposeful. And life-changing. I have a new appreciation for that verse in Micah that says to Live Justly, Love Mercy and Walk Humbly with your God. (I still think the Old Testament is filled to the brim with craziness, but it doesn't mean that I can't see the wisdom and beauty that the writers managed to impart into certain passages ... that I can't take them on their face as truth.) It's a reminder to just keep walking.