It seems like every time I go to church these days, whether it was a great service or one of them tight and dry ones, I always come home with an urge to vent out some anonymous thoughts.
For starters, when I walked in this morning I got the handshake and the question. You know the one, comes right after the “How are you today, Sister?” Goes something like “Everything okay? You sure?” and is accompanied by the serious, intense look.
It works really well. I went on in to the sanctuary feeling even more like a terrible backslider (or at least one well on her way) and I haven’t done anything except ask questions and seek the truth.
The tough part is that I love all those people. And I know that if I don’t abide by that “list of rules” those relationships will take a drastic turn. I’m not trying to change, I’m trying to understand. Maybe that’s changing me.
All I know is that everything I was raised to believe tells me that if I don’t believe and follow the “old ways” without question then I am indeed a backslider and I don’t know how to get away from that even when the truth is looking more and more like something different. Especially when all we hear is that God wants to take away this and take away that and if you back up on anything, you’re not walking in all the light and that makes it sin for you. Is asking questions and trying to understand and make sense of these things “backing up on truth?” Well, apparently it is, if you aren’t coming up with their answers.
I just need to understand. I need to know what God wants. And then I’ll be more than happy to do it. I’m just having serious doubts that what a man says is “God’s List of Do’s and Do Not’s” really is GOD’S list…
