Human

I haven't been wanting to blog for some time now.  My mind is running in some new directions.  Here's one:

   Let's say there's no God (I think there is, but let's say there isn't) and your church told you there was one.  As churches are wont to do.  Now, you find out what you feel to be the truth, later on, and you're mad.  But how mad do you really have a right to be?  You believed it. You gave money to preach it.  You probably preached it yourself.  You got up early on Sunday, and sacrificed evenings during the week to activities surrounding it.  You sat in the seat and sang the songs.  So, who are you really mad at?  Yourself.  For believing it.

  Let's say (and this what I think) that there is a God, and your church gave you a very flawed, lacking, twisted view of Him. Now, you find out what you feel to be the truth, later on, and you're mad.  Once again, how mad do you really have a right to be?  You believed in that view of God. You gave money to preach it.  You probably preached it yourself.  You got up early on Sunday, and sacrificed evenings during the week to support it all.  You sat in the seat and sang the songs. So, who are you really mad at?  Yourself.  For believing it.

   My church taught me that it wasn't just a church.  That it was superior to all the other Christian groups.  That it was structured in a scriptural way, unlike any other group. That the other groups were only human systems, built up by the hands of men, with administrators where there should have been leaders, and committees and creeds and a myriad other human inventions, which are natural, fleshly, bureaucratic approaches to something that could be far more inspired and Spirit-led.  And now I think I know the truth: that our group was a church.  Just a church. That it was a human system, built up by the hands of men, subject to all the nonsense any other Christian group is subject to.  Building human, bureaucratic structure (contact information lists, unofficial leaders whose word you get punished for questioning, accounts, banking, a global network of marketing guys etc.) into everything, just like any other place.

    And how mad do I really have a right to be?  I believed in my better-than-just-a-church church right up into my early twenties.  I put money in, to propagate and reproduce tragically white copies of the group all over the world.  I supported and preached it.  I went to church five times a week right up through adolescence and young adulthood.  I didn't go to movies or concerts or live sporting events I was desperate to see, not because God had any problem with them, but because it would hurt my status in the group.  I didn't drink alcohol.  I didn't do any number of things.  Because of the "status" thing.  I missed out on so much.  So who am I really mad at?  Me.  For believing it.  How stupid was I?

    I can't blame everything on that flawed, idealistic human system anymore.  I believed it.  If, instead of being kicked out of it for not fitting in, I had been given a voice and a place in it, I might well be still defending it today.  Saying it is perhaps something more than a flawed human system, set up and maintained by flawed human beings who need a warm place to worship.  Something more than just another church.  That's how human I am.