October Madness on Christianity...
Lately I have been doing a lot of thinking about
a lot of issues and recently I was pondering about my beliefs. I am a Christian;
I was born and raised in a Christian home. I am a Christian…
In my pondering one of the thoughts that
came to mind was whether or not the billions of Christians out there (myself
included) really understand what they have gotten themselves into. Let me
explain; in order for one to be a Christian they have to believe the contents
of the bible in their entirety. What am I trying to say… I am afraid that many
a Christian believes the contents of the bible in an abstract manner. What do I
mean… let me give an example… you have to totally believe that if Jesus was
alive today and you were attending a wedding with him, the wine could run out
and he could ask people to fill wine bottles with water and he could proceed to
turn the water in those bottles to wine. You have to believe it as an
occurrence that could happen today, now. For you call yourself a Christian you
have to believe that a widow could tell a (real) prophet that her husband was
dead and all that she had was a little oil, and the prophet could instruct her to
borrow as many jars as possible and she should fill the many bottles with the
little oil. You have to unequivocally believe that a mortal man, who was conceived
by a virgin, walked on water. You can’t merely perceive them as bible stories
but you have to believe them as narrations of history. History that could easily
repeat itself today since the Great Book is clear that He is the same yesterday
today and tomorrow.
Maybe I have never taken time to define what
being a Christian means to me as an individual. Once upon a time when I was
doing a research study, a lecturer advised that when you introduce a key issue you
need to thoroughly define it; first by quoting other scholars who have
generated their own definitions then closing off by offering our own
definition. For example if the study were on consumer behaviour after giving
definitions consumer behaviour by Phillip Kotler and Schiffman & Kanuk I
would go on to say – “ for the purposes of this study, consumer behaviour shall
be defined as blah blah blah” And give my own definition. I guess what I am trying
to say is that I have the definition of Christianity from my parents, from my
church and from school but I have never
sat down and defined Christianity for the purposes of MY LIFE.
Let me briefly scheme through other gnawing
questions that I have -
How is it so easy for the large majority to
oscillate from God has a plan for my life when their prayers are not answered, to
He is faithful when their prayers are answered?
Why is it that when people die, it is said
that their time had come and God has taken them BUT when we enter into a new year
we are told that it is God’s grace that has brought us this far. Are we saying
that this grace did not extend to those who died; the very same people that we
said were taken at their God appointed time?
Correct me if I am wrong (please do) but
the basic precept of Christianity is Salvation. We believe that Christ died in
order for us to be pardoned for our sins. So why does it seem like we have
turned the Holy Trinity into some form of gene. Who like Aladdin we rub and
make wishes and expect that we should receive?
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