Many people wonder what made me start my "spiritual" journey to examining the foundations of my faith. For most of my life I have been a person full of questions. I always wanted to know the "why" of things. For a long time I accepted what pastors, preachers, and teachers said about the why. But, a couple of years ago - really when it came time to teach spiritual truths to my children, I realized just how shallow my knowledge of the "whys" really was. I didn't want my children to just "believe", I wanted them to know.
The second thing that started me on my journey was how broadly the term "christian" was used. It seemed that everyone was a christian - irregardless of the lifestyle that they led. Some were quite radical in their beliefs, others were rocking the mic in a club on Saturday, then rocking the mic in church Sunday morning. Some walked three steps behind their husband, others brought their latest boyfriend to church and sat on the front row. Some believed in hell other didn't, some believed in speaking on tongues, some believed in talking to the dead. There just seemed to be no "rules".
So, I sat on a journey to find out what God actually said about who was a "christian" and what it took to be a part of His family. My journey started easy enough - I consumed quite a few "christian" books, blogs, and videos. While some really spoke to some of my "whys", others tended to leave me more confused. It seemed that so many were simply making things up as they went. I never realized one bible verse could have so many different interpretations! There were a number of things simply inferred, but never recorded anywhere in the bible - could this really be okay. I realized I needed to go a bit deeper and a bit broader in my search.
Oh boy! Has this become quite the journey! I found out everything I thought to be a "given" actually wasn't at all. I found out what I "believed" about everything from the bible to "Jesus" was - while based on some truth, actually grounded in much more myth and lie. I never know the bible was a collection of books decided upon by a group of men from the Roman Catholic Church - and not a book that had been set in stone since the time "Jesus" had walked the earth. Even from the time of the Nicene Council - books and been added and taken away. I had no idea the letters of the "New Testament" had been found intact, all had been found in Greek - which none of the disciples spoke, and there were extreme differences between the various letters that had been found. I had no idea entire books and chapters were added to various NT letters after Constantine took over the Catholic church. I had no idea there were other letters that were rejected, not because they didn't have as much "authenticity" as the NT letters, but because they didn't agree with the tenets of the church at the time. It wasn't until I got my copy of the 1611 King James Version of the bible that I saw "Jesus'" name wasn't even presented at "Jesus", but "Iesus" and that there was no letter "J" in Hebrew or Greek or even English at the time. The letter "J" didn't come into the English language until the 1500's, and wasn't widely used until the late 1600's. Even the name I had called upon to the "saved" was made up!
I had no idea how I even came to view the bible was skewed by Marcion - a man with such crazy views he was eventually excommunicated from the Catholic church as a heretic. Yes, the concept of an "Old Testament" and a "New Testament" came from Marcion - not James, John, or even "Jesus". Marcion believed there was an "evil" God of the "Old Testament" and a "good" God of the "New Testament". It was shocking because that is the view of many christians today. They won't say it straight out, they may not even be able to verbalize it. However, this view rears its head when you say you live your life by the Torah. I am often asked "why do you want to be under the law" or "why do you want to stay in bondage"? That's funny, the Torah was given to Moses after God set them FREE from bondage- why would the Torah be considered bondage? I am told that "Jesus freed us from the "law". The Torah isn't seen as a loving gift from a loving Father - it is seen as slavery and bondage to an angry God that "Jesus" came to free us from. That view didn't come from Yahshua (the actual name of "Jesus"), that view came from Marcion.
The more I studied, the more shocked and angry I became. I realized the prophet Jeremiah was right. Here I was myself, repeating the words Jeremiah predicted I would say:
Jeremiah 16: 19- 20
O YHWH, my strength and my stronghold and my refuge, in the day of distress the nations shall come to You from the ends of the earth and say, "Our fathers have inherited only falsehood, futility, and there is no value in them." Would a man make mighty ones (gods) for himself, which are not might ones (gods).
Yes, I realized I had, in fact, inherited lies and unprofitable things from people that had created their own god (based on the Hebrew scriptures, but definitely not the same god). It would take a lot of work, a lot of digging - to find the truth hidden inside the web of had inherited. If you are interested in continuing to read as I post on this journey - you will discover what I have found and continue to learn.
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