many ways

 

I've found a lot of freedom recently in recognizing that there is almost always more than one way to think about something. Our world seems to demand a lot of black-and-white, this-or-that, in-or-out, right-or-wrong thinking. It is refreshing and freeing to realize that a lot of things - even the most important things - are not that way. For me, Christian faith has been the biggest area in which discovering a plethora of options has deeply impacted my sense of comfort as I wade through uncertainty. For example:

The Bible. I thought for a long time I had to think of it as either 66 totally inerrant, infallible, inspired books by God, or worthless. Turns out that Christians see the Bible very differently, and are still all Christians who value Scripture. Catholic tradition has more books in their canon. Ethiopian Orthodox didn't feel the need to have an officially closed canon, even to this day. Ancient Jews didn't have a closed canon either, and they were constantly expanding and developing what was considered authoritative. 

Hell. I've written a bit about this already, but it gave me such relief when I discovered that even among Christians historically, concepts of hell have been varied. Eternal or temporary? Metaphorical or literal? Essential or non-essential? All options are options. 

Sin. I discovered in my thesis research this week that the story of the Watchers (where fallen angels mated with human women, mentioned in Genesis 6) was one of the ancient explanations for the origin of sin. In that story, the fallen angels are responsible for having taught violence and evil to humans, rather than humans willfully rebelling in the garden of Eden. Furthermore, scholars have noted that understandings of sin have shifted over time, even within the texts we read today as the Bible. Early ideas of sin saw it more as guilt, whereas later ideas of sin saw it as a debt that needed to be paid. My take-away is simply that there is no one definition of sin, and that's okay. 

The Gospel. When I started watching the dismantling of my original idea of the gospel (Jesus died to pay for my sins so I can go to heaven), I felt like I was losing Christianity entirely. How can you be a Christian if you don't believe the gospel, right? Since then, I've slowly been made aware of more and more interpretations of the gospel that have made me realize I don't have to count myself out. "Gospel" means "good news," and not surprisingly Christians have had tons of different ideas of what that good news actually is. For many it is an earth-based, social-justice-oriented good news. For some it is entirely about getting out of hell and into heaven.  For some it is only about a heart change. For some it is a metaphor for something unspeakable and mysterious. For some it is a mix of all of it. For some it is something entirely different.

Jesus. As I began to question whether Jesus was a fully divine, virgin-birthed, prophesied, miracle-working, resurrected, universal king figure, I felt like I was treading in dangerous and untrod ground. He was the scariest part of my faith to examine because I was so afraid of losing him. I've found that ever since Jesus was alive, even people who loved him and followed him have believed different things about who he was. Other texts not in our New Testament give different ideas about him. Even the four gospels present portraits of him that range from fairly-human to very-divine. Some Christians have seen Jesus as a man filled by God in the way any of us could also be filled. Some see him as a gifted teacher who taught love. Some see him as a messiah figure who confronted Rome. Some see him as all of it, some as none. 

As I wander through the wilderness of figuring out life, I used to be so worried about being on the right path and staying on it. It has made the journey so much more wonderful to realize that there may be many "right" paths, or at least many paths that will still lead to beautiful places. I'll keep walking and see where they go.