The past few months I’ve been in deep thought about my belief  and Christianity.  I have to stop here and say, this has not taken away from my belief in God. I am not denouncing God as being my Lord and Savior, but as a young christian woman I have questions and concerns. It seems that I would always put my questions aside due to the traditions that I was taught leading to my faith journey until after seeing the movie “The Shack”. The movie was very well written as well as intriguing so I won’t spoil it by giving  away any details. I would recommend that you see the movie for yourself as well as read the book, which I am currently doing now.

After watching the movie these questions were raised in my spirit:

• What does it truly mean to be a Christian?
• Why do you believe what you believe?
• Is what I have been raised to learn and what I am being taught a true doctrine for my life?

I believe that after watching The Shack, I have been challenged to expand my knowledge  and personal relationship with God as well as what Faith and being a Christian woman means to me. I was challenged in my way of thinking where I had to ask myself, If someone was to ask you about your faith and why you believe in God can you truly answer? Sadly I don’t think that I could. Let me explain, the majority of my faith has been passed down from generations due to my culture. I knew that my grandmother went to church and later instilled these same values to my mother who pass them down to me.

When I begin to reflect on the things I have been through and how I got out of them and the super-naturalness of each specific situation, I can truly identify God and where God moved. The Why I believe in God is all in the victory in every situation. God brought me out even when I contemplated if God was there and existed or not. It’s almost indescribable in the “how” I came out of those situations as well as “how” God did somethings to better my life experience.

For me, it isn’t enough. I want to go deeper. What is the root of my faith? Where did it come from, how can I use it to change my life and interact with others. I have reached a  season in my life where I have become paralyzed in my faith journey to the routine of going to church to sing, dance, and hear a mediocre or fell good in the moment sermon. I am also active in several ministries and I believe that my focus has been shifted in maintaining the upkeep of the body of the “Church” that my own salvation or “temple” and walk is at risk due to not being spiritual fed in areas that I personally feel I am lacking in. When I did a personal analysis to see if I eliminated these duties would the situation change or feelings go way, my answer was still “No”. I realize that it first starts with self, but what do you do when you don’t know where to begin? Or even how to maintain your walk in dry seasons?

From my observation, it seems that some leadership or churches as a whole are more focused on being the best church, have the best choir, pastor, musicians, praise breaks, conferences, events etc that souls are being deprived of their spiritual growth and nourishment. Church now consist of recorded highlights of “high” moments just to compete with other churches every Sunday just to say that church was good. The dangerous thing about this is that highlights are being confused with the move of God. Every praise break and good dance isn’t bringing forth healing, restoration and breakthrough and more importantly a stronger relationship with God. Instead of sound teachings sermons are for the “feel” and not a conviction or wake up call to walk righteous. This is another topic for another day, but I believe that it holds a lot of weight when it comes to my journey of faith.

I am challenging myself to want more. God is pushing me to go further and not be complacent in where I have been. I am going to get out of my comfort zone and seek God in respects to my faith. I understand that it will be uncomfortable and I may be on this journey alone, but I feel this is something that must be done so that I have a better understanding of who God is and what Faith personally means to me….

#TheFaithJourney

Do you have the same thoughts?

What has been your experience?

Would you like to join in expanding your faith as well?

Do share!

*Healthy Dialogue only*