Introduction
Christianity is something I've grappled with for many years. I'd describe myself as Christian, and have done for all my life. I go to church, I believe in God and the Bible. I was baptised a few years ago. This started as something I inherited from my parents, after all, I only started going to church because of them at a very young age. In the last couple of years however, I've started to develop my own views, and trying to discover where I lie with my beliefs. I don't know if anyone shares theses views, or if I'm alone in what I think. I've struggled with belief over the years. I've bordered on atheism, and abandoning Him completely. I've flirted with the popular modern theory that Christianity, and indeed all religion, is completely ridiculous and outdated. I felt like I should record my thoughts and theories, describe my experiences and see them all in one place. I am far from a perfect person, and I have done many things I regret and I'm not proud of it. I'm also nowhere near confident in my beliefs; I feel uncomfortable praying out loud, or even raising my hands when singing worship. So before you read on, understand my position. I have two Christian parents, I've been to church all my life, yet I am very much flawed. These are the writings or a flawed Christian teenager who has experienced many emotions over the years, and here they are for all to see.
Origins
The origins of my faith are rooted many, many years ago. I don't know the exact date, but I was young. I went to Stopsley Baptist Church, but at that age I just took God and being a Christian for granted, as it was all I'd ever known. I can recollect clearly the day I took it into my own hands and decided I wanted to become a Christian. I think it was about 2005, and a guy called Doug Horley came to SBC to do a children's praise session. He gave us all little books that he’d written called ‘Becoming a Christian’ at the end of the session – in these books was a short prayer, which went like this:
“Dear Lord
Jesus,
I believe
that you are alive, and I believe you are God’s son.
I’m really
sorry for all the wrong things I’ve done – please forgive me.
I want to
make you the ‘Boss of my life’ and I’ll try and live my life your way not my
way!
Please help
me.” I described myself as a Christian ever since. That wasn't a particularly well-thought-through decision, and I was very young at the time. I started to take my faith more seriously when I joined the secondary school age group at the church. It was at a church-led summer camp in 2012, 'DIY Camp' that was the turning point for me. I had a great experience that summer, some of which I will mention later on. As a result of going on this camp, I decided to get baptised at the end of the year.
Struggling with Faith
Before DIY Camp I had become very distant from God and had let my faith falter. It was during this time I had a lot of doubts about my beliefs, and grappled with the idea of whether God was real, listening to a lot of atheist arguments and feeling rather persuaded by them. I’d been hesitant in talking about my faith and I’d even become very sceptical as we were learning about the Big Bang Theory at school, and my non-Christian friends made me very doubtful that God even existed. It made me very shy about sharing my faith, and I was reluctant to even go to church on Sunday mornings. Even to this day I haven't become completely comfortable with sharing my Christian views in the modern society, where Christianity is often ridiculed. I see the kinds of Richard Dawkins and Ricky Gervais making jokes about religion, and refusing to even accept that other people do believe in something without belittling them. It was difficult at times to see these views thrown around and endorsed by celebrities, as I saw overwhelming amounts of support for these atheist, anti-religion points of view, and this did nothing to help me in re-finding my faith.
DIY Camp
This camp, in the summer of 2012, was what restored my faith and put aside all the doubts that had been building up for a long time leading up to it. I was surrounded by a group of friends and leaders that I trusted and felt comfortable around, and I knew that I was safe from any judgement by these people who shared in the same beliefs and faith. This was extremely helpful for me in re-finding my faith and belief in God that I had lost, as I knew I could immerse myself in the worship and talks. There are a couple of notable experiences from this camp that had a big impact on me. The first of these was through ‘Space’ sessions, where I really felt my relationship with God come to life, which allowed me to go off into the woods and spend time alone with God. Through these I felt my faith grow incredibly strong in just a few days. I have a vivid memory during one of these 'Space' sessions where I literally climbed into a tree (the camp was in a wood) and in a completely tranquil and relaxing scenario, simply read my bible. It was one of the best experiences I'd had in a long time, and I truly felt God's presence as I sat there, able to enjoy the nature and alone time.
One morning during the camp, something happened which really made me sit up
and take notice. I was praying with a friend of mine, and we were praying specifically for our faith to grow stronger and for God to
give us more faith throughout the week – when we were done, a Bible verse
flashed into my head. This has happened a couple of times before and it’s been
something seemingly meaningless, but I thought I’d give it a go and looked it
up – it was Luke 17:5, and it said something along the lines of: “and the
apostles said to the Lord, ‘give us more faith’. I was amazed at how perfectly
that fitted to what we were just praying about, and this was the moment I took
notice and said ‘surely, God does exist.’ and suddenly all my doubts were gone. This was a big moment for me - I'd been brought up as a Christian from birth, but now I was choosing this path myself, and it became the base for wanting to get baptised that same year.
The Pool
There was an analogy presented to me by a youth worker at my church which I found very potent in my life; the leader at my church described faith as a swimming pool. You can be in the shallow waters, afraid to venture deeper. You can be treading water in the middle, not going anywhere. You could be completely submerged and immersed in the deep end. This really stuck with me as I realised then that there's no pressure to become fully devoted to God; all Christians are at different depths of the pool with their faith. I also thought of myself as treading water, nearer the shallow end than the deep end. I felt as though I was slowly drifting away from the deep end, as I started to believe less and less in Him through how society treated Christianity, God and the Bible with such contempt. This was how I felt a few years ago. Since then, I've slowly began to swim towards the deep end. I'm nowhere near there yet, but I've felt myself grow closer to Him. This is through regularly attending church again, taking an active role in the youth work of the church, and really immersing myself in the worship there. This pool is a great way for people who are uncertain about their faith; it gives them a real idea of where they would place themselves, and how they can move forward.
My Views
People are entitled to believe, or not believe whatever they want. I haven't got a problem with someone believing in a different religion, or not at all. I believe strongly that everyone should be equal regardless of race, sexuality or gender.
[Writing in progress]
