Earlier this week I reconnected with a friend from college. We were part of this very zealous student group called Missions Alive! (always with the exclamation) and were committed to going to the nations. To die on the “mission field” was the coolest thing we could imagine. She and her husband were solid people. Not super spiritual or weird. They just loved Jesus and loved people and wanted to work cross-culturally. I credit these friends for opening my eyes to the heresy of the “prosperity gospel.” They were the first people who point blank told me, “Jenn, this is NOT good theology!” I remember really deep conversations with them about all sorts of topics. Whether I realized it at the time or not, they were really influential people in my life.
I hadn’t really spoken to them in several years and when we recently caught up I was sharing about some of my theological struggles and she shared that she no longer feels comfortable calling herself a Christian and would categorize her beliefs as being a humanist.
She apologized for breaking such extreme news. In the moment, I wasn’t too shaken. I’m not the same person as I was in college, so I didn’t expect others to be either. However, the next day, when I couldn’t stop thinking about it, I realized the news really did affect me.
All week I’ve been thinking about it. I can’t stop thinking about it.
They were missionaries and in the midst of service and life, they didn’t do this dramatic “walk away from God into a life of sin” thing. They just stopped believing. I’m sure it was a gradual thing, but it happened nonetheless. Once they were people who centered their lives around God and what He wanted to do in their lives and then one day they stopped believing there even was a God.
And why can’t I stop thinking about them? Why does this scare me?
Because I could be them. Maybe I already am them.
Oh my, I can totally relate to this post… somehow my life on the mission field almost completely sabotaged my faith in God. Sometimes it seems that former ISP students are the most vulnerable to losing their faith.
Is it because we study other religions objectively and come to see all religion as producing undeserved allegiance?
Or is it because we see all the problems in all the churches worldwide and give up hope?
Or maybe being involved in missions, we experience so many disappointments in ourselves, in God, and in other Christians that we begin to doubt the presence and goodness of God?
Or??
I miss the club sometimes. But then…I see things now so differently. I guess you could say more soberly. When I was at Lee visiting missionaries had a phrase for this. “Throwing in the towel.” They often said it with disgust. It haunts me still. I didn’t and I don’t want to be one of those that throws in the towel.
I don’t think you are one of those people. *hugs*
Sounds like a very smart lady
You have nothing to fear Jenn…investigate. Perhaps she just started to use her brain and read much wider than what is available through evangelical publishing houses. Hummmm.
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