I grew up in a pretty conservative area, in a really conservative church. I tend to use phrases like "essentially fundamentalist" to describe the church I grew up in and, in fact, am still a member. And, as a teenager, I was hardcore into all of it. It's all I knew, and (so I thought) I knew it to be true.
Then I went to a liberal arts university to study the Bible academically. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that meant reading the Bible as if it were literature rather that historical fact or through the lens of faith! I struggled a lot, especially that first semester, but I grew and I came to realize that my faith transcends the words on the page. Truth is not always dependent on historical fact. When I was able to let go of my need for the Bible to be the literal Word of God and literally true, I came to realize that my faith really isn't dependent on much of it being historically factual at all. In fact, sometimes my faith is better off if it is in fact not historically factual! Like that whole God as an abusive husband thing...I mean, seriously, if God really told the prophets that God was gonna beat wife-Israel/Judah and leave her for the other nations to rape, what kind of God am I serving?!?!
This is the journey I have been on for the past eight and a half years, navigating between truth and fact, faith and reality. If you would have told me ten years ago I would be where I am today, I would have laughed at you. But here I am.
I mention all of this because my brother came home last weekend and for some reason decided to ask me all sorts of questions about the Bible. He's part of this men's group, and he decided to do the One Year Bible thing. And I tried to be good and give him an academic answer that still allowed for faith, although it was pretty clear on which side I came down, but I was trying to let him know that it was okay for him to choose faith over my academics (which I really do believe--just because I love the academic side doesn't mean everyone has to or even that they have to agree with it). But by the end of the conversation, my brother asked me, "Do you even consider yourself a Christian??"
I said yes, of course, but his question kinda threw me off guard. I know in seminary we always joked about how I was more Jewish than Christian and some people really thought I was going to return from Israel a Jew (and, in fact, I went to synagogue nearly every week but only went to church on Christmas and Easter). But at the end of the day, I have always been and still am a Christian. I mean, last semester, it was church on Sunday morning and Taize Wednesday evenings that kept me sane. I may not be orthodox. I believe that the Bible contains stories rather than history. I believe that some of those stories might not necessarily be applicable to us today, no matter how hard we try to make them be. But I believe that those stories are powerful, and they are powerful because they contain some sort of inherent truth (even if that inherent truth may not transcend time and space). I believe in God and in doing the right thing, in love and truth. I believe that being a Christian means something, that being a Christian makes me a different (and better) person than I would otherwise be. And I believe I can believe all these things and still be an academic, that in fact my beliefs in many ways allows me to be a better academic because I understand what is at stake.
I am, at the end of the day, both a Christian and an academic. Whether I am a Christian academic or an academic Christian, the fact remains that I am both.
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