Where do you come from?

Other posts in this series, Finding Faith
I. Where do you come from?
II. Do you own your faith?
III. Where is my faith going?
IV. How will I shape my children and their faith?

I've been thinking about my faith a lot lately. Not so much what I believe or why I believe it, but HOW I believe. A lot of the time I feel like a fraud. On the surface I'm a Christian, on the inside I'm a Christian, but am I really? It's been a while since I've had 5, 10, 15 minutes to sit down and actually read the Bible for myself. Even when I had time it certainly wasn’t a priority.

I'm frequently in thought with the Lord. I carry on a mental dialog with Him during the day and before sleep comes I have an “off-loading” with Him about how things went, what could've gone better, what's coming up tomorrow, and what and who are weighing on me. But does that make me a Christian?

I'm going to the Allume conference in the fall, which is for CHRISTIAN WOMEN BLOGGERS: Is that me? Am I real enough, devout enough, authentic enough, intentional enough to even be attending such a thing? God is certainly not my default response to anything in my life.

So back to my first question: Where do you come from? Or more accurately, Where does your FAITH come from?

“But from there you will seek the Lord your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul.” Deuteronomy 4:29

I've never NOT gone to church; no, I haven't been there EVERY Sunday, but I've always been attending a church. Growing up it was mass confusion: I was baptized in the Lutheran church, attended a Presbyterian, then a non-denominational, then a Baptist church. Now, I attend an Episcopal church.

My dad didn't start going to church with us until I was older, then we switched to a new church when I was 16 and I just really never felt at home there. Then once Matt and I started dating {I was almost 18} I would go with him and his family to the church we now attend.

We didn't have family devotional time or prayer time growing up, we didn't really discuss Faith and Jesus and God. We said grace and our prayers at bed time, but that was about it. I think my own parents were really only coming into THEIR faith when I was a teenager, and even then it was only their beginning.

The odd thing is: When I was 14 or so I wanted to be a pastor. Don't ask me where that came from: I have no idea. Obviously I'm not a pastor, but at that age I so wanted to write sermons that would call people to Christ, to know His Love, and redemption. I guess, in someway, that is what I would like blogging to become for me.

My faith didn't really come from my parents. So where did it come from?

Looking back I would have to say my {maternal} grandfather, Opa. Some of my first memories are going to church with him and sitting in on his Sunday School class when we visited. I don't remember much, just being there.

As I got older my Opa and I would talk. With him I could discuss my questions, my issues with being a Christian, my problems with the church’s hierarchy and traditions {which I still have major issues with}, without worrying about being told I was wrong. I could say things such as I believed that the process of evolution exists, but not that we come from apes, without fearing that he would brow-beat me for saying such things.

His love, his life, was more of an example to me about being a Christian, about following Jesus, than anything else. If anything, my faith comes from him. He allowed me to question without condemnation, he allowed me to talk through what I did and did not understand. He was my "Rabbi". 

With him there was no fear, on his part, that my questions would lead to renouncing God or Jesus. There was just open acceptance that we do have questions, and in having those questions we can seek answers, and through those answers come to know Christ better.

Where is this path leading me? Who will I touch? How I will I shape my children and their faith? Where is my faith going? Those are the REAL questions aren’t they?