Faith Shift: Finding Your Way Forward When Everything You Believe Is Coming Apart

Much of modern Christianity has been firmly built on “absolute truth” and conformity of beliefs.  Many Christians have begun to experience a shift in how to relate to God and the church.  We hit a barrier.  Things stop working in the ways we’re used to.  We notice inconsistencies in leadership and theology that never occurred to us before.  We start to experience spiritual vertigo.

Do you ever ask the questions like, “Why am I a Christian? Do I really believe in God? Is my whole life of faith a sham? Why have I given myself over to the church for years when it has consistently used me? How could I ever have believed some of the things I have been taught? Am I a blind sheep, following the herd from desperation to belong?” 

Do you ever feel like your faith is unraveling as you realize your list of “I don’t know’s” is growing?  Does the world no longer seem as black and white to you?  If not, or if you have no patience for people who ask these questions or feel these things, skip this post.  If so, keep reading!

Kathy Escobar (pastor, writer, advocate, speaker, and spiritual director in North Denver) defines the questioning of the systems to which we previously happily subscribed as a “faith shift”.  Some common experiences of faith shifters include:

• A background in a faith system of very clear rules and expectations for participants,
• A significant shift in your relationship with God and/or the church,
• Uncertainty about whom to trust with your thoughts and emotions,
• Discomfort in once-welcoming communities and groups,
• Fear that maybe you are the problem, that you are wrong, sinful, or deceived.

In her book Faith Shift: Finding Your Way Forward When Everything You Believe is Coming Apart, Escobar discusses her flexible model of the faith shifting process based on her observations of the stages that faith shifters tend to experience and shows that the shift is a progression. She explains the spiritual journey in terms of fusing, shifting, and unraveling. This can result in returning, severing, or rebuilding.  Everyone’s journey is different. 

Escobar insists that this book is not her memoir, a text book, or a self-help book with guaranteed results to squeeze out faith-challenging feelings and put you back in a spiritual box.    She is not giving easy answers or advice.  Rather, she acts as a facilitator, helping you put words to your experience, encouraging you to start the conversation with yourself, and re-assures by sharing stories of other’s experiences that can help you navigate your own unique faith shift.  She will help you process the shifting of your faith and show you that you can find your way to something more, something bigger and truer, without actually trying to tell you what it is.

I highly recommend this book to those who are questioning the things they always believed, and especially those who are unraveling from an identity within fundamental/evangelical Christian churches.  She will help you process, understand, and help you not to feel alone. And I speak from experience – as if she had crept into my head and heard all my thoughts, and then gave me the tools to rebuild a much larger faith that doesn’t have to be black and white, but many colors of a prism with so much mystery, freedom, and diversity to explore.  This book is top on my list of favorites for this season of my life.  You can get a taste of her writing and the topics in the book on her blog at www.kathyescobar.com.  For more information about the book, go here.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from Convergent Publishing in exchange for my honest review.

The Gift of the Midlife Crisis

The midlife breakdown happens like clockwork.  A systemic collapse. So they say.  I never thought it would really happen to me.  My faith in Christ was rock solid, could never be shaken.  I knew the Bible inside and out, and felt like I knew God the same way.  I had been face-to-face with grief, suffering, and evil.  I had been disappointed, treated unjustly, and peed on  by people whose acceptance and affirmation I craved.  I thought I understood why God allows suffering and evil and how he transforms us into a Christ-like image of Him. 

And then one day, five months ago, the impossible happened.  My belief left me. I had believed in some invisible world and a God who watched over me – and I went along with all this nonsense that turned out to be a hoax.  The things I learned (and taught) in Sunday school were stupid.  My whole life had been built on lies.  It was like looking in the mirror and seeing a silly costume on me and asking, “who picked this out for me?”

Without Jesus, my faith, and my religion, I had no idea who I was because He had been my everything, or so I thought.  I filed spiritual bankruptcy, and for five long months, I struggled.  The operating system that I had been equipped with from birth malfunctioned with a fatal virus, and I had no idea how to fix it. Or if I needed to replace it. 

Psychologists say our ‘operating systems’ are programmed to reach our peak power, and then to crash.  If this spiritual breakdown happens to ‘everyone’ in mid-life, I’d like to meet them.  Just one person.  Since I know no one personally who has experienced this, I have been reading spiritual memoir books like crazy to understand the experiences of others in hopes to understand myself.  About the fourth month into my spiritual/identity crisis, I picked up David Anderson’s book Losing Your Faith, Finding Your Soul: The Passage to New Life When Old Beliefs Die, and he helped me to begin to make sense of all this.  It resonated with my current feelings. 

In the early stage of faith, it’s all about our achievement through religious or spiritual performance. In our early adulthood, we spend most of our time attending to the outer shells of our lives, according to Anderson, an Episcopal minister and graduate of Yale Divinity School.  He explains that we are defined by our family, our jobs, our parenthood, our churches and how we serve, our neighborhoods, our inherited political parties. The world tells us how we are doing in both subtle and blatant ways.  We know our status and how we are doing, but it is difficult to get a read on our souls.  After we have played the game for 30-40 years, we come to the point where we decide ‘No more!’.

The gift of the midlife crisis, according to Anderson, is that it dethrones the pretender self and welcomes the ascent of the real self.   As we start to separate from the worn-out system, we discover we can take charge of our own lives, let go of the “you should’s”.   We step out, stand apart, and plant our flag, uncovering what is inside and not creating something externally anymore.

The strangest rule of spiritual growth is that it begins against your will. You undergo the stripping, and when you’ve endured the pain without resorting to your usual escape routes, you find a new kind of joy. It’s the kind that comes from nothing.  It’s a happiness that is not contingent on any thing; it just is.  You didn’t gain it, and you can’t lose it.  This happiness has nothing to do with your circumstances. (page 153)

Anderson explains that as we do the early work of separation, firming up the core of our being, we find we are no longer dependent on other people to change so that we can be free.  We no longer depend on other people to be less depressing or judgmental so that we can be happy.  We no longer depend on them to act like mature adults so we can too.

But where he says we start of find our own authority and our own power – this is where I digress.  Only in my complete nakedness was able to realize what was lacking.  I didn’t want to rely on my own authority and my own power.  I truly wanted to give it to Jesus. While my belief had left me, my faith never did.  While I rambled down roads of atheism and then agnosticism, then universalism, in the end, my faith in Jesus was what I chose, even after I questioned it.  It is because of Jesus that I found my true identity. 

I’m not at the same place I was at the beginning, though.  I’m still in the process of gradual transformation, but it no longer feels like a crisis.  I no longer feel like I have God figured out or that I have the answers, and I am embracing the mystery of it all.  I am letting go of criticism and judgment.  I didn’t even know it was possible because it was part of the ‘old’ me.  In letting them go, my heart opens wider as I simply let life have its say, let God have His say in whatever form He wants, and let people be who they are.

If your faith has failed you at some point in life, if you used to believe, or if you are pretending to believe and going through the motions, if you feel like your faith has been snuffed out by evil or suffering after a life surrendered to God, then I would recommend David Anderson’s book.  He will not lead you to evangelical or even Christian conclusions.  Like me, you may not agree with everything he says.  But he will help you articulate the journey, make sense of it, and lead you through the stages of doubt and re-discovery, pointing you toward where you are headed.  He will help you change your crisis into a journey.  (Thank you Blogging for Books and Convergent Publishing for providing me a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.)

Challenging Your Assumptions: Advice for a College Freshman and the Life-Long Learner

Historical geology, evolutionary biology, ancient history with its Mesopotamian and Babylonian creation and flood stories, sociology of religion….my children are both hearing and learning things they have never been exposed to before. What will they do with the apparent contradictions to their faith? Have they learned how to analyze and evaluate?  How will they integrate the new information with their beliefs?

It may sound dangerous, but my first advice is to challenge our assumptions, including our assumptions about what we believe the Bible says before automatically dismissing  new ideas as contradictory or dismissing the Bible as myth without fully examining both sides.  Clinging to our assumptions prevents growth, stunts loving God with all our minds, and inhibits insights.

We get stuck when we fixate on false assumptions.  For example, consider the mind puzzle with the 9 dots.  Can you connect all the dots with no more than four straight lines without lifting your pencil from the paper? 

In preschool, we learned about connecting dots and coloring within the lines.  Based on these experiences, we might assume that 1) we have to stay within the borders, and 2) each turn is supposed to pivot on a dot.  Sticking to these assumptions prevents us from solving the puzzle.

Another way we get stuck in our assumptions is the lack of challenge to our assumptions as illustrated by ‘the internet bubble’.  Search engines like Google and Bing learn our preferences and show matches that are likely to satisfy us based on our previous selections.  They will eventually screen out contrary information or information from other parts of the spectrum. Because we never see what gets filtered out, we wrap ourselves in a cocoon of our own beliefs. Similarly, when we tend to read books, blogs, and news media that agree with our points of view and we hang out with people who think like us, we may fail to see assumptions that need to be challenged.

For those of us raised in the church, and even those of us who were not, we need to recognize our assumptions about how we interpret the Bible as we attempt to reconcile its apparent contradictions to history/science and our experiences.

Here is my advice in challenging assumptions to my college freshman, who is quick to see the world as black and white:

1. Listen and understand before you automatically judge something to be wrong. Put yourself in their shoes and understand why they believe that way.
2.  Remember that all truth is God’s truth.  Know what your Bible says and the various ways of interpretation, both literal, non-literal, and figurative. You may have always assumed it said something it did not, or you may have always interpreted a passage in a way that it was never meant to be interpreted.
3.  Engage others in conversation about challenges to assumptions.  Examine all avenues and different perspectives.
4. Know that it is not all diabolical – not all black and white, good or evil.  It’s more than various shades of gray – think of it more like a rainbow of glorious colors to discover in a lifetime of learning, new ways of seeing, perceiving, understanding that enrich your life. God, the world, and you do not fit in a neatly defined box.
5. Avoid the ‘internet bubble’, but don’t try so hard to avoid it that you build a bubble at the other end of the spectrum.  Keep surrounded by Jesus followers, all kinds, and look for things you have in common.  Be willing to challenge each other’s assumptions while remaining united in your core beliefs.  Grow spiritually by continuing to worship with a group of believers and hanging with them.    

How to Open Your Eyes to the Presence of God

Just because we have eyes that see does not mean we use them to see what we should.  

Close your eyes and think of everything around you that is green.  I remember the plant in the corner and the green tapestry in the drapes.  Now look around you and notice everything that is green. I see the palm trees on the coaster, the number on a dollar bill, the color of a pack of gum my husband left on the desk, the pencil holder, a button on my cell phone, the binding on a couple books on the shelf....actually, there is a lot more green around me than I realized!  I had to put on my "green glasses" to see them.

In the same way, we can develop "God glasses" - sensitivity to seeing evidence of what we know to be true about God in our lives, to see Him at work in us and around us.  If we know that God is with us, that He is omnipresent, how much time do we spend noticing? How can we see better?

Donald Whitney, associate professor of spiritual formation, gives some practical steps to opening your eyes to God's presence (from Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health):

1. Go often to the place where God has revealed Himself most clearly - the Bible.  Absorb it, linger over it, let it percolate the soil of your soul.
2. Acknowledge His presence with you by talking with Him.
3. Seek Him in the manifestations of His presence in congregational worship.  His presence there is accessible in ways different than solitary worship.
4. Continually reaffirm the truth that He is omnipresent.

I would add praying - being in conversation with God throughout the day, asking Him to give you His eyes to see as He sees, to love as He loves, to forgive as He forgives.  And then listening.  

Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health

My small group leader urged us to read the Bible every day because it will completely change us.  I've been reading the Bible every day for many years, but am I changed?  I've been contemplating this question all week, from whether I am really changed to how I could be reading my Bible better.  I stumbled across a book in my public library by Donald Whitney called Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Heath, and discovered that over the years, God truly has been changing me and still has a lot more transformation to accomplish.  The transformation has been gradual, but occurring, nonetheless.

Donald Whitney, associate professor of spiritual formation, asks the following questions in assessing spiritual growth:
1.  Do you thirst for God?
2.  Are you governed increasingly by God's Word?
3.  Are you more loving?
4.  Are you more sensitive to God's presence?
5.  Do you have a growing concern for the spiritual and temporal needs of others?
6.  Do you delight in the bride of Christ?
7.  Are the spiritual disciplines increasingly important to you?
8.  Do you still grieve over sin?
9.  Are you a quick forgiver?
10.  Do you yearn for heaven and to be with Jesus?

Some of these I could not say yes to five years ago, and I am encouraged to be able to see that indeed, God IS changing me.

How Does God Change Me?

How do I change? How does God change me? If God is doing the changing, what am I responsible for?

This gradual transformation is not up to us to do on our own.  The Holy Spirit is the source of change.

This gradual transformation is not something we just sit back and wait to happen.  We have to be willing to follow the Spirit's leading.

Change is like bread dough. We have to have both the yeast and the flour working together in order for it to become bread. In order to be transformed, we also need a couple of ingredients - both the Holy Spirit, and our willingness to follow (even if we don't do it so well). Both kneaded together.

The rising process is lengthy.  It's a lifelong process. It begins when we take the hand of Jesus and choose to follow Him, when we receive His gift of forgiveness through His work on the cross. When we take His hand, we join a lifelong partnership.  The yeast must have the flour.

The flour must have the yeast.  The flour can't become bread all by itself, no matter how hard it works at it.  Gradual transformation is not about trying to be better. It is surrendering. Not a resentful surrendering that says, “whatever, you win,” but rather, a joyful surrendering that says, “what ever, however, I want your way because it’s better than mine." It is about allowing the Holy Spirit to change us.  And it is obedience to Him.   

A Transforming Thought...

I teeter between feeling low about myself and full of myself.  One minute I’m feeling worthless, invisible, useless, and the next I might wonder why everyone else around me is so ignorant. Self-pity vs. self-righteousness. I hate feeling either one. It’s hard to love others when I am busy thinking about myself – either my self not measuring up or others not measuring up.

The answer to low self-esteem is not high self-esteem. It’s no self-esteem. No estimation of self. Jesus said, “…whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:39b) -- quoted from James MacDonald in Lord Change Me, page 28

So how do I lose my self-consciousness?  I must lose my self.  I’m still trying to figure out specifically what this looks like in practice...

A Transforming Thought...

Change isn’t coming like some big sweeping force over you, or like a large blanket. Here is how it IS coming: It’s arriving one adjustment at a time, bit by bit, measured progress on specifics.  (quoted from James MacDonald in Lord Change Me, page 66)

Three steps forward, two (and-a-half) steps back – sometimes the progress of becoming more like Jesus seems so miniscule that I wonder if I’m changing at all.  Or once I find I'm making progress in one area, there are three others revealed to me that need a lot of work.  But when I look at the specifics, the things I struggle with and the things I am handling better as I pass through various seasons of life, I can see that Jesus is changing me. 

Today at work, I was commended for having a positive attitude and being even-tempered, not letting things get to me. I had to look backwards over my shoulder to see if someone else was the object of the compliment.  So maybe, maybe sometimes this negative, cynical, critical, emotionally-ruled old self is being transformed -- one adjustment at a time, bit by bit, until eventually it becomes noticable. 

What is God working on in you?