Being Real About Skepticism

     In psychology, Identity vs Role Confusion occurs in adolescence according to the theorist Erik Erikson. Maybe this is partially true, but I think that college is more of an identity-forming time than my high school years. Maybe I was looking around at different clubs in high school and I started to go deeper in my faith. Where I feel like my faith was like dipping my foot in a pool in high school, I feel like college has been literally diving all the way in. This diving in first brought up this "being on fire" that I think so many Christians strive for. This season lasted a few months, but then I was truly faced with this questioning within myself: "I know that Jesus is Lord and Savior of my life, but how do I do this faith thing right?" This lead to many questions regarding the programs I was involved in and the beliefs I felt I had for so many years. 

    I was so confused about everything: How do I worship God in Spirit and in Truth? What should corporate worship look like? Why do I feel like I am doing everything wrong in my faith? These questions plagued my mind all throughout my sophomore year into the summer before my Junior year. I felt I was just doing everything wrong, and I could not understand where to live for the Lord right. I wanted to worship him rightly and to attend the right church and live the right life. I called my sophomore year of college my "Mid College Identity Crisis" and I reflect back on being 19 and 20 years old realizing that was the season I was in. Everything of who I was came into question, and there was so much I did not understand in my identity of being a daughter of the king. I felt I was in the Role Confusion crisis of this stage of development in overall confusion. It was not fun to be in. 

    I became so skeptical through this time. I had this underlying unbelief (partly from what I found to be unanswered prayer in my freshmen year of college) that impacted the way I was living my life. I was contemplating and questioning everything. I think hearing of different miracles brought this up. It was not that I did not want these miracles to occur for people, but I think I just struggled with understanding deliverance and healing miracles from God. I did not know if these miracles were just put on for performance. I struggled for a year and a half trying to figure this out. I wanted to know the truth exactly of what was going on. I also felt far off from God during this time. I grew in the understanding that God is always near even when he does not seem near. Going through this season made it hard for me to settle down at a church and find community in that sense as well. Even though I would not have wanted to go through this season, something beautiful that came out of this season was rediscovering the beauty of hymns. I was navigating worship during this season, and I remembered listening to hymns growing up at my first church. I felt like these hymns like How Great Thou Art and Shine Jesus Shine connected me back to my child-like faith during the time I went to my old Reformed Church. I realized the beauty and the truth within these hymns. In fact, one hymn This is My Father's World got me through a particularly challenging time with unforgiveness this past yearthrough this line "though the wrong seems oft so strong, my God is ruler yet". I think God creates beauty through hard seasons because he is a good God. 

    Skepticism is super challenging to overcome, and I think I still struggle with it some days. I will see something and think to myself "how is that even possible?". Last summer, I realized in this difficult season of overcoming this skepticism is that the Lord knows the work of his own hands better than anyone ever could know. Even the most profound theologian will not know the works fully to the extent that the Lord does. So many wounds in the world today we need to realize that the Lord has already overcome. He already took on the pain and the brokenness of this world when he died on the cross for us. This does not mean that we won't suffer as this temporary world is broken, but in relation to eternity our suffering is temporary. My grandma told me when I had a conversation with her regarding one of my assignments this year "When you are going to live forever, I am but a pup". A pup is very young, and when you realize that eternity is very long, our time on this earth is short in relation to eternity. Now just because I am saying Jesus has overcome every single thing you are struggling with or ever will struggle with, I will not invalidate the fact that we struggle with incredibly tough and challenging things. I have struggled with abuse, depression, anxiety, abandonment, etc., but none of this I have struggled with a part from God. Not a single one of these things I have struggled with a part from Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior who saved me and delivered me. 

    There have been many tears too, and real vulnerability with God, my counselor, and my friends. Do not try to put on a smiley face mask when you feel like you are breaking inside. The smiley face mask won't hide your tears from the God who sees you. Go to him as you are and be so real with him. He will not be there to say "don't cry", instead he says in Matthew 11 "Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and i will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am GENTLE and HUMBLE in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." I put emphasis on these words that stood out to me when going through a hard season. In my life, people have yelled at me or made fun of me for crying. When scripture says that Jesus is GENTLE, this means that he will sit with you in your weariness and he won't say "Get over it", he will instead say "I am here with you". Jesus being humble is him knowing your pain, him having experienced it, and him being with you through it. In this we need to realize the closeness, vulnerability, and comforting presence of our heavenly father. 

    Our God is almighty and powerful, and as humans it can be hard to really see what God has actually done. I think when we stand in front of the throne one day and worship the King of kings, it won't matter the physical act of a miracle. It will matter the heart of God who provided a way to forever with him. In a word study I did on the word Heart, the audience for the passages in scripture often believed that the heart was the center of who you are. Not only that, but the heart is often associated with love. God's love is central to who we are as saved children of him. The center of who God is is the Creator who had a redemptive loving plan for his children to one day return to perfect relationship and worship of him.  Realizing this that God is almighty and powerful, that his heart is what leads him to move, and that he truly knows where he is at work allows me to live in freedom of trying to get to the place of understanding it all. The truth is that we don't need to understand the mysterious ways that God works, and one day we will be able to look back and understand, but God does truly know the works of his own hands.