About twenty minutes ago I discovered that one of my Christian heroes may not be a Christian.  I am speaking of artist Akiane Kramarik.  A couple years ago I heard her speak at a conference and was amazed at the pure love she radiated.  As an artist and a spiritual Christian, I had been a bit jealous of her incredible experiences with God, which made mine seem insignificant and boring, and her amazing talent which made me feel insecure in my own.  But when I heard her speak, I couldn't help but deeply admire and love her.  All jealousy disappeared.  She was one of the most incredible people I had ever seen.  Her personality confirmed to me that she had been in the presence of God.  She was so gentle, so inviting, so alive.  She made me feel the way I imagine Jesus might have made people feel back in the days he was walking on the earth.

Tonight I was watching a public television interview with her, and my heart sank to hear that she had tried Christianity and Catholicism and other paths and simply considered herself spiritual now.  I continued to quietly watch the interview until I couldn't take the shock and disappointment anymore.  While I was watching the interview, I hadn't been struck with the same amazement I had when first hearing her.  At first I thought it might be the difference between seeing something televised and in person or that maybe she is just in a different phase in life.  After hearing that she no longer associated herself with the religion I associate with, I wondered if that was why.  It's hard to say one way or the other what is going on.  Other than divine revelation, I can't really know. 

I started searching for confirmation as to her religion and wasn't able to determine too much.  Eventually I landed on a site devoted to reason and debate that seemed to have many atheistic members.  They were debating whether Akiane really painted the paintings and whether or not God was involved.  The more I read, the more frustrated I got.  There are few things more incredibly irritating to me than listening to atheists debate.  It feels like trying to play catch through a glass wall.  You have so much to say, but it never gets across and nothing gets across to you either.  You cannot touch the other's humanity and make a genuine connection.  

As a Christian, there are certain truths that I ascribe to.  They are anchors that make me feel safe.  They help define what I do and do not agree with.  I like them.  I like that the God I believe in has opinions and tells me what they are.  It makes him seem more real, more tangible and more solid.  At the same time, there is a large element of mystery and change involved in practicing my religion.  While there are things I know about God, I often discover that some truths are only accurately seen in connection with other truths, and often I can only see clearly when I am listening.  I read the Bible, it is incredibly familiar to me, but still there are things that don't register or make sense until they are illuminated to me supernaturally.  The truths are like skeletons, wisdom the joints bring them together in a way that makes sense, faith the muscles make them move, The Spirit of God is the blood provides fuel and life, and authority and power the skin that protects.  My understanding and experience of Christianity is utterly complex while still maintaining strong elements of extreme simplicity.  It cannot be defined simply by a doctrine, an argument, a demand for proof.  It must be treated more like a living, breathing thing.  

I hate how debates make us forget that we are people.  Perhaps it is simply that I am more dominantly emotional than logical.  I love my step father, but he is more logical, and while growing up there were many times that he and I disagreed.  I felt trapped, like a fly in a web, trying to untangle myself from his strong logic.  My frustration was immense.  He always won.  And yet he was wrong.  I didn't need to hear what was right or wrong nearly as much as I needed to feel cared about, and if he had been more perfectly right, he would have seen that.  And to his credit, as I grew older, he did.

Questions arise.  My world feels more and more secular every day.  Certain Biblical truths that were seldom challenged when I was a child are now more often than not hotly criticized.  Maybe my feelings that Christianity is the only way isn't what God really thinks.  I mean, Akiane seems to have outgrown those thoughts, and she certainly has more evidence of the presence of God in her life than I think I do.  And yet, just because I am not as talented as her, doesn't mean that I should discredit my entire religious upbringing and much more importantly, my own experience.  While I may not be a prodigy of both art and poetry, and while I may not have had people searching for hours while I experienced years of heaven, I am still just as loved, just as important to God

Why am I a Christian?  Partly it is because how I was raised.  Partly it is because I chose it.  Partly it is because my life has repeatedly shown me small glimpses of God, and I like what I see.  Mostly because I crave his company.  Even when I am afraid or too lazy or distracted to talk to him or listen to him, I don't quit all together.  I don't want to let go of my chance to know God.  Couldn't I be some other sort of believer in God?  Well, bluntly, I like the cross.  Not the torture of the thing, but the security that knows that my access to God is not based on me but on him and his deeply selfless sacrifice.  That Prince Charming has rescued Cinderella, and I am safe, thoroughly completely utterly safe.  If it is not based on me, then I can't mess it up.  It allows me, if I choose to take advantage of it, the ability to take my eyes of myself and how I'm performing and to enjoy being loved.

This last year or two, I have lost a lot of my confidence as a Christian.  I have frequently struggled with believing the lie that I have to prove or earn or behave to be loved.  I've felt like a failure.  All these amazing strides I made over the years...the prophesy, the healing, the faithful Bible reading and time spent feeling connected to God seems to have diminished greatly.  A blazing fire looks more like fragile coals.  I feel sad.  Like the model who gains 50 pounds or the basketball player who hasn't been training hard enough and has lost his stamina and his edge.  And yet I also have hope.  I am not defeated, I am still here in my seemingly small way.  Somehow God is at work behind the scenes and I rely on his confidence while mine feels weak.  

In the meantime, I'm not sure what to do about Akiane.  I guess nothing.  I don't have access to what is going on inside her head, so I guess I'll let her live her life, and I'll live mine.  I'll pray for her that she knows the real God and the truths that he defines himself with.  I figure things like that are best left up to God.  After all, it isn't as if I am the one who created him, and I must defend him and make sure that he is believed correctly.  There may be times that it feels like a good idea to communicate my faith, but I think in this case it is better for me to trust that he knows what he is doing.

And I will probably stay out of debates with atheists.  I doubt most atheists who like to debate are emotional types like me who care first how we are treated and second what is right.  You know, there are so many behaviors that I consider sinful, and yet I often do not speak of them, especially in the presence of those who I think might be doing those things.  I don't want my opinions to make them feel bad or angry.  In my mind I usually separate sin and people.  Sin is an inanimate thing, and can be treated without kid gloves.  People are complicated, logical and emotional, limited, strong, but needing protection and love.  But people who do what I consider sinful are rarely able to hear my opinions on those sins without feeling judged.  I feel somewhat boxed in.  Why is it not understood that while I find fornication to be deeply unpleasant to me, that I do not want suffering for those who fornicate?  I think things are sinful because I think they are bad for people, not because I think people who commit sins are bad.  Why then am I judgmental or narrow-minded or a jerk for simply having an opinion and kindly sticking to it?  I think perhaps it is less about me and more about things that have hurt people in the past.

Well, I feel somewhat better now after having given voice to my thoughts and feelings.  It makes it a little easier to move on and helps quell the urge to throw my frustrated thoughts at an atheist debate blog.  We all know how well that would probably end.  

I have been making comics.