The Co-opting of My Christian Faith

There's this thing that I found a few years back... this feeling of peace. I wouldn't go so far as to claim it as Nirvana, but it is perhaps Nirvana adjacent. I definitely don't go about every moment of every day experiencing total serenity, but I have taken hold of something that I feel is particularly poignant and — through practice — have found it not terribly elusive.

Imagine the complete absence of fear, anxiety and suffering — all the things that might trouble the soul of a human being sort of dissolve and fall away — all that remains is a transcendent peace. I didn't really find it in Atheism, Buddhism, traditional Christianity or any other popular religious or secular worldview. The seeds of my peace began in an often overlooked passage of the Christian Bible, and so I suppose you could argue that my peace originated in Christianity, but I wouldn't necessarily call what I now hold as my peace wholly Christian.

A little background on me: I grew up in a practicing Christian home. We went to church every Sunday and I became a "born again" Christian in my teen years. As I've navigated adulthood, I've moved away from literal interpretations of scripture and, while I derive value from the lessons biblical stories teach, I've given myself the latitude to throw out anything that makes no moral sense (i.e. genocide: [Deuteronomy 7:1-6, Deuteronomy 20:16-17], forcing women to marry their rapist: [Deuteronomy 22:28-29]).

Now, to anyone who hasn't grown up hearing Bible stories, I'm about to take a somewhat deep dive into parts of the Biblical text I grew up learning about. I fully realize that this may be the point at which I lose a large part of my audience, but I feel as though this is all going to make sense in the end for everyone I'm speaking to now — atheist, Christian or anyone in between.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Christian ideology, most Christians hold to the idea that the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus is the source of a Christian's salvation. The narrative being, if you believe that Christ is the Son of God and that he died for your sins (i.e. Took the punishment you deserve for acting in a sinful manner [Romans 6:23].) you become "saved" and Christ will prepare a place in heaven for you so that when you die, your soul will be transported to a place free from suffering (John 14:1-3). This is the tradition I grew up believing.

However, the foundation of the peace I now experience originates in Luke 22:39-44. This is the passage that describes the hours just prior to Jesus' crucifixion. In this story, Jesus and his disciples go to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray, and Jesus is in a bad way. He's anxious and afraid of what is to come, because he knows that in a few short hours he will be put to death. Jesus separates himself from his disciples to pray privately and pleads with God the Father to be spared the death he knows is before him. He prays fervently and he receives an answer from God. The answer is "No". The passage states that an angel appears before him to strengthen him, but the answer to his prayer is "No".

There's this "blink and you'll miss it" moment in the story where Jesus shifts his focus off of himself and on to everyone else. When he entered the garden he was focused on himself, and was burdened with fear and anxiety; but when he leaves the garden, he is no longer fixated on himself and what's about to happen to him. Instead, his focus is on everyone around him.

We see this shift in focus as he departs the Garden of Gethsemane. When the centurions come to arrest him, one of Jesus' disciples cuts off one of the centurion's ears with a sword in an effort to protect Jesus. Jesus tells the disciple to stop and heals the centurion (Luke 22:51). At Christ's trial Christ almost appears meek and offers little to no rebuttal in reply to his accusers (Matthew 27:11-26). At his crucifixion, he looks down and sees his mother and advises John, one of his disciples, to care for her when he is gone (John 19:26-27). Jesus shows compassion for the penitent criminal being crucified along side him (Luke 23:39-43), and finally, Jesus prays to God to forgive his murderers even in the midst of his own murder (Luke 23:34). In short, the Jesus that departs the Garden of Gethsemane is almost a completely different person than the Jesus that entered it.

Youth ends when egotism does. Maturity begins when one lives for others.

Hermann Hesse

Over the course of several years, living for others gradually became the "salvation" I gravitated toward... more so than the traditional death, burial and resurrection of Christ. I found that the "hook" to the traditional salvation narrative was ego... or the preservation of it; and that just didn't appeal to me. My existential perception has shifted... My whole orientation toward life has shifted. I now feel like a leaf on a tree: here for but a season and then I'll be gone. While I'm here I can either nourish the tree of which I'm a part — my family, my community, my co-workers, my friends — or I can focus on nourishing myself. I've been intentional in my effort to live for others.

In my next post, I'll describe in greater detail this gradual mind shift that has brought me peace.