Why am I a Christian?

Prelude:
This thought omits a base believe that God actually exists; but it’s there. That’s a whole other thought process.

In the period of preparation for loving God, the soul loves in emptiness. It does not know whether anything real answers its love. It may believe that it knows, but to believe is not to know. Such a belief does not help. The soul knows for certain only that it is hungry. The important thing is that it announces its hunger by crying. A child does not stop crying if we suggest to it that perhaps there is no such thing as bread. It goes on crying just the same. The danger is not lest the soul should doubt whether there is bread, but lest, by a lie, it should persuade itself that it is not hungry. It can only persuade itself of this by lying, for the reality of its hunger is not a belief, it is a certainty. – Simone Weil

To say I’ve become disillusioned with my faith would be an understatement. I can’t seem to make heads or tails of any faith or philosophy in my life right now, yet; I’m still going to chalk myself up as follower of Christ. Why? First and foremost because I want to believe Christianity is true; I want to believe in that hope. But even I’ll admit any belief system has to be based on more than desire. I’ve made myself sit down and wrestled through everything I’ve been taught to believe and everything I’ve been told to believe and even things I’ve been taught I shouldn’t believe I’ve come up with the following reasons why I am a Christian:

1. I borrow some faith from others.
To gain and keep someone’s respect could easily be one the most difficult achievements for me in this life. There are a handful of strong Christian men who have had a profound impact on my life. These men are deep thinking, intelligent and are not just quick to believe in stories. In a way, my Christianity is borrowing some of theirs. I could not walk up to any one of these men and tell them that I think what they believe is nonsense. They have earned my respect in life, and as such, their beliefs have gained credibility.

2. I see the inherit and obvious evil in the world itself.
There is a consistent and persistent longing in my being for something more than what I’ve seen. The older I get, the more I’m realizing that things are really “screwed up” (Really deep, philosophical term there). There is an inherit evil in the world itself that is not based solely out of the actions and attitudes of man. There are obvious outside forces impacting situations, and they are not for the better. Accepting this truth pops the bubble of the best laid plans of any socialist group, the reincarnation cast system, the Buddhist path to enlightenment, and any humanistic world system that teaches: “If we can get are act together, we’ll all be OK.” (I’m paraphrasing, but you get the idea.) This thought points toward the authenticity of the Bible and it teachings to expect bad things to happen. Expect being the key word.

3. The amount of accuracy in which the Bible can define my personal heart.
I am a man at odds against himself. I have both good and evil desires; desires equal in stature and strength which I give into both regularly. The good I want to do, I seldom do. The evil I want to despise, I can’t give up. My heart is wicked. My eyes are lustful. My mind is selfish. My spirit is arrogant. When I let me self control go; my very nature is to fulfill my own selfish desires. It is not in spite of this I believe, but rather it is because of this I believe. The Bible accurately and extensively accounts for how evil my own heart is. I cannot get this account from any other source. Actually, most every other world religion or philosophy I’ve searched into wants to confirm the opposite for me. That is, they want to tell me that I am OK, that I am basically good in nature… despite my all actions to the contrary.

My faith is dangling by these 3 threads. Are they enough? For now, they appear to be so.