Honestly thinking (& rethinking) about God, the universe, and everything in between

Tag: rethinking (Page 1 of 2)

Can You Pass the Multiple Choice Test?

(Part One of “Hearing God’s Voice”)

35,000.

That’s what neuroscientific researchers claim is the average number of choices a person makes per day.

Talk about multiple choices!

I’m not the first one to write about this figure. Do a quick Google search and you will quickly see a vast array of articles on the topic related to mental health, decision fatigue, leadership strategies, dieting, creativity, or any number of areas you can think of.

Of course, many of those articles exist in order to provide helpful strategies for overcoming and success in each of these areas, and I’m sure a number of them are helpful.

Few people that I know actually experience true peace.

I’m also certain that anyone who takes a look around at the world we live in will quickly conclude that a large number of people continue to make poor decisions every single day. Likely, if you honestly examine yourself, you will also conclude that there are many decisions you make daily that you constantly question – either regretting past decisions, fearing the consequences of current choices, or anxious about future ones.

Few people that I know actually experience true peace. In fact, I would say I don’t know anyone who doesn’t experience regret, fear, or anxiety on at least some small level every day. While regret can sometimes be good in terms of helping us to make better future decisions, and fear can be warning signals to avoid danger, many times they can also overwhelmingly control us and actually cause us to make future poor decisions – thus, creating a vicious cycle of poor choices, shame and fear, poor choices to cover the shame and fear, more shame and fear, etc.

That 35,000 number, of course, is not just about the big decisions. It has to do with minute choices you make second by second, such as your choice to even click on this article or whether to continue reading past this sentence. A significant percentage are often on a much more subconscious level.

I point this out because I believe these 35,000 choices have a much greater impact on everything than we tend to realize and are ultimately at the root of every single problem we experience today. 

With so many multiple choices to make each day, is there a way to pass this test? Continue reading

Split-Brain and the REAL Reason People are Leaving the Church, Part 2

In July of 2019, Joshua Harris, author of I Kissed Dating Goodbye and the person largely credited with advancing the “purity culture” movement, shocked the evangelical Christian world when he announced on Instagram, “I have undergone a massive shift in regard to my faith in Jesus. The popular phrase for this is ‘deconstruction,’ the biblical phrase is ‘falling away.’ By all the measurements that I have for defining a Christian, I am not a Christian.”

Just a few weeks later, Marty Sampson, worship leader and songwriter for Hillsong, sent a second shockwave as he likewise proclaimed, “Time for some real talk… I’m genuinely losing my faith… and it doesn’t bother me… like, what bothers me now is nothing… I am so happy now, so at peace with the world… it’s crazy.”

Then in May of 2020, Jon Steingard, lead singer of the popular Christian band Hawk Nelson, posted “After growing up in a Christian home, being a pastor’s kid, playing and singing in a Christian band, and having the word ‘Christian’ in front of most of the things in my life – I am now finding that I no longer believe in God.”

Hidden behind this wave of well-known individuals is a growing number of men and women who have quietly slipped away from the church, many simply finding new ways to practice their faith and others leaving behind faith entirely. A significant number of them had spent most of their lives in the church, some of them serving as leaders and pastors, before realizing that they could no longer reconcile their actions with what they truly believed.

In revealing words, Marty Sampson went on to say, “I want genuine truth. Not the ‘I just believe it’ kind of truth. Science keeps piercing the truth of every religion. Lots of things help people change their lives, not just one version of God. Got so much more to say, but for me, I keeping it real.”

Real. A word often cited by those struggling with faith.

In Part 1 of this series I noted what I consider to be the underlying thread behind people leaving their faith communities: people have a need to believe in something that is real and they’re simply not finding it in the church.

Also in Part 1, I explained some of the neuroscience, combined with harmful theology, that I believe has contributed to this, particularly in Western society. I highly encourage you to read it before proceeding, as it will make a lot more sense of what I have to say in the upcoming sections. For those who have already read it, here is a shortened summary: Continue reading

Split-Brain and the REAL Reason People are Leaving the Church, Part 1

I had already been working on an article exploring reasons people in the Western world are leaving the Christian church in significant numbers when I learned about the fascinating case of “split-brain” surgeries – something that totally blew my mind (no pun intended).

In the 1960s Roger Sperry, Joseph Bogen and colleagues performed an experimental surgery, officially known as corpus callosotomy, on multiple patients who suffered from epileptic seizures. The procedure involved severing the corpus callosum which connects the left and right hemispheres of the brain.

Though the procedure is no longer performed today it turned out to be highly successful and, for the most part, patients were able to go on to live normal, healthy lives. But it wasn’t long, however, before split-brain patients noticed some peculiar and fascinating side effects.

One patient reported reaching into the closet with the right hand to pick out an outfit, only to have the left hand pick something different and refuse to put it back. A man found himself going to embrace his wife with one arm while his other arm simultaneously pushed her away.

On a more dangerous level, a female patient relayed that when she was driving her left hand would snatch the steering wheel from the right. She also reported her left hand: unfolding sheets her other hand had folded, closing doors the other had opened, and snatching money back that her right hand offered to a cashier.

In short, because each side of the body is controlled by the two different halves of the brain (the left side by the right hemisphere, the right side by the left hemisphere) these side effects seemed to indicate that the two hemispheres of the brain have two completely separate, and sometimes competing, wills.

So what does this have to do with people leaving the church?

One half of the person’s brain had faith and the other half was an atheist.

Here’s where things get even more interesting. Split-brain patients naturally became the subjects of further brain experiments. Able to selectively control input to each hemisphere, neuroscientists used the opportunity to direct various questions (via input to the left versus right eye or ear, for example) in order to determine how each half separately handles various functions or attitudes.

In one experiment, V.S. Ramachandran reportedly asked a patient, “Do you believe in God?” The response from one hemisphere was “Yes” and the other hemisphere was “No.”

In other words, one half of the person’s brain had faith and the other half was an atheist.

What does this mean? Is our faith biologically controlled and entirely dependent upon whether we are “left brained” or “right brained?” 

My answer is that it’s a bit more complicated than that. But what I hope to demonstrate throughout the rest of this article is what I have come to believe is the root cause of the mass exodus from the church in Western society – we are all operating out of a “split-brain” mode, largely dominated by left-brained only thinking.

Such thinking has infiltrated the Christian church itself for years, creating an unsustainable belief system largely removed from the type of lived-out faith that Christ intended. The consequences are that the jig is up, the dominoes are now starting to fall and people no longer see the God who has been presented as something that is real. Continue reading

Confession: I Know Practically Nothing About God

Confession: I just wrote an entire book trying to explain and define God, but I actually know practically nothing about him.

I hope you will forgive me for it.

Of course, I’m in good company, as plenty before me have tried to do the same.

Add in the fact that each of us individually have all sort of made up our own ideas about God without really having much of a clue and likely shared them with others along the way.

“But wait a second, Steve,” you say, “there’s plenty of evidence out there telling us exactly what God is like.”

But God himself begs to differ:

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:9, ESV)

In context, the “heavens” here refers to the celestial bodies way out in space (planets, stars, etc.) that people in Old Testament times would have observed (at least partially) as they gazed up into the night sky – in other words, the whole big universe.

So just how high is the universe? And how much can we even comprehend? Continue reading

Is Stephen Hawking’s Claim There’s “No Possibility” of God Possible?

Artist’s illustration of how a black hole system could look. Image Credit: Dana Berry, NASA

World-famous cosmologist Stephen Hawking’s newly released book Brief Answers to the Big Questions, compiled from years of speeches, interviews and essays prior to his death, is a fascinating read.

In the very first chapter he tackles the big question of, “Is There a God?” Ultimately, he concludes that the laws of science are such that the universe didn’t need a God to create it. “If you accept, as I do, that the laws of nature are fixed, then it doesn’t take long to ask: what role is there for God?” he queries.

Furthermore, he argues that because it can be shown that time did not exist prior to the Big Bang, there was no time for a cause and, therefore, no God: “For me this means that there is no possibility of a creator, because there is no time for a creator to have existed in.”

He proposes, consequently, that it’s scientifically “possible that nothing caused the Big Bang. Nothing.”

Now, to establish up front, there is a tendency for some people of faith to try to villainize people like Hawking for daring to speak such notions – or to arrogantly try to “shut them down” by proving how ignorant that person really is.

I have no such intentions. I hold the greatest amount of respect for Mr. Hawking and recognize the amazing contribution he has made not only to science in general but to me personally in helping provide a greater understanding of our universe and how it works. I also do not pretend to even come close to holding the intellectual prowess and knowledge that he has.

On his own part, Hawking confesses that he doesn’t “have a grudge against God” and has “no desire to offend anyone of faith.” To me, he is merely attempting to speak truth as he sees it.

That said, I do believe he is ultimately incorrect in his assertions on God’s existence because he, like the rest of us, is the victim of false assumptions about God – many of which have been purported for years by theologians and scientists alike.

The following are the reasons his conclusions fall short:

Continue reading

13 Ways You Make God Too Small and the 1 Reason Why

I previously shared an article titled “We’ve Made God Too Small.” This was based on a thought process I went through and a major revelation that not only changed my life but also sent me on a spiritual, philosophical and scientific journey, essentially leading me to rethink how I think about God.

I also shared in my very first blog article, “Not Gonna Lie,” how I am a hypocrite – because half of what I state here I have trouble believing myself.

It is with that understanding I present the following list. Even though I say “You” I could just as easily say “I.” I have been guilty of every one of these at various points and continue to struggle to this day.

But I also know I am not alone. I have seen this kind of thinking problem in practically everyone I’ve met.

And so I give you…

13 ways you make God too small: Continue reading

I’m a Christian and I Don’t Believe Something is True Because the Bible Says

bible-in-sky-flare

Before discussing the main point of this article, let me be clear up front:

There are no other writings that have had greater impact on my life than the collection of writings we commonly refer to as “the Bible.” *

Though I’m as human as everyone else and often get too busy, too tired, etc. I try to make it a discipline to read portions of the Bible – whether it be a chapter, a paragraph, or sometimes even a single word or sentence if I get hung up on it – every single day.  No other work have I read as many multiple times.

Single readings have literally altered my life.  A single verse forever changed my career direction, certain verses have gotten me through some of the most desperate, hopeless-seeming situations, and a single sentence once literally caused me to quit my job, uproot my family (back when we had two small children) and move to another state without a new job or specific place to live.

I do not regret any of those decisions or moments because to this day I have no doubt that God was behind them and specifically led me to those verses.

And though I think there is much carelessness and confusion when we use words such as “inerrant,” “infallible” and “authoritative” in relation to the Bible, and though frequently passages have been interpreted outside of culture, context, and literary form – often abusively – I do believe there is something miraculous about how the writings have been preserved for us through all these years to be able to read today.

I do believe there is power behind the words.

And I do not take lightly the fact that there are people out there in parts of the world who would give anything just to have a copy and that many have died just for possessing it or for trying to get copies to people who don’t.

With that made clear up front then let me say it…

I do not believe that something is true because the Bible says. Continue reading

Wash

Photo courtesy of Chiceaux Lynch

Photo courtesy of Chiceaux Lynch

It was the most demeaning of tasks, performed by only the lowliest of servants – often slaves in the households of the rich.

The roads were dirty and dusty and likely covered with animal dung.

Thus, with nothing but sandals to wear, one’s feet were often coated in filth.

The hosts would, consequently, provide a bowl of water for cleansing – particularly before a meal in which the guests would lean back on the floor and prominently display their feet.

In ordinary households, guests would wash their own feet; but in wealthier households the lowly servants and slaves would crouch before the honored guests and wipe the grime off for them.

Thus an extraordinary thing happened this particular day when the I Am –

…the very law that had the power to form an entire universe with numerous galaxies billions of light years apart

…the law that had existed since before the beginning of time and would be there to the very end

…the law that was responsible for light and energy and atoms and the creation of life itself

…the most authoritative law there ever was

– rose, removed its garments, wrapped a towel around its waist, bowed down before each of its disciples and proceeded to wash their feet. Continue reading

True Story: The Case of the Missing Groom

Waiting_Bride_at_the_New_Orleans_Museum_of_Art

Everyone has one of those stories: the kind of strange, true-life events you tell at a party that people find hard to believe.  This is mine.

Though I confess some of the specific details over the years have escaped me, I assure you the story itself is real.

Back in the 90’s I worked as a freelance cameraman for a company that videotaped weddings.  One weekend my fellow freelancer David and I set out for what we thought would be a typical day of: capture the bride and groom individually getting ready, front and back camera setup for the ceremony, tape the photography session without getting in the still photographers’ way (or on their nerves because you’re taking away from their business), capture the bride and groom entering the reception, first dance, cutting the cake, interviews with sometimes obnoxiously drunk people congratulating the bride and groom, and get the final moments of people pelting them with rice or bird seed and watching them drive off.

In and out…boom…we’re done.  I hate to admit it, but what was often a very special day for some was pretty formulaic for us.

But this day was different. Continue reading

Must Our President Be Christian? What Even Evangelicals Get Wrong About Separation of Church and State

Bible and flag

“Separation of church and state.”  Few phrases have caused such division and controversy.  From the famous Scopes Monkey Trial to battles over the Ten Commandments on public display to stories of high school coaches praying with their teams, there is no shortage of opinions.

Recently, the phrase has even become part of the dialogue in Republican presidential primaries.  After, I questioned the faith claims and behaviors of one of the leading candidates, several objectors decried, “What about separation of church and state?”

Surprisingly, evangelical Christian supporters of the candidate – ones who in the past have traditionally defended this is a “Christian nation” – have begun using a slight variation on the phrase when they proclaim that we are electing “a commander-in-chief, not a pastor-in-chief.”

But all of this is symptomatic that even evangelicals have become victims of a great misunderstanding about God. Continue reading

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