Six years ago, when I was a Christian, I was in a room at a church with several whose lives had been torn apart by drug addiction. I had gone out of curiosity, to see what I could do to help. According to others at the church, I was a good, decent, well-churched young adult, and I was encouraged to go there because it was thought that I might be able to offer some advice and guidance. Maybe share with them a few Bible verses, give them some insights, and be a kind of role model.
I was not prepared for what I saw. Person after person who talked in that room was depressed, distraught, and disappointed over the “sins” they had committed over previous week. And as some of them talked you could see them clutching, tightly, to their Bibles — far more torn apart and worn than mine. You could see the fervency in their eyes, the desperation in their voices from the thought that this book — if they could hold onto it tightly enough — could save them.
These people were far more devout than anyone in my Bible Study, than the any pastor I had known, than just about any Christian I had ever met. Because the Bible, for them, was not just something you sang songs about. It wasn’t an excuse to have get-togethers in a building and have Sunday dinners afterwards. There was far more sincerity in their eyes than in any of the well-monied or conventionally successful individuals who went to the church. Far more desire to protect their faith than I have seen in any Christian apologist, before or since. Because they thought the problem was that they didn’t believe hard enough that a man came back to life after three days of stone cold death for all the drugs they had ever taken. There was an anguish and yearning there that fueled a deep, deep faith. This wasn’t aesthetics; it was their lifeblood.
After the meeting was over, I went to a bathroom stall, shut the door, and wept. It was too much. It wasn’t fair
I wasn’t a more mature Christian than these people. They were far, far, far more spiritual and committed than I could ever hope to be. And to see them at the end of their rope because of the advice of others like me who didn’t have one iota of what it was like to walk in their shoes, that had an infinitesimal fraction of the fervency they had…that really affected me deeply.
I’m not saying I went to a “health, wealth, and prosperity” church. It wasn’t that — if you had asked anyone in that church whether God had anything to do with finances, they would have insisted that He didn’t (except maybe to mention Dave Ramsey, possibly). Certainly no one at the church would admit to the things I’m saying in this post…
And yet, when I left the meeting, I was told sincerely by another advisor who showed up, “I’m so glad you came to the meeting today. You’ll be such a good mentor for them.”
Because, among that seemingly successful crowd, believe it or not, I was someone who seemed among most sincere. And I was, to some extent, possibly. I prayed in private a lot, I tried to give the glory to God for all I did, I had memorized thousands of Bible verses, I largely depended on the Bible for my everyday life, and so on.
That’s part of why I don’t think thanking God is humble these days, six years later (and an an atheist now), after I’ve had a time to think about this and many other similar moments.
It’s kinda like thanking God for the stuff that makes your life nicer is like saying that God did something special in your life that he didn’t do for others who often seem so much more passionate about being committed to Him. I guess the reason it really bothers me is because that’s not true. I really don’t think you get what you get because some God deemed you to have it. You get it because the world worked a certain way, you did certain things, and that was the result. And even if there were a God and He did deem you to have something, doesn’t it seem a bit arrogant for you to thank God for His “blessing” when your neighbors in third world countries are starving?
I know that may sound offensive to you…but what else am I supposed to think?
Some say, “Well, we can thank God when we have a lot and when we have a little; it’s just God’s plan.”
That seems nice, maybe, when you’re comparing two people who are fairly well off. But is it really humble to insinuate that it’s God’s plan for you to eat a nice meal and it’s also God’s plan to have a little girl in a third world country starve to death? Is it just me, or does that seem a bit arrogant?
Is it really humble to say that your trust in God came through and worked for you when, just a bit farther down on your Facebook timeline, someone who is even more desperately clinging to God than you is destitute and struggling?
It just doesn’t seem humble to me; it seems haughty. I know that’s probably not what you intend, but when I look at it…that’s what it looks like.
And it also seems like a bit of a lie, whether you intend it or not…almost as if you’re saying that belief in God will make a difference, which results in people who believe in God far more than you probably do who get the impression that they are supposed to be struggling while you live a decent life because the God they love and devote themselves to says that’s the way it’s supposed to be…and if you go to several churches, you’ll hear sermon after sermon after sermon advising this — either to 1) simply accept God’s will for your life if you’re destitute, or to 2) just accept that God’s will is not for you to be destitute and struggling — that if you trust in and love Him will give you money.
Both the “thank God for what He decided to give you” and the “follow God and you’ll have what you need” versions of Christianity seem a bit cruel to me.
In looking at the world with an honest, fair mind, it seems that it’s not about thanking and following God…it’s about what you have the ability to grasp, and the way you go about getting it, and the people who help you along the way, along with several other rational, more concrete factors.
So instead of thanking God, I think it’s a bit better to just be honest about the bare-bones of how you got to where you were. Maybe the reason you’re a successful engineer who isn’t on the streets hooked on meth isn’t by the grace of God, but because you grew up in middle-class suburb, never was even offered meth, went to a private school, and got a full ride to Columbia because you studied with the best SAT prep coach in the area. That honesty may sound arrogant if you’re used to thinking that true humility is giving thanks to God, but I have found that it’s actually a bit more helpful and humble, partly because it actually helps uncover the reasons why we got to where we are and shows others how to get there, too. It also shows them that God isn’t picking and choosing where people are “supposed to be” — this isn’t about who is right or who was wrong or who God chose to do what. Rather, it’s about the way the circumstances happened to be.
That honesty can help us look less at what God has supposedly allotted people and look more at the actual factors that enable or dissuade success. It can help give people actual evidence-based solutions instead of ones depending on a God who “works in mysterious ways” that cultivate confusion. It can help us work to make circumstances so that people around us can have happier lives, and it can help people to look more logically at the actual nuts-and-bolts of their circumstances so that they can more logically and productively solve their problems.
In any case, I think thanking a God whose plan seems to be clearly better for some than others doesn’t really mesh with humility very well — it seems more helpful, honest, and humble to use logic, reason, and evidence to determine how you got to where you are and, thus, how others can get there, too — without hoping that God chooses to bless them the way that He chose to bless you.
It just seems like a bit of a nicer, more honest, humbler way to go. At least to this former Christian-turned-agnostic-turned-antitheist.
Makes sense?
[Image Courtesy of Alan Light under Creative Commons License]