Asking for prayer and a way back to Jesus
Hi there! I've been really enjoying following this subreddit, the discussion is so interesting and often encouraging. A quick bit about me, i'm a 42 year old mom, was raised in the LCMS lutheran church and went to lutheran school for primary and high school. I went to a state university and started attending various evangelical/non-denominational churches at that time. ECT and penal substitutionary atonement were at times explicity or implicitly taught at most of them, and eventually I developed a very fear-based and shame-driven spirituality. I loved Jesus, but was pretty ambivalent about the Father, and just felt better if I didn't think too much about any of it. Sometime in my 30s a close friend told me that they were no longer Christian, and it was the first time I was forced to confront my beliefs about God and ECT and after much wrestling i arrived at some peace believing that God loved my friend unconditionally and would not send them to hell, although how God would "win them back" was beyond my knowledge or control. A year or two after that I had my first kid and continued to wrestle. By the time I had my second kid I was moving into my "deconstruction" phase, where I was finally able to shatter some of the lies I had taken on as truth. I read Brad Jersak and similar authors, and for a while I was delighted to find a faith in Christ that truly saved all. But I had a lot of built up anger and resentment (mostly towards the church, but also somewhat towards God) and so my deconstruction continued until eventually I no longer felt a close pull toward Jesus as a savior or divine (although I still revere and respect him and believe there is *something* about him...) I think partly it was the illogic of the trinity, specifically the dynamic of a father and son (no mother?) and then also the holy spirit... I'm obviously not the first to struggle with it, but at this point in my life I was so exhausted with struggling (and no longer fearing eternal damnation) so I just let it all go. I've been kind of coasting in that place for about 7 years now. I feel like I'm in a much better place as far as my mental health, feeling much less shame and fear. We still attend a christian church and I still consider myself christian (maybe just stubbornly refusing to give that label up) but if I'm honest i haven't felt a close connection to Jesus for quite a while. But I've also felt dissatisfied staying in the ambiguous (and still somewhat angry) agnostic desert. I still believe in God, and every so often I've had the thought that maybe it *is* blasphemous to all Jesus God. But most recently I've realized that if God is patient, unconditionally loving, and understanding of our human limitations, that even if Jesus *wasn't* God, that God could handle us treating him as such. But that if Jesus *is* God, well, I don't want to walk away from that, not really. But at this point, it really feels like trying to put the cat back in the box. How do I get back to Christ? I pray, I read scripture when I can handle it (I have a lot of baggage around the Bible after my upbringing)... it just feels impossible. I welcome any wisdom, any prayer, any tough love, anything you feel moved to share. Thank you!