I am a Christian.

If you're like me, you may have spent a large portion of your adolescence in the wonderful establishment that is youth group. No place else can you learn/make up hand motions to even the most reverent of worship songs, get about forty different t-shirts with the most random religious references known to man or tarnish the sanctity of the church by playing an all-night game of capture the flag in the chapel. One of my favorite things I learned from youth group however, was a particular song. I'm sure a large portion of you know it...."I am a C. I am a C-H. I am a C-H-R-I-S-T-I-A-N...." and, well...you know the rest. As a super-cool youth group kid, we would make up variations of this song that changed the letters in to words such as " I am a Chicken. I am a Chicken-Ricken. I am a Chicken-HIcken-Ricken-I-Sicken-Tickin-I-A-NIcken". I mean, I was really, really cool. 

What's crazy is I feel like sometimes when I tell people I'm a CHRISTIAN, they hear that I'm a ChickenHickenRickenISikenTickenIANicken. They hear the general gist of what I'm saying - but end up filling in the details with their own agenda. They automatically substitute their own notions, beliefs or ideas about being a Christian in to my religious affiliation, and then expect me to comply to their standards. I'm a Christian? I must be judgmental. I'm a Christian? I must be super-pure and above reproach. I'm a Christian? Surely I must carry my Bible with me at all times and know at least 100 verses. How am I supposed to know how anyone else defines my beliefs or affiliation? Sure there is doctrine and Biblical basis for a few things, but most of it is a muddy, gray area - and excuse me if I offend anyone in saying so - anyone who views Christianity as a "black and white" life style really should re-read....well, the whole Bible. That's the beauty of what a perfect God created in our beliefs, breathing room and grace to accommodate the strict conservative AND the most liberal. Why would we change our God-given aptitudes and interests to adapt to a socially defined idea of the perfect Christian?  

This idea that being a Christian can mean one lifestyle and one set of world-views leads me to make a lot of qualifying statements when trying to share my personal outlook on life. "I'm a Christian...but" gets thrown out a lot in my conversations with non-Christians (and other Christians as well). I find myself waging an uphill battle against every stereotype, prejudice and notion that someone has formed of Christians because I personally take a more unorthodox route to my core beliefs. Don't worry, though - at the center of it all, I still hold true to the good stuff - love, our sinful nature, the beauty of grace and the call to sanctification - but the rest, the stuff that is the gray areas, I've made up my own mind about...regardless of current cultural norms (at least I'd like to think). 

Notice how I really haven't shared my beliefs on this post. Because after years of having deep, trying (yet, rewarding) conversations - I've become a bit gun-shy at pulling out the Ch-word. I prefer to let my life do the talking, my love do the ministering and my heart to do the evangelism. Words and notions are hard things to navigate, especially with such a loaded topic as religion. Life is messy, why shouldn't my Christian walk and beliefs follow suit? Though even with the hesitance, I still relish the chance to share my heart with other people. I know I may be misunderstood, judged or condemned, but there is power in knowing who I am regardless of the approval of anyone else. There is power in proclaiming the sweetest, most real thing I have in my life - and there is power in finding truth and understanding in someone else's beliefs, regardless of how different they are from mine. 

I am a Christian. I am messy and complicated, even in my beliefs. I am a CowHowRowISowTowIANow.

I am alive.

Alternate title to today's post: I am dying. (I refrained from making it my actual title, due in large part to a wish to abstain from needlessly worrying all of my facebook friends.)


So don't worry — my suspected brain tumor has not become a reality...yet. When I say I'm dying - I simply mean that I'm on my way off this planet, one day at a time.

But aren't we all? Every day we live means one less day we have to....well, live. It's as simple as that. We are all steadily moving towards death — some sprinting towards the inevitable, while others are slowly marching their days down. None of us know the day we are going to die, yet we spend countless hours obsessing, worrying and guessing about when and where death will meet us. Why, as humans, do we have such an undercurrent of fear for the one thing that is guaranteed in life? Is it our fear of the ultimate unknown? Fear of loneliness? Fear of the pain associated with death? Fear, fear, fear. What other reason is there to explain the overriding obsession we have with death?

Some of you realize I'm outlining the primary argument for existentialism. Being the wife of a self-proclaimed "existential psychotherapist" - I may think of this subject a bit more frequently than your average Jane. I would even go as far to say this is something I think about a lot. You see, I want to be able to live a life free of fear, and I would venture to say death is the root of most of my fears in life. Fear for my finances stems from a fear of not being able to be provided for, which comes from a fear of starvation - which, you guessed it, is founded in a fear of death. I want to look at the worst possible scenario - death - and find it isn't so scary, and that my decisions are defined by more than fear.

Now, I'm not trying to give an electronic plea for suicide prevention. I am simply saying I am not (well, try not to be) fearful of death. Why would I be scared of something everyone ever has failed to overcome? I want to be able to take the fear of death and transform it in to a motivation to live. Because of the threat of death, our lives become valuable, commodities to be cherished and valued.

I am alive. I am dying....but I'm not dead yet. I plan on doing a lot of living in the mean time.