In my final year at theology school we were asked to submit a personal statement of faith.
Now I seem to remember there was some controversy around how one assesses someone's personal faith statement and I don't think I really put a lot of effort into it, evidenced by the fact I can't really remember what I wrote.
I think the concept of faith statements, however, is important. How you define or sum up what you believe will no doubt change over time and can be a daunting prospect to try and think about. Every now and then I come across something someone has said or I have a moment of seeming genius and think I've got it - 'that's what I believe' - encapsulated in a neat little nut shell.
But then, of course, I'll think of a thousand reasons why that isn't quite right or feel that it doesn't cover the scope that I want it to.
The other night I had one of those moments where I thought, yeah, maybe at a base level what I believe kind of boils down to this...
I was reading an article about where our motivation for social justice comes from, about how it's so easy for us to (often unintentionally) end up trying to please God, other people or even our selves in caring for the poor. Giving of ourselves to make the world a bit better. In fact from a Biblical perspective, doing these things is actually the least that is expected (Micah 6:8; James 1:27), but our motivation comes from the fact that we are already loved with a love that isn't earned.
God's love for us is like a father's love for his child, absolutely unconditional. The child is simply loved for being there, for existing. There is a deep connection that only parent and child can share, and because I believe that God in a sense is love, and that love only exists because God first loved, that love relationship is intensified times infinity because God is infinite and cannot be contained.
I am therefore I'm loved.
I also believe in a God who didn't just create in love and forget about us, but is intimately interested and involved in his creation.
Whilst he lovingly gives us free will, he also, like any good parent, desperately wants to be involved in our lives - he wants a relationship with us.
So in the same way that God took the initiative to create a world in love, he also takes the initiative and becomes human. He lovingly limits himself and becomes finite in Jesus. In a sense, he lived a life like any of us live. On another level he lived a life full of hardships and pain that we cannot begin to imagine.
He ultimately dies a criminals death without dignity.
The liturgy (shared prayers and statements about God that we say together) often used at church says that Jesus made, once and for all, the perfect sacrifice for sin.
His innocent death means that we can know God as Father once again if we choose to.
In knowing God in this way, we enter into what we might call 'new life', one where we live in relationship with God through the Holy Spirit. This life is new in that it is a life fueled and motivated by different things than before we got to know Jesus. And it looks different. No one is perfect, but gradually Christians should begin to have their lives shaped to look more and more like Jesus' life (obviously not carbon copies, but to live with the same energy, drive and motives).
This life is ongoing as I believe Jesus' life is ongoing, and not just that. I believe it is a life like no other. Not always easy, but so worth it.
I'm loved therefore I am.
Now I seem to remember there was some controversy around how one assesses someone's personal faith statement and I don't think I really put a lot of effort into it, evidenced by the fact I can't really remember what I wrote.
I think the concept of faith statements, however, is important. How you define or sum up what you believe will no doubt change over time and can be a daunting prospect to try and think about. Every now and then I come across something someone has said or I have a moment of seeming genius and think I've got it - 'that's what I believe' - encapsulated in a neat little nut shell.
But then, of course, I'll think of a thousand reasons why that isn't quite right or feel that it doesn't cover the scope that I want it to.
The other night I had one of those moments where I thought, yeah, maybe at a base level what I believe kind of boils down to this...
I was reading an article about where our motivation for social justice comes from, about how it's so easy for us to (often unintentionally) end up trying to please God, other people or even our selves in caring for the poor. Giving of ourselves to make the world a bit better. In fact from a Biblical perspective, doing these things is actually the least that is expected (Micah 6:8; James 1:27), but our motivation comes from the fact that we are already loved with a love that isn't earned.
God's love for us is like a father's love for his child, absolutely unconditional. The child is simply loved for being there, for existing. There is a deep connection that only parent and child can share, and because I believe that God in a sense is love, and that love only exists because God first loved, that love relationship is intensified times infinity because God is infinite and cannot be contained.
I am therefore I'm loved.
I also believe in a God who didn't just create in love and forget about us, but is intimately interested and involved in his creation.
Whilst he lovingly gives us free will, he also, like any good parent, desperately wants to be involved in our lives - he wants a relationship with us.
So in the same way that God took the initiative to create a world in love, he also takes the initiative and becomes human. He lovingly limits himself and becomes finite in Jesus. In a sense, he lived a life like any of us live. On another level he lived a life full of hardships and pain that we cannot begin to imagine.
He ultimately dies a criminals death without dignity.
The liturgy (shared prayers and statements about God that we say together) often used at church says that Jesus made, once and for all, the perfect sacrifice for sin.
His innocent death means that we can know God as Father once again if we choose to.
In knowing God in this way, we enter into what we might call 'new life', one where we live in relationship with God through the Holy Spirit. This life is new in that it is a life fueled and motivated by different things than before we got to know Jesus. And it looks different. No one is perfect, but gradually Christians should begin to have their lives shaped to look more and more like Jesus' life (obviously not carbon copies, but to live with the same energy, drive and motives).
This life is ongoing as I believe Jesus' life is ongoing, and not just that. I believe it is a life like no other. Not always easy, but so worth it.
I'm loved therefore I am.
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