I'm going to admit to something really big. Something hard to admit. Something I have had a difficult time understanding.
I've lost some of my faith. By faith, I mean my Christian faith.
I've been Christian since I was young. In the last ten years, my husband and I have made our faith a much bigger priority in our lives. We introduced our toddler to church while I was expecting our second child and have been consistent church-goers since.
However, at least for me, something changed in the last few years. I was a strong Christian before I lost my sister. I can now safely say that while I am still Christian, it's not the center of my universe. I had an epiphany the other day on why this has happened.
If I am to believe everything in the bible, then I know for a fact that I will not see my sister in heaven. As far as I know, she was not a believer. If she was not a believer, then she is not in heaven. On the day she died, my pastor tried to reassure me that I may not know for sure the level of my sister's faith at her death and that perhaps our God is a more merciful God than we will ever know. It brought me comfort at the time and I've clung to that hope.
But in the 4 1/2 years since I lost Trisha, I have slowly felt my faith slip away. I have gone through anxiety and depression, a lot of anger, I went through counseling, I struggled to find more meaning in my life, I have prayed to exhaustion. But still, no matter how much I turned to God, I felt my faith diminishing.
I am really struggling with the concept that I will never see my sister again, here on Earth or in Heaven. I miss her with every ounce of my being. She was an incredible sister, and is sometimes the only person I want to talk to on my darkest days.
But my faith offers me NO comfort in those moments. If I don't have the promise of an eternal life with her, then how is God supposed to comfort me in my deepest moments of grief? Do I want to continue to believe in God when it is offering me little comfort to get through the worst thing I have ever experienced?
I want to regain my faith, believe me I do. I continue to sporadically attend church and when I am there I am engaged. My husband is one of the strongest Christians I know. I live in a faith-centered community. But I also want to have hope. I want to see my sister again.
Many hugs for you, my friend. I wish I had some answers, or some new way of looking at it. Grief is never ending, it just seems to ebb and flow. I too question my faith in regards to my mom, who was an atheist. I don't know how to reconcile what I believe and what I want to be true.
ReplyDeleteI can completely understand why you feel the way you do. I am sorry about your sister and sad for your loss...Death is one of those things that's so hard to understand, and the idea that non believers don't go to heaven has always been a sticking point for me and something that I haven't always 100% believed or felt right about.
ReplyDeleteI am sure people have given you advice over the years...and I am sure it all came from the right place. Some of it probably made sense....But you do have to find your own peace, your own understanding. Finding that peace is going to be a very personal experience all your own and it may not even include religion or Christian beliefs.
Some people seem to have a very easy time finding peace in their religion, but for me I've never really got the answer or understanding I was looking for.
Again this is only my opinion.
AND I'm sorry is this comes out scattered on my mobile phone and my window is TEEEEENY.
Aunt steph to say that faith and or the determination of souls is based on what religion or faith is understandable but at the same time the bible/torah tells us that we cant know and then it is based by their actions rather than faith… even then we cant know. I compleatly understand. Not a week goes by when i dont miss mama. Papa says we all end up where we are supposed to and it is up to God and even then heaven and hell dont exist in the old testament.
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