a friend's journey

I spent some today talking with a work friend today. He was born and raised a charismatic, fundamentalist Christian (his words). He was raised in the home of a pastor of those churches. He became a teacher and a pastor within that environment.

When we first met it was 2003 and we were both in our first year of being Personal Bankers for BofA. I was just kinda going sideways (probably not possible) in my Christian life and he was "on fire for for God". He was preaching and teaching and I remember him coming in one Monday and telling me a story of a lady who was miraculously healed during their Sunday morning service that weekend. I remember being happy for him and the feelings that had created for him and privately knowing that God didn't do that type of thing...especially for those wacko charismatics. Jason was the picture of holiness and righteousness.....never drank, smoked, cursed, went to rated R movies, looked at women the wrong way, etc...

Fast forward 5 years and Jason is now a professed Atheist. I don't have enough room to go through the journey that got him to this point but I do want to tell you that it wasn't anything bad. No cheating wife, no bad stuff with church or church members, no fall out with his mom or dad.....nothing to "blame" for what has happened.

I also want to let you know that I'm not worried about him at all. I believe in a really big God and I also believe that God has big plans for Jason. As I told one of our mutual friends today, Jason is a very intelligent person with a high IQ and he was probably past due for something like this. He is still very young (25 or 26) and has never (until recently) had his rebellious phase or a single time of questioning the doctrine and theology that has been handed down to him as a third generation pastor.

I'm actually very excited for him because he is still very much seeking truth and if I know Jason and if I know (even a very little bit) about God, I know that the faith that he will come out of this with will be something real, transformative, sustainable and reproducible....something he hasn't had in the past.

I ran across this quote and found it somewhat appropriate:

Man can certainly flee from God... but he cannot escape him. He can certainly hate God and be hateful to God, but he cannot change into its opposite the eternal love of God which triumphs even in his hate.
Karl Barth