How much does my voice count, really?

Over 7 years ago, Toby and I tried something new.  It was a new church plant, or perhaps a church transplant.  We found ourselves as members of a smaller, new body of believers.  Now, when you are involved in a larger organization, your voice is just one in a hundred or more.  But when you are in a small organization, your voice can have more impact.  This is both exciting and terrifying to me!  Exciting because I have the opportunity to help build the faith traditions of a new church.  Terrifying because of the greater responsibility.  There was no denominational 'Statement of Faith' to guide us.  God was with us every step, but we had to learn to rely on Him more.  I needed to really figure out what I believe about Christian doctrine and why I believe it.  When I was in high school, my history teacher allowed me to explore the topic of world religions for a project.  I wrote a 35 page paper on it.  Can you imagine reading 35 pages of a 15 year old's ramblings on religion?!  What a good teacher.  This allowed me pick Christianity and know why I picked it.  It allowed me to pursue God in a Christian church for reasons beyond 'that's how I was raised.'  When I went to college and continued to pursue Him, God honored my desire and I began to experience Him in more real and exciting ways.  But finding myself with a teaching gift in a new church forced me to really dig into scripture.  And not just read it but think about how I interpreted the words I read and how sometimes other people interpret it differently.

This stack of books really helped me.  The Systematic Theology books by Wayne Grudem discuss a lot of topics.  Grudem is a true educator; he presents several sides to a discussion instead of only presenting one opinion.  It allowed me to read the passages and pray about which issues I felt were really vital to being a believer and which were small differences.  Spoiler alert: I concluded that many things I have felt strongly about in the past are still valuable to me but I don't think they define a true believer.  There's a lot of minor doctrinal differences out there.

A friend recommended Hanegraaff's The Complete Bible Answer Book to me and I have really enjoyed it.  I don't always find myself agreeing with Hanegraaff's application of scripture, but I love seeing how he applies Biblical principles to modern questions.  His understanding of scripture and literary elements is amazing.  The way he connects common themes from different books of the Bible; wow!  What an inspiration to understand my Bible better. 

The book on top is my most recent book finished.  The Allure of Gentleness encourages believes to prayerfully explore their doubt and allow others to do so.  Dallas Willard handles many topics with logical arguments.  He also drives home to importance of living out a Christ-like life and responding to doubts and questions with gentleness and respect (isn't that what Jesus did?).  Willard's discussion of hell was unlike anything I've ever read or heard.  I'm still rolling it around in my brain. 

Anyway!  If you would like to explore your faith more, I recommend any of these books.  As Willard says, leaps of faith are almost always based on knowledge of God.  No one can know Him fully but we are divinely invited to know Him more.  Ponder and pray and know Him more!