In my grandparent’s Floridian backyard was the most magical tree. It had enormous girth, low, long branches, and vines that connected from tip to root. And each branch was adorned with luminous, ethereal Spanish moss. I was enraptured by my grandparent’s tree, but especially the Spanish moss. I dreamed of our own backyard in the Tennessee hills ornamented in such a way. I started to pray, inspired by my literal understanding of Old Testament stories. Somehow I’d gleaned that my hopes would become reality if I prayed hard enough. So whenever we left home, I’d pray for the backyard trees to sprout Spanish moss. Upon return, I’d race out back, look up at the big trees with the anticipation that my prayers had been answered. But they never were.
Literalism was embedded within my young, earnest heart. I thought the Bible stories were prescriptive; if Abraham could talk to God then surely God could grant me Spanish moss. Years later, I heard a church testimony given by a woman who prayed for gold teeth and claimed to receive them. I believed it, but also wanted a look into her mouth to confirm my belief. Apparently God gave gold teeth to some, while ignoring the childhood prayers of a girl obsessed with Spanish moss.
I found prayer confusing. I’d asked for the desires of my heart, from Spanish moss to requited love. But God didn’t seem very concerned with my requests. He felt far off; an absent deity. My literal interpretation told me prayer and Bible reading was sufficient for understanding and flourishing. Within the churches I spent time in, a literal interpretation focused on human wretchedness, and urged teenagers to guard their hearts and abstain from much cross-gender interactions (lest attraction give way to burning passion), for men to lead, and women to follow. I grew up viewing the Bible as a rulebook with literal answers and commands for life and living. Literalism created, as Dallas Willard says in The Divine Conspiracy, “a gospel of sin management.”
When actions are policed and teachings focus extensively on human corruption and wretchedness, it often leads a certain kind of literal theology. It affects our very lives, our perceptions of life and wholeness, and the very God we worship. In God in Search of Man, Abraham Heschel says we cannot divorce God from humanity. If humanity is created in the image of God, then humanity contains within itself remnants of the divine. “The idea with which Judaism starts is not the realness of evil or the sinfulness of man but rather the wonder of creation and the ability of man to do the will of God,” writes Heschel. We tend to hold a poor view of human life, our neighbors and ourselves, when we forget the words spoken in the beginning: very good (tov). Life is not only about God, because God is not separate from life.
I wonder if many evangelical Christians have misplaced their God-given creative minds. We’ve attempted to separate the sacred from the secular, even though it’s technically impossible because life itself is sacred, regardless of personal belief. In her book The Very Good Gospel, Lisa Sharon Harper distinguishes between thin and thick faith. “Thin faith creates its own collection of instagram memes that serve as life principles. One’s personal point of view becomes the highest authority. Because thin faith lacks roots, it can be swept away, manipulated, and even marginalized so that it has no bearing on the private or public lives of the faithful.”
Thin faith takes Bible verses at face value, centering theologies on a particular verse or verses that may have little or nothing to do with what we think. Thin faith accepts translations without digging into the agendas of translation boards, and reads scripture through a modern cultural lens without considering how the ancients would have approached the Torah. Thin faith pits Paul’s words against Jesus’s actions, elevating household codes above Jesus’s own behaviors. It ignores the Psalmist’s despair and speaks only of joy and assurance, neglecting text upon text of justice in the here-and-now, looking only to the hereafter. Thin faith is built upon a lack of creative thought and exploration, void of wonder for the richness of texts, the reality of mystery.
There seems to be a misunderstanding of the why that leads to deconstruction (or dismantling, reevaluating, “self-clarification” as Heschel writes, etc.). Many have grown wary of a thin faith, the Instagrammable verses, the growing stories of abuses within the places that should be safest, the failure to acknowledge and give space for doubt, the theology that leads to sin management instead of deeper wonder and love of the Divine.
Peter Enns writes in How the Bible Actually Works, “Those who have a hard time with the God of the Bible can’t be dismissed as faithless rebels against God’s word. Some want to have faith—but they also want to have integrity. They live here and now, not there and then, yet they have this ancient Bible and a Christian faith bound fast to it, and the way forward feels like walking on a razor’s edge between two options—belief in the absurd God or belief that the idea of God is absurd.”
My childhood self possessed a Narnia-esque faith, a belief in the magic of Spanish moss in a climate that wasn’t tropical enough to sustain it. Logic took a backseat to the wonder of plant life that seemed other-worldly. In countless Christmas movies (especially the Tim Allen classic The Santa Clause), the characters have heart-to-heart moments (with sad instrumental background music), and share their tearful stories of when they stopped believing in the wonder and magic of Santa. Over the past couple of years I’ve had far deeper conversations with folks who have grown weary of thin belief and all-consuming literalism. Some have become seekers, others have grown apathetic. I understand it. I understand what it’s like to arrive at the realization that some prayers will never be answered. I’ve felt intense grief as certainty crumbled and doubt swooped in.
Literalism nearly killed my soul. I was hyper-focused on actions I thought would save me, judging those who didn’t follow suit. I grew exhausted, burnt out. How is it a religion that teaches works won’t save is so consumed with saving works? I wanted faith and couldn’t fathom a life without it. Like Enns writes, I wanted integrity, to live and act and make in such a way that inspired, to return to fallow ground and feel the pleasure of God. My faith was thickening, even in the process of questioning. A burgeoning creative mind was leading to a more robust faith. It’s not a before-and-after story, a testimony of miraculous gold teeth or Spanish moss. Rather, it’s learning, a process, a faith sustained by the sacred, creative work of seeking, digging in, holding the unknown with far less literalism, and far more wonder.
Some books that have helped me in the process of re-thinking and developing a more creative mind towards the sacred:
How the Bible Actually Works by Peter Enns
Art + Faith, and Culture Care by Makoto Fujimura
Womanist Midrash by Wilda Gafney
The Very Good Gospel by Lisa Sharon Harper
God in Search of Man by Abraham Heschel
Walking on Water by Madeleine L’Engle
The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
The Wounded Healer by Henri Nouwen
The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard
*I also can’t recommend The Bible Project podcast enough
So good, Sarah! I was raised in much of this style of thinking about the Bible. And while it feels like such hard work to uproot the nasty mess of what needs to burn in my theology, it’s such important work. Thanks for being a fellow guide on that road.
Absolutely beautiful. You spoke everything that is in my heart!