Latest / Clear Path Christianity / Why I Didn't Walk Away from Christianity || CPC Podcast Ep. 21
Transcript
- Cole Crone: I mean I don't necessarily have anything like super profound and I'm gonna I'm gonna try not to be snighty about some of some of my commentary on this particular topic. because I I have I have seen a lot of videos and podcasts and Instagram shorts and and or reels and other sorts of things. about people who talk about their experiences leaving either cults or high control religious groups or any anything like that. And it it seems that people generally take two paths. And I find one of the paths to be super annoying. Which I know is like not, I mean, obviously. I mean I'm a fallen person. I you know, obviously. And the other path is the other path I understand a lot. a lot better. I'm gonna try not to like give away which one I think is annoying and which one I don't. But it seems like people that have a bad religious experience, particularly in Yeah, certain types of high control religious systems. They tend to fall into a kind of like relativism, moral relativism, a hyper subjective worldview, sort of where it's kind of like a live and let live or you do you, or hey man, if it works for you, that's great. You know, every if if your worldview works for you, then that's that's fine, man. Stick with it. doesn't work for me, but that's fine. You know, that's that's my truth. And then there's people who just go to like agnosticism or even further into nihilistic atheism or something like that. And I mean, for me and for us, our our path doesn't really look like either of those things. Like we we left a cult and found I mean, as of late, or as of as of the recording of this, I mean, who knows, in the next few years Islam's kinda taken off population wise, but like in the next few years it could be different. But I think Christianity is still the number one religion in the world via well, as in terms of like just population. And of course, a lot of those people probably aren't taking anything the Bible says seriously, or actually living the religion they claim to be a part of, but At the very least, they're people who identify themselves as Christian. So to leave a cult or a high control religious system and to find mainstream Christianity I is not something I hear very often. And so I do think it's an intri we have kind of an interesting story. And I I do have a relatively clo close friend who went that direction, who kind of went the atheistic direction. And I know people who have gone the other direction to the kind of hyper subjective direction. So I kinda want to talk about here why Christianity in particular appealed to me when I came from a group that claimed to be Christianity. Why didn't coming out of a group that claimed to be Christianity sour me on Christianity as a whole? And the first the first reason is that what I grew up with wasn't Christianity. I I I grew up in a in a counterfeit Christianity. it it was counterfeit because it had no biblical basis, for one thing, and I have talked about that on this podcast sort of at nauseum. And two, it had no historical basis. It was a relatively new group. historically speaking. And so it it seemed to me that w I had equated my church with Christianity growing up. And then when I discovered what Christianity really was, it wasn't that I got soured on Christianity. It's that I got soured on the the f the the fake, the counterfeit that I was sold. And so the analogy that I have prepared To help to to possibly explain this a little better, is that imagine that you were given a $100 bill, which you later discovered to be a fake, a a counterfeit one hundred dollar bill. You wouldn't then conclude that money isn't real. Right? You would just go, Well, that I just it was just a fake hundred dollar bill. There there is a such thing as a as a $100 bill. Just the one that I had happened to be carrying around isn't wasn't real. And so you you would more likely conclude that someone had scammed you than that money isn't real. Or that the idea of currency isn't real. And so my crisis looked a little bit different than the many of the others that I hear about or read about. In that it wasn't a matter of me asking, is Christianity true? But rather it was me asking what what is Christianity? And so that that was the that was the first thing. obviously in order to discover what Christianity is, I had to go back to the source texts and and ask and actually explore them for myself, which conveniently enough was something that was frowned upon where I came from. And for good reason. I mean, if you're trying to sell people a fake, you don't want them familiar with what the real thing actually is. And so I didn't leave my religious community because I stopped believing the Bible. I left because I actually started to take the Bible seriously. So a lot of people that grow up in some form of religious system that associates with Christianity or claims to be Christianity, they will often find the Bible difficult to believe. Whereas I I went the other way around. I I actually I actually found the Bible to be more believable as I discovered it. It just didn't it just didn't comport with what I had been raised believing. And so just as I mean a few examples, the Bible talks about teaching taking place in the church, and my church had none. The Bible talks about preaching, the church preaching the gospel. my church didn't do that. baptism was another thing. There were no baptisms. in my church. Another thing, communion. Communion was not given in my church. there was no biblical form of church leadership. And so and these are these are just a few things that my quote unquote church didn't have that every church in the Bible did. And so I I kind of began to realize that I needed I needed to reject the lie that I had been told that the reason that the Bible was being kept from me is because I wasn't capable of understanding it. Once I rejected that lie and I opened up and began to actually explore the Bible, and began to see the disconnect that that was there, that was when I actually began to realize what the situation was. And and in doing so I discovered that the the Bible wasn't the thing that I had to overcome. It was the things that the Bible was exposing, the problems that the Bible was exposing in my community that claimed to be Christianity. Now another another aspect of this is I'm a always have been a huge history nerd, and my church basically had no history. no historic connection to the first century or in fact the first eighteen centuries of church history. There was not only is there no overlap between my religion, the religion I grew up in, and The Bible, but there was no connection between my religion and the religion practiced by the earliest Christians, all the way up into the modern era. So the the story that the the story that I was basically told is that you have the time of the apostles and then you have a a long blank space and then you have a few guys that brought the apostolic era back about 150 to 200 years ago. Now the the problem with that is that If you actually look at the history, you see that that is just impossible. when you look at the history for yourself, you you see that you you can't have this kind of restoration movement. and then there there have been Christians that have carried on the apostolic teachings from the beginning. And so it if you're going to make the case that there was a a Parenthesis, if you're going to propose the parenthesis theory, you are the one making a positive claim, and therefore you are the one that needs to have evidence for said claim. And my church presented none. And frankly, I find the positions of other restoration movements to be equally wanton when you actually explore the historical development of Christianity. So you have a f a few. a few things that are commonly taught that or commonly presented in our world today, Versions of versions of which are are presented today and I found myself equally unconvinced by each one of them. one that you hear is that Paul corrupted the message of Christ. That's one that you hear a lot today. I I find almost no evidence for that personally. you have people saying that the early church corrupted the faith. So if it wasn't Paul that corrupted it, maybe it was the early church that corrupted it, or that this the Catholic church and people mean different things when they s say that. I think there's I don't think most people even know what they mean when they say that. They just it's just easy to take pot shots at the Catholics. So they say the Catholic Church unfairly silenced opposition. Again, these are these are positive claims and positive claims require evidence. And the evidence that is out there from my from my for my money is is lackluster at best. What what I found instead was continuity with the scriptures. I found beautiful creeds. I found a surprisingly united church, even through several r really rather serious schisms. I found faithful believers across the centuries. And I the more that I learned to appreciate them, the more I realized that well, there actually is. one unified body of believers that has transcended time and space for two thousand years. And so not only did I see good historical evidence for for one historic faith, but I I was moved by the prospect of being a part of that two thousand year history. Another thing that I've discovered that was lacking in my upbringing, and another one of the reasons why I didn't abandon the idea of Christianity just because I'd been sold a a fake, is that I actually I actually discovered the gospel and actually discovered what the gospel is. What is this message that people have been preaching for for two thousand years all all over the world in pretty much every known language for the last two thousand years? So when I when I began to read the Bible and study the writings of Christians throughout history, I began to become more and more enamored by the person of Jesus Christ. Furthermore, I began to contrast the person and work of Jesus Christ with the figures of other religions. And there was basically no comparison to be made. I'm not I'm not trying to like slag anybody off or take shots at anybody's religious views. Trust me, I've I've had some wild ones myself. But the The the message, the message that was given r really hooked me. I I was hooked by the gospel that had been preached throughout the centuries. aspects of Jesus Christ like his divine nature, his sinless life, his willingness to seek out the marginalized. he he's not He's not just another guru. And no matter what certain types of quote unquote Christians might want you to believe, there's actually something about him that almost can't be explained. We don't really have categories today for someone like Jesus Christ. He doesn't fit into our modern boxes. Now foremost I discovered that Jesus Christ was the only religious figure Who was actually willing to enter the brokenness of our world and to take responsibility for it, even though it wasn't, even though he's not at fault. Right? he's not the one who made us go wayward, right? Jesus isn't the one who said, You guys have to make a mess of everything. Jesus isn't the one who came up with the idea of oppression, and lies and deceit and coercion and all all of these things that I c seem to be part and parcel of human existence. Things that have ex things that have taken place in every civilization that has ever existed throughout all of the annals of time. And yet he was willing to come into that and to take responsibility for that. And and no other god on offer was willing to do that for his creatures. And so the the that that began to help me to really focus on him and to see him as the hero that We all need. And then again, the more that I learned about grace and justification and assurance and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, all of these things were just were just icing on the cake for me. whereas what I was brought up in was performance, very fear oriented. affiliation with a particular organization, those sorts of things. So my confidence in Christianity grew the more I learned about the person and work of Christ and the beauty of the gospel message and and all of its component parts. Now the the next thing was was big for me and it was actually something that was odd. It it it wasn't something that I expected. And it it's the idea of freedom of inquiry and investigation. Now, if you're from a cult or a high control religious group, you know this, but I'll say it anyway. You're not allowed to ask questions. you're you're not allowed to challenge beliefs. You're not allowed to look at evidence. Evidence is hidden from you. you you are told and expected to blindly believe everything that the group asks you to. So when I started to really study Christianity, I found a rich history of thinkers who actually was ac had actually done the thing that I was doing at the time. And that was to actually look at the claims and the defense given for those claims. And so I I discovered the work of people like Justin Martyr, Saint Augustine, Saint Anselm. Thomas Aquinas, William Paley, clear up through the modern era, people like C.S. Lewis, William Lane Craig, John Lennox, on and on and on the list goes. I I I'm seeing all of these people reading their works and watching their debates online and all that stuff. And I'm just like, man, seems like Christianity is mopping the floor with all of the other worldviews that it comes into contact with, despite the fact that. The people are actually looking for what is true. They're they're actually examining the evidence rather than just blindly trusting spurious sources. So this this wasn't interestingly, at least for me, this wasn't something that was just taking place online or in academia. But it it there were there were many, many just run of the mill Christians that I met who were actively engaged in the pursuit of truth. So you know, pastors and teachers and and Yeah, other leaders were encouraging people to read the Bible for themselves, to ask questions, to check sources, to really test the teaching. And that was something that I didn't I just assumed wasn't going to be allowed because of my upbringing. And then the the last thing for me is just in the final analysis, for my money, it's just the best explanation on offer. Christianity is just the best explanation on offer for my money. now, like like any good truth seeker, I spent an extensive amount of time exploring alternative worldviews. asking questions like, what if there is no God? Right? What what if what if atheism is correct? what if it's impossible to know? Right? What what if what if an agnostic position is actually the most safe, logical, reasonable position to take? what if another religion makes more sense of the world? But for me, I came to greater and greater faith in Christianity by looking at some of its best defenders and actually looking at not Not the worst arguments for a particular worldview, but actually looking at the best arguments for a particular worldview. And thankfully, there are there's a rich history of Christians going up against other worldviews, whether you like to read books or watch debates online like I do. I I was I watched debates for just a few to name a few. You have William Lane Craig versus Christopher Hitch. Christopher Hitchens, you have Dawkins versus Lennox, you have various debates, particularly taking place now between Christians and Muslims, between Christians and Mormons, between all these different groups, all these different worldviews debating online in for the whole world to see and to assess. And time and time and time again, I found the the the evidence for Christianity, his biblical historical Christianity to be just the best explanation on offer over and over and over again against every other worldview that it has gone up against. Now, f this was not merely an emotional endeavor. Mere Christianity, as as C. S. Lewis called it, became more convincing to me in a number of ways, from intellectually, historically, morally, existentially, At every level that I assessed it, I found it to be to c to continue to come out on top and to be the best explanation for the facts as I understand them. So I'm I'm not going to get into all of those different areas here or present arguments here. There's a thousand people on YouTube doing it and doing it better than I ever could. But suffice to say I was I was pretty sold. And so I I I understand and want to be sensitive to people who come out of cults or other high control religious groups that sold themselves as Christianity specifically. I can understand those people coming out of groups like that and wanting nothing to do with Christianity. Or wanting nothing to do with any particular religious system. If if your only experience of Christianity or religion more generally is manipulation, fear, isolation, control, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, it's understandable that you're ready to just clean your hands, wash your hands of the whole affair. But that that that wasn't that wasn't my story. I I didn't discover that Christianity was false. I discovered that what I had been taught about Christianity wasn't actually Christianity at all. So thankfully for me, the the the collapse of the counterfeit is what provided a path to the real thing. So if if you're tuning in to this podcast as as we as we restart things a little bit here. And you were someone who has walked away from a harmful religious environment. I I want to I want to encourage you to not reject Jesus because someone misrepresented him. don't don't judge Christianity solely based on its counterfeits. Judge Christianity based on the person of Jesus Christ, based on the biblical record, based on the faith that has been confessed by Christians throughout history. Sometimes the greatest obstacle to finding Christ isn't leaving religion. It's learning to distinguish Christ from the counterfeit that claimed to represent.