What are your religious beliefs?
About? I don’t know how to answer this question. The general question I hear is: what religion do you associate with? I often associate myself with Christianity. I am aware that some Christians would not allow me or they do not approve of me claiming that name for myself. Sometimes I do not want to claim that name for myself, because of other people who claim it for themselves, and because of the baggage associated with that word. I feel judgmental saying that I don’t want to be a Christian because of other people, but I guess it’s true. Everyone is judgmental at some point. I really enjoy a quote than came to me the other day by Maya Angelou.
‘Someone asked her if she was a Christian, and she asked the enquirer, “Are you a Christian?” And the person replied, “Yes, yes of course.” And Angelou said, “Already? Being there already is unlikely for most of us.”’
If being a Christian implies being like Christ, than few people are so completely like Christ. Maya was trying to give a different connotation to being completely like Christ, and that is something I have not found and that is something that I am not. So although some days, I do not want to be a Christian, other days I hope that one day I will be.
If you’re a Christian, how did you come to Christ?
Again, I’ll stick with the normal or the reception of this question of which I am familiar. I was raised Christian very similarly to how one is raised Jewish. It was my culture. It was my parents’ religion. It was what I was born into. I also had what one may refer to as a “born again experience.” I did choose to be baptized. I have chosen to stay involved with local churches. My initial response to this question was to say that I am still coming to Christ. And to push off of the concept of the born again experience, I believe that I am born again many, many times. And that God is making me new again, and again, and again.
What church do you attend? How are you active there?
I most often attend Shelby Presbyterian Church. I like to think of church as going beyond the walls of a church building. In that sense, the church that I am most often with is a small group of wonderful people within the Gardner Webb University Residence Education program. I could have said about Shelby, even within that church, my church within church if you will, is the Sunday school class I attend. More recently I have been getting involved in a small group at church that I believe will also be a church within a church.
I have began to attend the food ministry that happens in my church building and I think that the people that I meet there are a wonderful example of the church and the kingdom and I’ve very glad to meet them.
Are you active in the community?
Starting with my smallest community, Royster, I am pretty involved, although my involvement is largely supervisory. Outside of that, I’m probably at a medium level of involvement at Gardner Webb and at the Divinity school, more so than some, less than others.
I’m involved in the community of Cleveland County through the Hands need Hands program, which is part of Communities in Schools, and I mentor a nine year old named Patrick. He’s the coolest nine year old I know. (How many do you know?) Maybe just one. We hang out and do fun things. I love him.
I recently started getting involved in the food ministry at my church, which provides meals and emergency food for the people in the community who need it.
I am currently working on volunteering at the men’s homeless shelter in Shelby, the Beacon.
In the larger community, I am making a trip to Miami, Florida next month, with the main purpose of making a community of homeless people feel a little more human than the city is making them feel, especially since the city has forced them to be homeless. I’m going with three other guys, and we hope to make, or to start to make some change in how the city treats them. (Click here to find out more)
How do you witness to people?
I’m going to say that I don’t, and I consciously don’t. I don’t have anything against evangelism per se, but I am uncomfortable with the connotations that I most often find associated with evangelism and witnessing. As opposed to witnessing, I want to share myself with people, and my whole self, as much as I can. Part of who I am is my relationship with God, and so that comes out eventually. I am not going to force it out, and I might not even massage, persuade or finesse it out. If in certain relationships it never explicitly comes out, than I can still have shared what God wanted me to share with them, which is love and the gospel.
What is your political standpoint/Where do you stand in politics?
On the outside. I am sometimes, unfortunately, uninvolved and ignorant of politics. Other times, I am purposefully uninvolved in politics. Given time and discussion, I do take stances on “political issues”. But I do not have an overarching political stance.
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