Sorry its been so long. Chunks of time are few and far between but I have some now and I want to address some of the things you said in your e-mail.
About the lack of authenticity you feel at church:
This is why I didn't like, still don't like, and never will like the Catholic church. Or the concept of church. Or religion. I hate all of it. Jesus uses the word church twice in the gospels, in reference to the body of beleivers, and never to a building. You answered your own question in your e-mail. Why should people need other people to lead them in worship, in order to know God? They don't. Your faith is personal, and you take responsibility for it. It shouldn't matter what other people think about it. Don't worry about the people at your church, maybe they have faith and maybe they don't, but don't let that affect your faith. Christianity is a relationship with God, who's Word is manifested in the person of Jesus Christ. That's the only guy who we depend on for our faith. Christianity is about Christ, not people who call themselves Christians. I challange you to leave the church, to work out things on your own. There is just as much spiritual deadness and hypocrisy in the so-called church, if not more, than anywhere else in the world. Its great to spend time with people of your same faith, and worship God, and that's why church is awesome, but don't depend on it for your faith. The fact that people feel "closer to God" when they watch you play is a testament to the power of music to carry you away, and put you on another plane spiritually. Yet a feeling in itself is not true faith, and you are correct in being skeptical. And just because you lack faith right now doesnt mean that God can't use your music to affect you in all kinds of things. God uses everything to his ends. Men create pain and spearation from God and each other through their rebelliousness and the evil that they do, but God takes that and repares it and makes it whole and beautiful again.
"Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him! For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."
Romans 5: 7-11
God heals and fixes what we break. Just because we screw things up, or just because we may not be doing something for the right reasons doesn't mean that God can't turn that around and use it for good. When people were preaching the gospel back in the day just to bring Paul down and bring attention to themselves and did so without any real faith, Paul says this:
"But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice."
Philippians 1:18
About your statement: I'm not sure if faith is for everyone...
Religion is not for everyone. It's not really for anyone. It's a human construct, designed by men to try to fit God into a managable box so we can have both God and worldly things at the same time, get our "spiritual high" at church and then go live like dogs the rest of the week. If that is what you are referring to, then your correct, absolutely. But if by faith you mean "a belief in Jesus Christ, that he died for us and lived a life perfectly in accordance with the will of God" then that statement doesn't make any sense. Either Jesus is who he says he was, or he wasn't. Those are the only two possibilities. So, if he was, then faith in him is without a doubt for everyone, because by accepting the Holy Spirit into our hearts, believing that we are reconciled to God, and living life by the example he set for us because we beleive him when he said he was the "truth, the way, and the life", we are set free. If he is not who he says he was, then faith is for no one, because there is nothing to have faith in and there is no power in the things we say that we beleive. And that is what you must decide for yourself, and I challange you to read the Bible and live it out and learn about that power for yourself, irregardless of other people's opinions, for what do they matter! They live for temporal things, transitory things, things that flash and burn and die in a plume of smoke. It's true that a lot of people are weak, that they hide behind their faith and use it as a crutch because they are too scared to think for themselves, yet are not bold enough to actually live out a life in service of God, in accordance with his teachings. They taste neither the rushing highs and lows of money, sex, drugs and power nor the peace and strength that comes from true faith. They are slaves to a law they don't fully beleive in, and slaves to the world around them! How unhappy are people like this. You and I have never been these people. We always have sought after truth. When we lived apart from God, we sought after all of the pleasures of the world, testing each and being disappointed over and over again. We know that there's more to life than that. We both want freedom, and were scared away by church and the Bible and people who lived joyless lives in service of God's law without knowing God. But the follower of Christ tastes life and freedom in its completeness. Everyone's a slave to something. I am choosing to bond myself to the will of God, to righteousness, to eternal Love, and in doing so I free myself from the passions that have held me back for so long. I am happiest in communion with God, worshipping him, talking about him, studying and discerning his will. What purpose to we have here, if not to glorify him?
"What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness."
"I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Romans 15-23b
That right there says it better than I ever could. am by no means am I pretending to be some pillar of godliness here. You know me. But God is righteous, and when I seek him, and join myself to the body of Christ, than I am made holy. And I'm learning...slowly.
