What is this?

I thought I might start out this blog with an informal purpose statement.

 

I've been looking for a place to tackle the hard questions in Christian life for some time now. I've found that the average church tends to be much too busy explaining the fundamentals of Christianity to new Christians. Don't get me wrong, this is a wonderful thing; people need to hear the good news. But for me, I've been a Christian long enough that I've heard the same basics over and over and it feels like I'm stuck in first grade sometimes. I also wonder sometimes if pastors are afraid to tackle hard topics because Christians don't always see eye to eye on these things and they don't want to rock the boat, so to speak. I hate to think of it, but maybe they don't even know the answers themselves.

 

I've tried putting a bible study/small group together to achieve this goal, but it has never turned out quite right. There are several factors that stand in the way: Many people don't want to spend time thinking about it and doing research; they would rather have someone else do the work and then teach it to them. That works fine in church settings, like Sunday School or the weekly sermon from the pulpit, but that's not what I'm after; I don't need it spoon-fed to me. In other cases, people wouldn't mind doing the work, they just don't have time to spend doing research, much less get together on a regular basis. And the final problem is that, in order to get some sort of deep discussion going, people need to feel comfortable enough with the people around them that they can admit that they're struggling for the answers themselves.

 

So, here I am on the Internet. There's no need to plan regular meetings at someone's house; people can read and post anytime they want. Anyone who's looking for quick and easy, fill-in-the-blanks bible studies can just keep right on surfing to some other site. And, while it is publicly available for everyone to see, there's a degree of anonymity on the Internet that I hope will help keep discussions as honest as possible.

 

I also intend to turn this into a "team blog", meaning I want to add more people than just me that can post articles here and keep the discussion civil and on-topic. If you're interested in participating, please contact me and let me know.