I don't have to worry about aging (Part 1)

There is also an aspect of the process of aging and decay that carries promise in the Christian world view: For the Christian, the outlook is not predominantly one of decay and frailty but of growth and maturity. Again, when I say "Christian" I have the "ideal Christian" in mind, the "Jesus-like Christian," the one who most Christians try to aspire to with various levels of success. 

The reason for that outlook is ironically based in failure. As I've said before, Christians believe that throughout all of history there has been only one person who lived a life devoid of any shortcomings: Jesus. And the "history" in this case includes the future. According to Christian belief, there never has been anyone else who, solely based on their ability, has been able to live a life completely pleasing to God. And there never will be. For Christians who are following Jesus as the ultimate model of how to live life, this means that we will never be completely successful.

I admit that this in itself doesn't sound particularly attractive. But another way of looking at this fills this very same concept with hope.

Christians try to emulate Jesus. While they will never reach the pinnacle of that endeavor, they're always on their way to that pinnacle. The Christian life is one long process of becoming more and more like Jesus. Now, just to make sure there is no misunderstanding, "becoming like Jesus" does not mean we have to copycat every single character trait we imagine Jesus to have or somehow try to recreate scenes from Jesus's life so we can be just like him. Instead, it means being as radical as Jesus in loving God and the people around us. That's it. (And—spoiler alert—it's really hard.)

To come back to that "process" mentioned above. A process implies that there is movement, progress. And that's exactly what Christians experience throughout their lives (provided that they continuously follow Jesus): They  experience growth. A growth that does not peak in their twenties or thirties or even in their forties and fifties. It's a growth that continues to the very last moment of life on this earth, to the very last breath a Christian takes. That's why the Christian life is not one of decline, and age is not something to dread. Yes, physical strength will cease and the mind may not be as sharp. But neither of those is related to faith and the continued growth that is the hallmark of the Christian life.

But still, you might point out, how can you possibly continue to pursue that path if it's littered with so many failures—the times you've failed to love the way Jesus did? The answer to this is rooted in God's forgiveness. As I mentioned before, Christians believe that when we ask God wholeheartedly for forgiveness, he will give that forgiveness right there and then. This means that not only do we have to feel no shame for whatever we asked him to forgive us for, but God will actually "forget" it. It's erased. There's no trace of it. There is one condition, though: The way we're told to ask is with all of our heart. This means we're asking for forgiveness for whatever we've done with the complete desire not to do it again. Even if we might know it's going to be hard or even impossible, our heart has to want it not to happen again.

This really is the key to why the progression toward a better life, even if we never quite get there, makes sense and becomes desirable. It's because there is faith in an all-knowing and perfect God who understands how people tick and pushes them in the right direction. Those people (us) naturally respond with thankfulness to the process of forgiveness and its self-cleaning aspects and the sense of a motion toward a better life.

Let me try to explain it in a different way.

Imagine that everyone in the world is part of an orchestra. Among all the musicians who are playing certain pieces by certain composers according to the way a certain conductor wants them to perform, there has only ever been one violinist or clarinet player or cellist who at all times has been completely in tune, who has played all the notes perfectly, whose pitch has never wavered. Not just for one piece or two, but all the time and without fail. 

It's out of this world how that musician is in tune with the composer, the conductor, and the spirit of the music. And it really is. It's not possible for others of the "world orchestra" to achieve that perfection, but it is possible for them to become better and better, becoming ever more like her. Needless to say this takes practice—in fact, a whole life's worth of practice. If you talk to musicians who play in ensembles or orchestras, they will tell you how wonderful and hard it is. It's hard because it takes so much effort and time and many, many experiences of failure. But it's wonderful because there is progress for each of these hard-working musicians, and there are times (as fleeting as they might be) when this state of complete harmony with composer, conductor, and music is actually reached. And that transcendence more than makes up for the sacrifice.

It's not a perfect illustration, but it might help a little.

I don't have to worry about aging (Part 2)

I do remember how confused and frustrated I was after I had just become a Christian when I first encountered this concept of "becoming ever better" but not being able to actually reach that goal in this life. It felt so anti-climactic in its unobtainability. I remember feeling that I had just made a decision to radically change my life, and while I knew there was a lot to learn and that I had to mature on many levels, it felt like an unfairly long haul to me. I'm certain I was not the only one in that part of my Christian faith journey who felt like that. After all, it's very much against what Western societies teach (to differing degrees): You can achieve anything if you only set your mind to it! It's the bread and butter of every motivational speaker. 

This "achieve-it" mentality typically refers to attaining relatively static goals: a particular possession, a degree, a behavioral or time-management change (diet, workouts, more time spent with family, etc.), or a change in relationship status (marriage, start of a romantic or best-friend relationship, divorce). What's different with the Christian kind of achievement is that it's a maturation process. And as you would expect from any process, especially one of maturation or learning, this is not one without setbacks. Constant ones, in fact. So constant that they are only matched—and happily surpassed—by the number of improvements.

Is this exhausting? It sure looks like it when it's spelled out like that. What makes this not only endurable but for the greatest part joyful is the reward of playing in tune with the conductor and, most importantly, the nature of the "conductor"—God. You see, this whole concept of maturation through a long process of failures and successes would not work with a conductor who is impatient and ready and willing to give up. Christians believe in a God who, as the architect of this framework of improvements and failures, must be forgiving. If it were a suddenly attainable goal, like a flash of enlightenment, to become like Jesus, forgiveness would not to have to play a role in the nature of the Christian God. Because Christianity has a realistic understanding of the stubborn, self-focused nature of human beings, we don't believe in sudden and lasting perfection, so God needs to be love. And this is exactly what it says in the Bible.

So, let's come back to why this long process is an advantage. To switch our metaphor, it's like this: Life is one long process of coming home. While Christians will not reach our home in this life, every day brings us closer. Not because every day is a day less until we die, but because it's another day toward maturity. And while our bodies might get weaker—if we make it into old age—our home with God becomes ever clearer, and with every additional day and hour we have a stronger sense of where we belong.

I can come to terms with death

I've already written a bit about death in one of the previous sections—death as the ultimate evidence that suffering is part of our existence. For Christians, there is another entirely different way to look at death. Christians don't believe that death has the last word. Christians believe that this life on earth is a mere blink compared to our lives in union with God.

While no one knows exactly what that looks like—aside from an absence of death and suffering—it forms an important building block of our faith. You may be thinking, well, that's not believable because it is certainly not imaginable. And indeed, it's something that is obtainable only by faith, which for Christians doesn't mean a lesser reality, just not one that is based on empirical evidence.

But what does this mean for Christians who do have the faith to see that reality? It means that death is a mere stage whose finality relates only to this life we have encountered so far. Death is real, but it's also fleeting. 

As I've mentioned so many times before, Christians are just people. We're anything but perfect. We might cling to our lives even when we know we don't have to, or we might give in to a fear of dying, which in turn makes us suffer. But generally speaking, Christians are not afraid to die in the hope—the expectancy—of what comes next.

This in turn implies that several billion people worldwide (the estimated one-third of the world's population who considers itself Christian) have a fundamentally different outlook on this all-important matter of finality compared to those who don't and who see death as final.

Think about what that means: Think, for instance, about what it means as far as our ability to love and give. This capacity becomes unlimited when we don't have to worry about ever being paid back. Think about its implications for the suffering we experience through diseases, loss of relationships, financial hardships, or general deterioration. They're still there, but we can view them very differently because of their now very, very temporary nature.

Even though we look forward to life after death, Christians don't reject our lives here and now as unimportant. Instead, the Christian view of the life after death is what drives and motivates this current life. A birds-eye view of Jesus' teachings reveals that though he talked about life after death, the vast majority of his teachings were related to the present life, with the gritty realities of how to love and how to forgive. So rather than being in a waiting mode before entering the eternal presence of God, Christians are—or should be—in an active loving mode, modeling as well as we possibly can what that presence looks like right now. And with every single little step toward the love we imagine God to be like, we ourselves become a little more like God on earth, Jesus. As I said, we'll never attain that goal here on earth, but the hardships of life, the loneliness embedded in all of us, and the apparent randomness and meaninglessness of life find answers right here and right now. Life after death is beautiful to imagine, but this life is rich and beautiful and meaningful as well. Even when it hurts.

Wrapping it up

For several years I've been talking about starting a project in which leaders of Christian groups could offer an introduction into their practices to people without a religious home. It wouldn't be a theoretical course on the foundations and beliefs of that particular strain of Christianity, but an introduction to how their adherents practice their faith: how often and in what manner they pray, how often they get together with others to worship or talk, how they focus on God, how they help one another and others, what kind of projects they participate in, and so on. And then the religious "seekers" would do exactly that. They might not believe in the God they're praying to, they might not recognize the new traditions and customs as their own, but they will commit to practicing them for two months, nevertheless—to see what happens.

In the process, the seekers would have full access to the leaders of those churches (or knowledgeable representatives) for questions and conversation.

The goal of this exercise? To see if these two months of practice change the seekers. Would it convince them to stay away from that particular Christian strand? Or would it cause an internal change that makes them want to explore the underlying beliefs more deeply? We may never know, but my sense is that the practice would be transformative. In lieu of the actual experiment, I wonder whether I could suggest something similar but less orchestrated. 

In this book, I've talked about the benefits of being a Christian:

• finding an answer to our deep and undefined loneliness 

• discovering a new and diverse community of people

• seeing a new and reliable purpose in life and a new definition of what it means to have an impact on the world

• believing that life around us and in us is meaningful and relevant

• having someone to look up to 

• realistically and humbly appreciating who we are as human beings 

• newly appreciating beauty and how it impacts our care for the world around us 

• discovering our own story within a much larger story that provides meaning and guidance 

• rediscovering thankfulness

• comprehending a whole new concept of forgiveness and the impact it can have on our lives

• recognizing a meaning behind suffering and aging 

• understanding death 

A list like this underscores the significance of these benefits. 

I can't think of any one of those benefits to which someone would say, "Yeah, that one doesn't sound so great. Maybe this or that, but those two I'd rather leave behind." I do understand that someone might read the list, sigh, and say, "Well, it sounds nice, but it's clearly not for me because I just can't believe in God, or at least not the kind of personal God Christians believe in." Of course, if believing in God were so easily attainable, many more would believe.

So here's what I would like to suggest. Maybe it's more of a challenge: Why don't you try it out? What do you have to lose? Why not pretend that there's a God and start talking to him? And maybe at some point you might actually talk with him.

Really, you might say, play a game of make-believe? Yes, exactly! Play make-believe and see what happens. Give yourself as much time as you need to try to pray. Try reading the Bible. Try exploring the churches in your vicinity to understand how they approach God. And continue to keep in mind—as I've said so many times—that churches are full of people in need, people who are anything but perfect. So get ready to meet people who are just as needy as you are. 

And by the way, the reason for the existence of so many different churches is this: At some point in history, sometimes more than a thousand years ago, existing churches split (and often continued to split) because they disagreed about how to worship God (there were other reasons, too, but this was the main one). Often the splits were painful, but the result is really quite wonderful because it shows the enormous complexity and diversity among Christians. 

You might already know about some of those churches, or about the Christians in those churches, and think you're certainly not that kind of religious person. But that's the other beautiful thing about the wide variety of churches. Some churches might shock you (positively or negatively), some might give you a sense of awe, some might feel cold and exclusive, and some might feel warm and inviting.

To come back to the "faith challenge": What exactly is this for? To find out whether the God that I've been writing about in this book is real. Unfortunately, I can't say, "Look at the beauty of nature or this glorious flower or this newborn baby and you will see God." Or "Look at the suffering in the world or the suffering you're experiencing personally and you will recognize God in it." Or "Read this and that section of the Bible and you will finally understand that God is real." God cannot be proven. But God can be experienced. God can be encountered through experience. It can be a long process, but my sense is that you will know when to throw in the towel after you've given it a conscientious try, or when you realize that your pretense is getting less and less pretentious and more about the living and loving God.

Let me know how it goes. I'm praying for you!