The thing that scares most off the hero’s journey
is that it has a long stretch that looks like the zero’s journey.
In my estimation, I was raised very well. I would never have guessed any of my family, let alone myself, might experience deconstruction.
Conservative and regular church attendance were contrasted and complemented by a scientist father and teacher mother, both who encouraged critical thinking and open-mindedness. My father was never afraid to vocalize controversial takes, particularly ones regarding the faith. My mother ensured we had reliable Christian material with which to stand our faith upon. Our family, including my sister and brother, have gone on to lead faithful, Christian families and lives.
And yet here we are. Perhaps you are, too.
This is a book about rebuilding out of the ruins of a post-postmodern world. The journey of reconstruction takes on truth, faith, meaning, and learning how to know right from wrong.
As I realized mine was, your view of Christianity might be heavily influenced by the Ten Commandments and the Law from the Old Testament (Old Covenant). You know: Do this, don’t do that, acceptable, unacceptable, right, wrong…
I invite you to come along as I revisit my journey. You’ll come across the twists and turns, the side-streets and alleys, and the hills and valleys I ventured through in seeking the answers to some of the biggest questions we all carry.
I have ruminated and written over many years, hashing out questions, trying to get to something firm, something I can stand on, something real.
Our journey will take the form of a canvas painted with words, thoughts, essays, with dab and stroke, so that, when we have made the last touch, we’ll be able to step back and look upon wild dabs and strokes, erratic, irrational, even, but ultimately coalescing into a rich, lush, landscape of soul-satisfying meaning.
We’re going to stroll down a road marked on either side with the billboards and milestones of my written explorations. The first step of a thousand miles must be to orient ourselves. So, we’ll set the stage to give you a frame of reference so you can better understand what’s to come.
Once we have that covered, we’ll go down the rabbit hole of rationality, irrationality, and the paradoxes of our beliefs. We’ll resurface and see how upside-down the world of faith really can be by taking a look at the Kingdom of Heaven, who Jesus really said were blessed, and our predictably pathetic attempts at trying to ‘be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect’.
When you’re ready, we’ll deep dive what Jesus was really saying when he said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.” (Luke 22:20b)
But to start, we’ll begin near the end, taking a look at what the humble prism can teach us about truth and how we can go about finding it.
This is a book about revisiting, reorienting, recalibrating, and regenerating.
We’re going to explore reconstruction out of deconstruction.