This is the first post in sharing about my life and theological journey. Believe me when I say it’s wild ride. I’ll plan on posting a series about the different places I lived and church and life experiences I had.
I’ve known about Jesus since I was born. Seriously. I’m not even joking.
Ok, perhaps I’m exaggerating a small amount. But only a little.
I was born in the Year of Our Lord 1989. March 21, 1989, in fact. My 35th birthday is just a few days from now. This time of year always causes me to stop and reflect. Reflection and introspection are going to be a common theme throughout this blog. It’s just kind of what I do. And it drives my wife crazy sometimes.
Now, where were we? Oh, yes. March 21, 1989. I am the second child of three, which means I’m also the middle child. My older brother is almost exactly two years older than I am, having been born in March of 1987. Don’t tell him I wrote about him, please.
I was born in a place called Clifton Forge, in the US state of Virginia. I have no memories of this place, but I have been through town a few times in later life. It’s a cute town, and that’s about all I can say about it. You see, I spent quite a bit of time moving when I was young. I lived in Virginia, North Carolina, and Kentucky. It’s in Kentucky that I have my earliest memories.
My dad went to college to be a school teacher, but he also went to seminary and was ordained as a pastor in the Baptist church. We moved to Kentucky when I was between 2 and 3 years old. My dad had accepted a job as a pastor at a small, independent Baptist church at the top of a mountain in a very rural area. I remember driving with my parents around the mountain roads, watching coal trucks zooming down the perilous curves, mere inches from a drop to their doom.
Many of my earliest memories also involve going to church. In fact, we lived in a small, two bedroom condominium that was positioned on top of the church itself. Every Sunday we would go downstairs to the church and go to a small side room for Sunday school and then into the main auditorium for the service itself, where my dad would lead the songs and preach.
I don’t remember a lot about the church. I remember that my mom taught Sunday school. I remember getting in trouble in church during the service and being dragged out by my mom, screaming, “No! No! I’ll be good! I promise!” I can still remember the feeling of her slapping my butt after we were a safe distance away. Now you understand why I was screaming.
It was also during this time that I remember hearing the message of (Independant, Fundamentalist Baptist) Christianity for the first time. When I say Baptist, people conjur up all kinds of images, many of which involve Southern Baptist churches or other more mainstream Evangelical churches. Trust me when I say that, while we shared similar theological views with these churches, we were far to the right of them. In fact, most people can’t even comprehend what I mean when I talk about it. It sounds like a cult. And that’s probably not a completely inaccurate description.
Basically, I was taught that everyone is a sinner. Adam and Eve (because we had an incredibly strict, literal interpretation of the Genesis story) ate the fruit in the Garden of Eden and thereby passed sin down throughout all humanity, where it spread like a sickness. As a result, God is angry.
Like super, super, inconsolably angry.
He (in this denomination, God is exclusively male) was angry at each of us even before we were born, because of this doctrine of Original Sin. As a result, we are all destined for eternal punishment in the undying fires of hell. You might think that this doctrine is a bit much to be teaching children, but it is at a young age that we begin hearing about this hellfire and God’s anger and sin.
Therefore, we are all in need of a savior. Thankfully, God gave us a way out and sent his son, Jesus to die for us and be resurrected. He was a perfect sacrifice because he never did any bad stuff. All we have to do is ask Jesus to save us and take away our sins and then we are saved and we go to heaven when we die instead of hell.
Sounds simple, right?
In theory, it is simple. But this doctrine of eternal torment in hell terrified me. And I don’t mean it just kind of scared me. It kept me awake some nights, worrying that I was going to die and go to hell. And so I did the natural thing. I asked Jesus to save me so I didn’t have to go to hell when I died.
But that didn’t end my fear. But that’s a story for another post.
Needless to say, church was an incredibly important part of my life during our time in Kentucky. Our lives were dominated by it. This domination continued throughout my childhood and adolescence and into my early adulthood.
But I still hold my time in Kentucky in a special place in my heart. It wasn’t all spankings and fear of hellfire. As it was a rural area, I was allowed to play outside on my own from a very young age. There was nowhere I could really go and get lost. I spent hours and hours in the church parking lot after a rain, pretending that I was a sailor and playing with a plastic boat in the streams of water that would be left rushing down the mountain.
Our neighbors had goats, and they would often escape the fence and make their way into our church parking lot. They would do what goats often do, eat things and poop. I remember finding innumerable goat pellets left behind after they had attacked our parking lot. They looked like chocolate ball cereal. And yes, before you have to ask, I played with them. I did have the good sense not to eat them though, even though I often wondered if they actually tasted like chocolate cereal. I still have no idea.
It was also in Kentucky that my sister was born. I was five years old at the time. We had to drive several hours to Lexington, where my sister was born in a hospital. A favorite story my family liked to tell as I was growing up was that one of the nurses at the hospital told my dad that he had plenty of time before my sister would be born. He took my brother and me to Wendy’s to get some lunch.
Upon our return to the hospital, a nurse chased us down, yelling at my dad, “Where were you?! While you were gone, your wife gave birth to your daughter!” My mom never, ever let my dad forget that one.
But overall, my memories of our time in Kentucky are positive ones. It was a beautiful place, with kind people. It was also a beautiful introduction to what it means to be human, and my first experiences of being independent, playing in our mountainside parking lot.
Anyway, I’ll plan to continue this history of my life and the development of my theology in my next post. Next up: moving to South Carolina, and my earliest memories of feeling inadequate both at church and in my life. It’s a wild trip.
As I reflect on the wild ride of my early years and the beginning of my theological journey, I’m reminded of the power of storytelling and shared experiences. I hope that my tales of goat encounters, Sunday sermons, and childhood fears have resonated with you in some way. But this is just the beginning of our journey together. I invite you to join me as we continue to explore the twists and turns of life and faith. Share your thoughts, memories, and reflections in the comments below—I’d love to hear from you! And if you don’t want to miss out on the next installment of my story, be sure to subscribe to my blog for updates delivered straight to your inbox. Until next time, keep exploring, keep questioning, and keep seeking truth.
Coffee & Theology 