Where am I?

It's a simple question if we are talking about mere geography, right?  Where am I?  Ask Siri and she would even give you an estimated address.  "Where am I" is a good question to ask when getting off of a city bus, in a strange town you've never been in if you are trying to get to a connecting bus or train or car. And it is usually easily answered by whomever local pedestrian you might ask.

But ask yourself "where am I?" to questions of faith, doubt, life, relationships, love, and emotion and the answers will vary from day to day for most.  Maybe even moment by moment.  It's only because we are human.   Human beings traditionally can be fickle, flippant, wishy-washy, doubtful, and undecided.  Add an anxiety or personality disorder to the mix and you will get varying results.

It makes one wonder if it is even worthwhile answering this question if the answer is just going to keep changing.   But, I still ask it.  I ask myself this question on a regular basis, and sometimes I even know the answer.  Sometimes, I am on a roll with answers, then I reach a plateau of sorts and land back into the mystery of unknowing.

When I am honest with myself (and that is pretty normal these days), I have to admit that I don't know as much as I should about life and love and faith and belief and science and things that are not so black and white.

But I do have personal knowledge of some things.

I know what it feels like to be loved.

I know what God feels like and that there is God.

I know that I have a long way to go to understand either of those two ideas.

I know that everyone else who has experienced these two ideas, is in the same boat as me.  There really are no experts in love or god.

Disagree?  Just look at all the books attributed to the subjects of love and God.  Think of all the different religions and all the different love stories.

Try to number the ways of belief found in your own religion.  Christianity for one is the most diverse of religions having over 43,000 denominations worldwide by some estimates.  It is incredibly pluralistic and varied.

To some that would seem to be a limitation.  They might even argue that Christianity is a farce because no one seems to agree on what it is.  I see it as a great advantage - an opportunity to learn and understand the god of Christianity from the view of 43,000 other vantage points.  Even within each denomination there are conservative groups and progressive groups, traditionalists and modernists, and even post-modernists.

This means that I can say right now with very little uncertainty that I am in fact a Christian.  And really, no one can argue with me about it.   It also means that there is room to grow and grasp and move and stretch and learn and study and teach and converse about the many varied approaches to god found in the one religion.

So where am I?

1.  I believe in God
2.  I am a Christian
3.  I know love first hand.

More on this later.