Why I’m (still) a Christian

I’m being received into the Orthodox Church by chrismation (anointing with blessed oil) in three weeks.

Thinking about this occasion has given me cause, therefore, to give consideration to my reasons for undertaking that step. But my reasons for why I’m entering the Orthodox Church are rather, properly prefaced by why I’m still a Christian at all. Through everything, there has been one concept that has captured my imagination, one that I ultimately cannot shake. One reason why, in spite of all of my wandering around – from a nominally Catholic home, to a conversion experience at age 15, to a weird mishmash of evangelicalism and Catholicism, to die-hard scholasticist Calvinism at the age of 20, to giving up on the concept of God entirely until realizing that I was ultimately trying to engage in moral reasoning as a Christian* while living outwardly as an atheist, to being spiritually rehabilitated (somewhat) in two theologically liberal mainline churches (the United and Anglican churches) until finally struggling mightily with figuring out if the claims of the Orthodox Church to be the one true Church of Jesus Christ were actually true (spoiler alert: I think they are).

The reason why I have not been able to shake off the claim of Christ on my soul is best summed up in the words of the World War I poet Edward Shillitoe. His poem, Jesus of the Scars, is worth quoting in its entirety.

If we have never sought, we seek Thee now;
Thine eyes burn through the dark, our only stars;
We must have sight of thorn-pricks on Thy brow,
We must have Thee, O Jesus of the Scars.  

The heavens frighten us; they are too calm;
In all the universe we have no place.
Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?
Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars, we claim Thy grace.

If, when the doors are shut, Thou drawest near,
Only reveal those hands, that side of Thine;
We know to-day what wounds are, have no fear,
Show us Thy Scars, we know the countersign.

The other gods were strong; but Thou wast weak;
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,
And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone.

This poem, ultimately, puts into words why I cannot shake the claim of Jesus Christ upon my soul. I thoroughly belong to Him, and this is why. My entire life’s experience – from growing up with Spina Bifida, to getting bullied heavily, to my parents divorce and the resultant nastiness, and the alcoholism of a family member, and my constant physical illness – has been one of crucifixion.

No other faith claims that God – the almighty creator of the Universe – entered into our suffering.
No other faith dares to call God ‘Emmanu-el’ – God with us.
No other faith claims that God ‘became sin for us’ (2 Cor 5:21) – that is, endured the physical consequences of sin – death and rejection from God in His human nature (which is nonetheless perfectly united to His Divine nature…), finding Himself utterly abandoned and subject to the same pain as His creation.

In short, I am a Christian because my life has been one of continual crucifixion, and Christ is the one and only crucified God. And having been crucified – having ‘stumbled to His throne’, and, as Fr. John Behr points out, having (paradoxically) entered into His glory on the very instrument of torture used to execute Him (Mark 10:35-45), He died, and spent three days among the dead, setting the captives there free. And He rose, scars and all, for death could not hold the source of Life and Light. And He ascended into heaven, scars upon His hands, His feet, and His back. And there the scarred Man sits, at the right hand of the Father, His scars forever emblazoned upon His hands and feet like a love letter to humanity written in blood.

In the final analyis, this crucified man, can find solace in none but the crucified God-Man, Who, though He was God and all things were created through Him, yet became the Creation out of His love for us.

Show us thy scars, we know the countersign!

There is a real sense in which Christianity is ridiculous. It is irrational. Weakness is strength. The almighty God and image of the immortal Father becomes a helpless baby at His Mother’s breast, grows up, and is murdered by His own people. The ugliness of the Cross is supreme beauty in the divine economy, and we enter into the mystery of that beautiful ugliness at every Divine Liturgy, when we make present the one, completed sacrifice of Calvary and then feast upon the Lamb who was slain for us there. And so it is, the beautiful, irrational scandal of Christianity.

The other gods were strong, but Thou wast weak; they rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne,
And to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak; and not a God has wounds but Thou alone!

To Him be glory and dominion unto ages of ages. Amen.
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*by this I mean specifically and in particular (but not limited to this specific example) that I believed that the values expressed in the Beatitudes were good. I believed there was value in weakness. I believed that people with disabilities and the poor and marginalized and dispossessed have things to teach the world and that we would be far better off as a society if we learned the lessons they have to teach. But in a worldview dominated by survival of the fittest, people with disabilities and mental illness and people whose lives are a clusterfu– are at best a drain on society and a strain on resources. I believed that, somehow, the marginalized – the ‘meek’ were often better people for their meekness. In short, I had a set of beliefs that rang deeply true to my spirit but that I could not account for within my atheistic worldview. So it goes.

-Ryan Hill