Category : Articles

Sub Category : Spirituality

Courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear. – Nelson Mandela
Fear is ultimately my worst enemy. The fear of heights, water to an extent, smothering and such have me taking precautions in life. Some precautions are good but some precautions hinder me.The fear that hinders us all is the fear of death. Everything living that I have seen fears death. An ant, a cockroach, a bee, a bird, fish, etc., all things fear death. A cockroach runs from me because I have already judged him guilty of being an icky house dependent parasite. I've seen cockroaches jump off of heights up to my chest and beyond to get a way from me. They know I'm their death so to speak.

Are we born with this fear only to have to face it head on? That would seem to be the case because without a doubt, every living thing carries the sentence of death in it and our health plays the witness. Man's biggest hope in life is to have eternal life and to never have to taste death. The taste of death without the hope of eternal life must be horrid! How much more misery can their be than to die without any hope of life hereafter. I don't view myself as a Christian JUST because I want to be comforted at death. A lot of atheists think that religions are a good thing for the world in that it keeps the world in fair moral condition and has the comfort, in the time of death, of believing we will be raised again. I don't believe in Christ for just that reason, that I myself might have comfort at my death for if I only believe for that reason, there is no comfort at all because, well, I don't truly believe in Christ.

The one thing I do believe in is I believe in love. I believe that if I have the ability to love then the One who created me must have the ability. I am talking about the One who gave mankind His first breath because physically speaking, I am of my mother and father, who have the ability to love. The answer falls on a loving God because where did my parents inherit love? How about their parents? So forth and so on till we get back to a Creator who has the quality of love and gave it to mankind.

I look often at my personal attributes and meditate over a God who has these and more. If I am able to love someone so deeply that I would give my own life for them, then certainly the One who created us is able to do this! If I am able to forgive a man for some unthinkable crime towards me in the eyes of giving second chances, then our Creator has to have this ability! If I look at all the good things that I can do then I state to myself that it is a fact there is a God. If not, what in nature do I need to be loving for in the survival of this life. It would be a useless trait in my own survival and would probably bring on death quicker if I was the only one who felt love. We all feel it though! We all have the ability and the attribute, we even have the will!

So I give myself the question and true answer as to why I believe in Christ, Jesus. I am a Christian because no other religion I know of has more acts of love recorded in the publication that standardizes their faith. I know hate is evil! It tears the world apart. It burns families and leaves others going up in smoke. I don't like the feeling of hate! It makes me feel, well, wicked. So I idolize the God of the Holy Bible whose greatest attribute toward mankind is His love for us. It pushes Him to do all the other things He does like having mercy, showing justice, being graceful, having compassion, and taking my place in death to save me. Christianity matches my spirit. It matches the feelings I have deeply rooted in my heart! It matches how I have told my children to be without even being aware of the contents of its sacred writings!

I will end this in asking myself, is there any other religion that shows me so much love and matches my spirit with its Spirit? The answer is honestly no! I am unaware of any religion that shows so much love. If hate be the instigator of wickedness then love HAS TO BE righteous. It has to be because the feelings these two produce are further apart than the opposite ends of the universe. There is no other answer for me. I gave my answer as to why I am a Christian. What's yours?

"For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life" (Jn. 3:16, HCSB)

~ Marvin Stanley Cox, Jr.