I can still remember sitting in the balcony of the Olivet Reformed Church in Grandville, Michigan…listening to the pastor preach a sermon on the Unpardonable Sin. It scared me at the time because even as a child I had questioned my religion and wasn’t sure if I had crossed the line yet or not. Fortunately, he ended his sermon on a more positive note by saying that if anyone was worried about it, they need not be, for their concern was proof enough that they had not yet committed this sin… for those who had, however, there would be no concern or remorse whatsoever,  for their souls were already dead.

 Over the years I continued to search for a God while losing my religion… and as the questions became more and more profound, I became increasingly aware that I would never find the answers in any church worship service or from the sermons of even the greatest theologians… for all of their answers were based in believing that there was a God, but nowhere could I find evidence for their claims… still for me to say that God did not exist would be to deny the Holy Spirit, and I wasn’t yet ready, to surrender my soul.

It would be years before I finally grew tired of pretending to be what I no longer was… and although I knew there would be consequences, I was prepared to accept them, for I could no longer feel my soul, and the faith I had clung to, for so many years, could no longer be rekindled. I had committed the unpardonable sin of denying the existence of a God, and just as foretold, I had no regrets.

All of those years spent living in fear of a God that has never existed… how foolish it all seems to me now. There is a saying that goes something like this, “To find one’s Soul, one needs to lose it.” I lost mine but in its place found Joy, Peace, and the Understanding that I am the One I was searching for all along.