Why Being ‘Open-Minded’ Almost Kept Me from Finding Jesus

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Welcome to Christianity.com. I'm Jessica Brody. I'm an author, an editor, a journalist, a writing coach, and I'm a Christian, and here's how that came about. I was raised in the Lutheran church. We went to church on Sundays. We prayed. I knew about Jesus, but even after going through confirmation and being an acolyte, I got to my teens and twenties, and I didn't have a real relationship with Jesus. I called myself a Christian, but I was open-minded. I didn't understand what it really meant to follow Christ, to be an actual Christ follower.

I thought it was a label or an identity, you believe, or you don't believe. I didn't understand that it was a deeper spiritual conviction. It wasn't just religion, and honestly, I had many doubts about what it meant.

Was Jesus the only path? All of those things were in my head at that time; it was hard, and I wasn't convinced. Then, after a while, I started stumbling closer, drawing closer, and as I had kids and as I started to understand what life was really all about and how caught up I was, I think, in selfishness and culture and all of these lies that were all around me, I became convicted that I needed to start getting to know Jesus. I needed to understand who God was authentic, not this idea of the Lord that I had somehow invented, that I had somehow gotten this mistaken impression from culture. Whatever lies that I'd been listening to, and I wanted to dig deep and know Him, who He was.

I started reading the Bible, and it was hard at first. I have a master's in English literature. I'm used to reading hard stuff, but I couldn't really understand the Bible. I looked around, and I just plugged away. I got a good translation that made sense. It was in more everyday speech, and I started reading, and I prayed that God would help me understand what I was reading. I really wanted to know, and it took a while. It took some hard work of everyday reading, even when I didn't understand, and it took me saying, I'm just going to trust that when I'm through with this, I'll understand. So I pushed through, and I kept reading, and then, one day, I realized I got it. I understood, and then the Bible just came to life for me. I read verses like John 14:6, and Jesus said, 

"I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

In that verse, He didn't say, I am away. He said, I'm the way. You know, I looked at the original Greek that that scripture was written in. It's clear. I mean, He's crystal clear that He is the way. Now, I don't want to put God in a box, but I know that my only path to salvation is Jesus Christ, and I also know what Jesus said, and it was believe and follow me and obey my commands, and so how can I do otherwise? I need to be all in.

I need to just jump in with both feet and no safety net, and so that's it. That's it for me. I'm a Christian. I follow Jesus. I don't always get it right, but I'm trying. You know, I'm trying to understand.

I'm trying to raise my kids in the Lord. It's the only thing. It's the only important thing. At the end of the day, I love God first and foremost, and I'm striving to love others as myself, whatever that looks like. I mess up, but I keep going, and every new day is just a new chance. 

Be blessed today and visit Christianity.com regularly because God's not finished with our story.

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