When people ask me what it’s like to believe, I’m reminded of a line that has never left me:
Belief is like riding an angry wild mustang—you ride it until it breaks, or it throws you.
Most people mistake their beliefs for their identity. So when those beliefs are questioned, they feel personally attacked. But beliefs were never meant to be static, they are meant to evolve as we do. If a belief cannot withstand examination, challenge, or testing, then it lacks integrity. Truth does not fear scrutiny. Only fragile ideas demand protection. The truth simply asks to be set free.
Over the past few years, as I’ve committed myself fully to the pursuit of truth, I’ve been met with fear, hostility, and accusations. I’ve been called delusional. I’ve been told I’m entertaining demons, condemned to hell, unsaved simply because I refuse to stop asking questions. The irony is not lost on me. Christianity tells people to read their Bible, yet when someone actually does—when they study it deeply, critically, historically, spiritually—and begin to challenge inherited doctrine, they are shamed into silence.
But I don’t mind.
Humanity has always feared the unfamiliar.
As a child, I grew up with very little stability except for one thing: a steady hope in what we called God. I used to dream of being paid to read the Bible for a living. The thought of spending my days with “Jesus” gave me peace when everything else around me felt fractured and uncertain. That dream carried me through pain, loss, and disillusionment.
And now, as an adult, I live that dream.
I read the Scriptures daily, in English, Hebrew, and Greek. I compare manuscripts. I study theology and history. I examine what was written, when it was written, who wrote it, and why. And I submit all of it to spiritual discernment. Because if God is truth, then truth must be sought—not inherited blindly.
But I would be dishonest if I said this path is always joyful in the way I once imagined it would be. There is a cost to choosing truth over comfort. A loneliness in choosing God’s word above the theology built around it. This work has required me to question not only doctrine, but the very narratives about the Bible and about Jesus that I was taught never to touch. It has demanded that I place loyalty to truth above loyalty to tradition, even when that meant standing alone, misunderstood, or mischaracterized.
That is what maturity looks like in faith. Not certainty without question, but devotion without denial. Not blind agreement, but reverent examination. That means putting the written word to the sword of the Spirit. The same sword Religion never thought you’d actually pick up and use.
Anything written by man can be edited, altered, translated with bias, and shaped by political power. History proves this again and again. What I’ve discovered is that much of what people defend as “truth” today is not truth at all, it’s comfort. It’s familiarity. It’s a feeling. The modern church often defends doctrines, creeds, and emotional security rather than actively seeking the living truth of God.
And just because generations of men agreed on something does not make it right. If the theology is flawed, the belief system collapses no matter how old or widespread it is. Much of what is taught today was constructed by empire, preserved by power, and enforced through fear. It is not divine truth it is manufactured certainty and certainty is the opposite of Faith.
We live in a time where people are still fighting for a “biblical lifestyle.” And to that I say: many things are biblical—but not many things are Christlike.
If we care more about what a book says than what Jesus taught; if we have to silence our conscience to remain “faithful”; if we defend belief systems and doctrines and a “bible” rather than embody love, then we are not walking a spiritual path. We are protecting an institution. That is righteousness in belief, not righteousness in character.
True righteousness requires honesty. It requires examination. It requires the courage to ask: Is this actually aligned with the character of Christ?
Do we love without limits?
Do we see people without condemnation?
Are we fully present, fully authentic, and safe places for others to be fully seen?
Because if we truly want to change the world, we must follow the words of Jesus more than the doctrines constructed about Him, many of which were written after He was executed for telling the truth.
Truth has always been dangerous to empires.
And I will continue to seek it without fear, without apology, and without surrendering my conscience, because belief was never meant to cage the soul. It was meant to set it free.
-Finn
