My journey of leaving the Christian faith is somewhat unique in that I was never treated poorly

by the church. A zealous young man, attending Bible studies, playing music on the worship

team, being trained to lead. I had been through the “periods of questioning” before, and had

come out the other side still a Christian. I had many internal battles of sexuality and gender

identity going on, but I kept those to myself and so I never experienced any controversy or

discrimination. I had a perfectly fine time at church. Despite that, honestly I never really liked

going to church all that much (primarily due to the introvert in me); it was more just something I

did because the Bible taught not to neglect meeting together. But my Christian faith was on a

much deeper level than mere church attendance: studying the Scripture, praying daily,

contemplating God and Christ and the Spirit. I had what I would consider a very deep

relationship with Christ.

What being steeped in the church did contribute to was – well, it really becomes a way of life.

When you’re involved in a community so much, you’re not really left alone to your thoughts – I

mean those real thoughts. Not the thoughts of “I didn’t quite agree with what pastor was saying

about Paul’s teaching on marriage;” no, I mean those real thoughts of “Is everything that I and

this community believe actually false?” Why upturn your life and your surroundings with such

thoughts? Well I won’t get too far into the details here, but several years ago we wound up

leaving that church due to disagreements with the leadership. And in that period after leaving, I

finally had that time to be left alone to my thoughts.

The questions started really as a branch off of why we left that church: “What should the

Kingdom of God really look like?” After all, Christ said that he was establishing a Kingdom. The

question for me was whether he established that Kingdom already, or if he would establish it

with his second coming. I started studying church history – all the corruption and infighting and

branching off into new denominations and on and on. If Christ established his Kingdom while he

was on earth, it seemed to me like a really terrible Kingdom fueled by power-hungry devils. So I

went with the other point of view: the world is left to its countless evils and suffering for now, but

Christ will return some day, and then and there he will establish a Kingdom of justice and peace

and love and mercy. But after adopting that point of view, the question became for me: well,

where is he? It’s been two-thousand years; where is he?

Where is Christ? Sure enough, this question chipped away at me to the point that I could no

longer take it. I had my first brief lapse into deconversion. And that lapse drove me into a period

of utter nihilistic despair.

“If Christ isn’t there, if God isn’t there, if there is no eternity then

everything is meaningless – my life is meaningless.

” This despair was so severe that after only a

few months I found myself reconverting. I needed something to give me meaning, and so I

reasoned out: “I don’t understand why Christ allows so much evil, but I love the character and

teachings of Christ so much that, if God has ever revealed Himself to humankind, it is certainly

in the person of Jesus.

” I had to have a cause to hold onto, and the beautiful message of Jesus

Christ was a worthy cause. I entrusted myself to Jesus, and committed myself to the Christian

teachings once again.Only this time around in my Christian life, I was much less sure of things. I had lapsed into

deconversion, and the shock was too much that I gave into the temptation to return, so that I

could have some purpose to hold onto. Christ gave me hope, a hope I had to have – the hope of

eternal life and the resurrection, of Christ’s defeat of Death. But the problem was still there in the

flaws of Scripture; and eventually everything around Christ began to crumble.

“Do I believe that

God stopped the sun so that Joshua could win a war?” “No, but I definitely believe in Christ and

the resurrection.

” “Do I believe that Saints rose from their graves during the crucifixion and

visited many believers?” “No, but I believe in Christ and the resurrection.

” “Do I believe that

Paul’s handkerchief healed people just by touching them, or that the bones of Elisha brought a

dead man back to life, or that God split the sea for the Israelites to cross?” “No, but I think I

believe in Christ and the resurrection.

” As my faith in the Scriptures decreased more and more, I

came to realize that I simply did not have the faith to believe in the supernatural. So why was

the one exception Jesus Christ? I believed in Christ because I needed hope; but that hope just

wasn’t enough for me to continue holding on, because I began to see it for what it was: wishful

thinking.

Well why couldn’t I have faith in the supernatural, in the idea that God had involved himself with

humanity? Suffering, plain and simple. The problem of suffering is the ultimate testimony to me

that God doesn’t care about humanity, that God might not exist at all. The very teachings of

Christ that made me aware of those who suffer – those very teachings also made me aware that

the suffering in the world is far too great to have hope in Christ as god-with-us, in his Kingdom,

and in his defeat of Death. I had to leave my hope behind, because I no longer had confidence

to truly believe in that hope. I had to deconvert.

The second time around with deconverting happened about two years ago, and it wasn’t such a

shock as the first time around. I had adapted, and the deconversion was this time moreso a

gradual acceptance of reality.This transition into accepting the loss of my former Hope has

certainly been sad and difficult. But it’s also freeing. Those battles of sexuality and gender

identity that I mentioned at the start – these things that I thought had been terrible sicknesses of

sin within me – I no longer have to fight those battles or see my pansexuality and gender

dysphoria as sins. I called myself a Christian zealot. Part of being zealously dedicated to the

faith was working so, so hard to be rid of the parts in myself which Scripture condemns. These

natural parts of me, I was always fighting against, and I was exhausted more and more as life

went on, to the point of being many times suicidal. But now, I am free from fighting. I am able to

rest. I am able to accept myself.

I am certainly still on a journey; but as I journey forward in life, though my hope in eternity is no

longer there, I have a newfound hope for the here-and-now. My relationship with Christ the Son

of God is no more, but I have a newfound relationship with myself in my own personhood.

A part of me is lost, but now all of me is free.