The look on Josh’s face made clear he had never heard anything like what I had said. We had met at a dinner party, where I had learned that Josh was a student at a very liberal seminary. He loved Jesus, but hated evangelical Christianity and mistrusted most modern manifestations of the church. What was the earth-shattering opinion I laid on him? I explained that although I was an atheist, I thought everyone who could be a believing Christian should, and that those who can’t, like me, should still practice Christianity. When Josh asked me why an atheist would believe such a thing, I answered: “Even though I don’t believe in God, I do believe in his people.” This didn’t make sense to Josh, and perhaps it doesn’t make sense to you either. Allow me to explain.
I grew up Christian, attending a dying Baptist church in an almost completely Catholic Latino neighborhood. There were maybe fifteen people in the pews every Sunday morning. All over sixty save for my mother and me. But they loved me. Invested in me. By the time my peers in other congregations were old enough to go to Bible summer camp, I was reading the book of Daniel in my one-person Sunday school. And not the easy parts of Daniel, about lions or furnaces, the heavy prophecy. By the time I was in high school, I spent my lunch periods leading Bible studies and sharing the gospel. During college and young adulthood, I drank yet deeper of the waters Jesus said would forever satiate their drinker’s thirst.
So I lived as a Christian. But did I really have a relationship with Jesus Christ? I no longer believe that I, or anyone, has ever had a relationship with Jesus, except for perhaps the handful of people who walked with the historical Jesus. But I did love the Lord with all my heart, and with all my soul, and with all my mind, and all my strength: the greatest commandment.