Having given a bit of background on how I used to see things before my crisis of faith, along with an overview of the two areas where that crisis eventually reached its sharpest edge – the nature of the Bible and the nature of the Christian life – what I’d like to do next is offer a brief picture of how my thinking has shifted since then. Before I do that, though, I want to pause on something I discovered in the middle of my unraveling – something that changed more than just what I believed, but how I believed. Something that changed the posture I brought to the whole process. And in many ways, what opened the door for the changes that would come next. And what I discovered was this: the version of Christianity I had inherited and long defended was not as ancient, or as universal, as I had believed. It was, in fact, a more recent expression of the faith, shaped not so much by timeless tradition as by the specific challenges and shifts of the modern world. That realization, as simple as it sounds, changed everything. It not only disrupted my sense of spiritual certainty, but also invited me to reconsider what else might be possible too.

For most of my life, I just assumed that what I believed was what Christians had always believed. Not because I had studied the whole sweep of Christian history, but because I trusted that the people around me – my pastors, my teachers, my spiritual mentors – were handing down the unbroken truth. There was Jesus, then the apostles… and now us. That was the arc. That was the story. And while I had a vague sense that other groups might see things a little differently – Catholics here, Eastern Orthodox there – I still believed that the core of what I’d been taught represented what had always been. But then, during the deepening of my crisis, I began reading more widely. I started digging into church history. I listened to voices from other traditions, other times, other cultures. And what I found was both unsettling and strangely liberating. I found that many of the beliefs I had seen as essential and obvious were actually quite new – shaped largely by a specific subset of Christians over the last few centuries, especially in the American context. What I had called “traditional Christianity” turned out to be a very modern Christianity dressed up in traditional clothing – something crafted more recently than I had ever realized.

What made this realization hit so hard wasn’t only the historical data itself, but the quiet unraveling of a deeper assumption I didn’t even know I had – that God’s truth always comes to us in one, singular, unchanging form. I had built much of my faith on the idea that what I believed was what had always been believed, everywhere, by everyone who truly followed Jesus. Learning otherwise felt at first like losing my footing. If the version I had inherited was just one among many, then what else might be open to question? For a while, that was unsettling, like staring into a fog where the landmarks I’d trusted had disappeared. But over time, I began to notice something else beneath the disorientation – a new kind of spaciousness. If the faith could take root in so many contexts, speak with different accents, and emphasize different truths across time, then maybe it was stronger, more resilient, and more beautiful than I had been taught to imagine. That possibility didn’t weaken my faith – it began to free it.

This didn’t mean that the tradition I was raised in was bad or dishonest. Far from it. But it did mean that my assumptions about what counted as “orthodox” or “biblical” or “historical” might need to be held more loosely – or at least more humbly. As an example, I had long believed that doctrines like biblical infallibility and inerrancy were timeless pillars of the Christian faith. In many evangelical circles, they’re treated as non-negotiables – the first domino in the chain. Lose that, and everything else falls. But I learned that those terms – and the frameworks they represent – weren’t even articulated until over a millennia after the Bible was written. And even then, they didn’t become widespread until the last couple of centuries. They were responses to a particular moment in history – specifically, to the rise of modern skepticism and the pressures of rationalism. In that sense, they were attempts to protect the Bible, not betray it. But they were also distinctly modern strategies, rooted in a very modern understanding of truth – one that equated truth with factual precision, and saw Scripture’s authority as hinging on its historical and scientific accuracy. That was a far cry from how most Christians had viewed the Bible for centuries. And it raised new questions about how much of what I believed was truly essential – and how much had been shaped by fear.

The same was true of my early literalism. I had always assumed that taking the Bible seriously meant taking it literally – and not just in a general sense, but especially when it came to stories about creation, miracles, and history. But what I discovered is that for much of Christian history, the literal meaning of Scripture wasn’t always the primary concern. In fact, many early theologians gave more weight to spiritual or allegorical interpretations. They weren’t worried about whether the story of Jonah was factual – they were interested in what it revealed about God, about repentance, about mercy. It wasn’t that they rejected the literal meaning. They simply didn’t assume that factuality was the highest or only measure of truth. That shift in perspective only really took hold after the Enlightenment – when truth itself came to be defined by what could be observed, measured, or verified. Stories weren’t “true” unless they happened exactly as described. And so, in response, many Christians began to double down on literalism – not because it had always been central to the faith, but because it seemed to be the only way to safeguard the Bible’s authority in a world increasingly ruled by science and history. The shift wasn’t just theological – it was cultural.

What struck me most as I learned all this wasn’t just how much had changed – but how unaware I had been of the change. I had never been taught to question these assumptions. They felt natural, even obvious. Of course truth meant factual accuracy. Of course a biblical story couldn’t be meaningful unless it really happened. And so I didn’t see that I was operating with a very modern set of lenses – lenses shaped by a cultural moment that equated reality with what could be proven. But once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. And I began to notice how this same framework had shaped other parts of my faith as well – like the emphasis on “going to heaven when you die” as the central hope of Christianity (another surprisingly recent development), or the way “faith” was often reduced to mentally agreeing with certain theological propositions. These were things I had taken for granted for nearly my whole life. But suddenly, they began to look less like timeless truths and more like cultural adaptations – responses to specific questions asked by specific generations for specific reasons in specific places. And that realization opened the door to something new. It was as if I’d been handed a set of keys to a much older house I’d never realized I was living in.

Now, to be clear, I don’t believe that ancient automatically equals better. Just because an idea is old doesn’t make it more true. And just because something is modern doesn’t make it wrong. Some of the most meaningful and life-giving parts of my faith have been shaped by modern insights. What changed for me wasn’t a preference for the ancient over the new – it was a recognition that what I had inherited wasn’t the Christianity. It was a Christianity. One version among many. And not only that, but a version deeply shaped by the battles and assumptions of modernity. Once I saw that, I began to feel a kind of freedom I hadn’t known was possible. Because if this one version wasn’t the only faithful one – if it wasn’t the “one true way” to be Christian – then maybe I didn’t need to cling to it quite so tightly. Maybe I could let go of certain ideas without letting go of the faith altogether. Maybe I could stop trying to defend the version I was handed, and start seeking the version that helps me love God more deeply, trust Jesus more fully, and live more faithfully. That shift didn’t happen overnight – but once it began, it never really stopped.

Of course, that realization didn’t come without its own kind of struggle. Letting go of the idea that my tradition was the correct one meant letting go of the sense of certainty and security it had given me for so long. It meant acknowledging that other people – people with different theologies, different practices, different emphases – might also be walking faithfully with God. That they might have something to teach me. That I might be wrong about some things. Or even many things. And for a while, that was terrifying. Because if they were right, what did that make me? What did that mean for the faith I had spent so long defending? Those were hard questions. They still are. But eventually, what began as fear started to turn into wonder. Because the more I saw the breadth and depth of the Christian tradition – the sheer diversity of thought, expression, culture, and experience – the more I realized how small my box had been. And the more I let that box expand, the more beautiful the view became. What once felt like theological erosion began to feel like theological growth. What once felt like disloyalty began to feel like discipleship.

Over time, what had once felt like a crisis of faith began to feel more like an invitation – not to abandon my faith, but to reimagine it. To see it not as a rigid system to be preserved at all costs, but as a living tradition, capable of growth, of renewal, of surprise. I began to see Christianity less as a set of theological blueprints and more as a spiritual ecosystem – a place where different expressions could thrive, even when they looked very different from one another. And in that space, I started to breathe again. I started to trust again. I started to find joy again. Not because all my questions were answered, but because I had discovered that the questions themselves could be holy. That God wasn’t waiting for me to get it all right, but was walking with me in the searching, in the stumbling, in the slow unfolding of grace. And strangely enough, I began to feel closer to God – not by resolving the tension, but by inhabiting it. Not by finding the edges, but by embracing the mystery. A mystery I’ve come to see as part of the gift.

In the next post, I’ll begin to sketch a bit more of what my faith looks like today – not in the sense of a fully formed system, but as a journey that’s still unfolding. I don’t claim to have found the way, but I’ve found a way. A way that has given me room to breathe, to question, and to hope. A way that makes space for both reverence and reform. And a way I hope might be helpful for those who find themselves walking through similar terrain.

Until then, thanks again for reading and – as always – stay curious, seek truth, and love well.