S0 E4: At the Crossroads: A Journey Towards Faith and Redemption

This is what the Lord standing at the crossroads and look.

Ask for the ancient paths.

Ask where the good way is and walk in it, and you will find the rest for your souls.

Jeremiah 6:16.

You're listening to Redeemed and Rebuilt.

I'm your host, Nick Grace.

And that verse, that's basically my life right now.

Stand at the crossroads and look.

Ask for the ancient paths.

Ask where the good way is and walk in it.

That's pillar three.

Spirit.

We've talked about the mind and we've talked about the body.

But today, today I want to talk about standing at that crossroad between staying a non believer or actually stepping into faith and what it looks like when a man who's been an atheist, an anti theist, a skeptic, a sinner, a screw up starts to wonder.

Wonder if those ancient paths might actually be good.

So let's get into it.

There's another line in scripture that hits me right where I'm at.

Immediately the boy.

Immediately the boy's father exclaimed, I do believe.

Help me overcome my unbelief.

Mark 9:24.

That's me.

This episode isn't a I used to struggle and now I'm fixed.

This is Catholic kid in a small town, small village, hardcore anti theist cancer anger.

Kids fear a man now standing at the crossroads, asking for the ancient paths with a lot of belief and a lot of unbelief in the same chest.

If you're angry, skeptical, burned out on church, or just quietly wondering if there's more, I'm right there with you.

Yeah, I grew up in the Catholic church in a really small town, a small village in eastern Canada.

And if I close my eyes, I can still see it.

The old wooden pews, the echo when the doors open late.

That one spot my grandmother had to sit in her pew every Sunday it was the same thing.

Someone would slip in a few minutes late and the whole church would turn around in unison.

You'd hear the whispers ripple through the building like a wave.

Who's that?

Look.

Who finally showed up.

There was this constant undercurrent of gossip and criticism.

Who was wearing what, who was sitting next to who, who's sleeping with who, who did what to who, who works where.

And yet everyone was there, dressed up, acting holy.

I mean, I remember going to church with my stepfather and staying.

We'd always go upstairs in the church.

I always wondered why he'd always want to go upstairs.

And I think it was for that simple fact is that during.

During the one hour that we're There at church, he would literally just be gossiping with all the other men, friends of his growing up, about this one and that one.

And, you know, I didn't pay much attention as a kid.

I mean, as a kid, I was just told, look ahead, listen to what the priest is saying.

But I. I always felt like I had to perform in church.

In my family's generation, image was everything.

You dressed right, you acted right, you looked put together.

Whatever was happening in the corners of life, that stayed hidden.

You didn't bring that into the pews.

As a kid, you see your parents and grandparents almost as semi divine heroic.

And then as you get older, you start to hear the stories, you learn who they really were.

And it's shocking now, it wasn't all bad.

On the positive side, I remember a real sense of community.

Maybe in hindsight, I don't think at the time when I was a kid, I felt a sense of community, but I can remember a certain time when my.

My mom had just, you know, left my dad and we were staying in our new house.

And I remember a package being delivered from the church.

And it was, you know, I think it was a couple of gifts and maybe a couple of items of food.

I mean, these are going way back.

So I'm sure the memory might be jaded a bit, but at the time, I mean, as a kid, you're just kind of like, ooh, another gift from the father.

No looking back now, it was a. I remember a real sense of community.

Everyone together, you know, doing the same thing.

A homogenous gathering.

There was something about that, that.

That I lost, but.

And honestly, atheism doesn't really do community well.

The church, at its best, is insanely good at building community, and I think men are starving for that right now.

Some of my warmest memories are bedtime Bible stories with my grandmother, those children's story Bibles sitting next to her, reading about David and Goliath, Noah's Ark, Jonah and the fish.

That felt safe, you know, I can remember I'd spent a lot of time with my grandmother as a young boy.

In essence, I was the youngest.

If I paint a picture of my youth, I was the last of what they call the grandkids.

All of my aunts and uncles had kids well into their teenage years.

My sister was 12 when I was born, so, I mean, they had the fortunate experience of all growing up together.

And then I came along.

My grandmother had already aged up into her senior years, and I was what they would have called her pet.

I was the Apple of her eye.

Nobody could do anything wrong.

Nobody could do anything to me.

I could do no wrong.

I remember I'd spend many a night while my mother was working or away with my grandmother.

And a memory that always just stayed with me is we'd always say the same routine Catholic prayers.

Our Fathers Hail Mary, pray for the saints.

Then we'd pray for the people in our lives.

And she'd always say, pray for your mother, Pray for your sister.

And I would just reiterate what she would say.

There was a sense of safety with that.

That, as I talk about it with you now, really brings up a lot of feeling.

But I have to admit, as a kid, I didn't feel like God really saw me.

God felt distant, abstract, more of a rule book than a father.

Back to my grandmother as a young boy, like I said, this podcast is raw and gritty.

As a young boy, you start experimenting with your body, and you start treating your body as if it's your own playground.

I remember, I don't know, I must have been eight or nine in the tub, exploring my body.

And I remember my grandmother storming into that bathroom, and I had the curtains closed, the shower curtain closed, but she knew what I was doing.

And I remember she was so mad at me, more mad than I had ever seen her.

And I remember she would say things like, God doesn't like little boys who play with themselves.

Or I'd be at the kitchen table with my aunts and my grandmother, and I would just, you know, start singing a song I heard that day or song I like.

And I remember my aunt telling me in a broken French language that I was brought up in Acadian French.

In essence, she would say, stop singing at the table.

It makes the angels cry.

And I'm not sure, I mean, I think those are just passed down through generations on their side.

But to me, that's what God felt like at the time.

As a kid, it was a rule book more than Father.

I took everything literally, especially the Old Testament.

I had no concept of ancient culture, genre or context or the literary impact of the Bible.

It was just, this is who God is.

I don't know if I like him.

That shift has really been huge for me, something I just recently started.

I stopped believing in God, stopped trusting his people.

I learned more about church history, crusades abuse, Salem witch hunt, people killed in the Name of God.

And I would use that.

How many people have died in the name of God, even in the Bible, entire civilizations wiped out.

But it started with, how can the church do this?

And then became, you know, how could God allow this?

These are his people.

So first the trust in Christians went, then the trust in the institution, and then slowly the trust in God himself.

And by the time I hit university, it had hardened.

You know, I picked up my first book I read from an atheist was the God Delusion by Richard Dawkins.

It was all over the media.

I mean, this was the heyday of the secularists, of the atheists, of the enlightened thought people.

And then there was Christopher Hitchens, who still to this day, there's not a man who was more eloquent, who could say things.

And there's still some things that I agree with him about.

And I really think the world is at a disservice now without his views and the way he presented them.

Although now I don't believe some of the things he has said.

He's still someone that this world could use right now as a voice.

So with reading those guys, I went from not going, I'm not sure I believe this to that's it, I'm an atheist.

But then there's another jump, then you can go to an anti theist.

And now religion is a bane on society.

And I still think religion has left some very dark scars.

But now I'm starting to see that, that that was more of the work of broken people than the heart of God.

And I'm not alone in that journey.

C.S.

lewis, who wrote Mere Christianity, started out as an atheist as well.

He once admitted, I maintained that God did not exist, but I was also very angry with God for not existing.

That's the contradiction I recognize in myself, in real life, my anti theism, which showed up loudest on social media.

If you brought up God, I had a take.

I was always ready for a debate.

Faith, politics, philosophy.

I mean, I'd send people articles, recommend books, push Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, jump into comment sections, argue with family, friends, strangers, didn't matter.

I kind of became that guy, the rational warrior, the smart atheist who'd seen through the delusion.

CS Lewis joked about that same posture.

He said, that's kind of what started happening to me.

I kept reading and it got harder to stay as certain as I used to be.

Oh, my mother, may she rest in peace, would always be mad at me for posting something on Facebook.

And she would call and she would tell Me, take that down.

It upsets your family, it upsets your aunts.

And at the time, I didn't care.

And if I'm being honest, I liked that identity.

I felt rational.

I felt above the naive believers.

I liked being the guy who wasn't fooled.

Looking back, there was probably a lot of hurt under that.

Because if God is real, then I certainly had some questions for him.

It's easier to say you're all idiots, God isn't real, than to say, if you're real, where were you?

In my mess.

Another thread in all of this is my body.

Like I said in the previous episode, for a long time I was around £500, moving through the world at that size.

Different.

I mean, you're always aware.

You're aware of the chairs, of the stairs and the stairs.

You're aware of who's actually attracted to you and who's just being polite.

So I adapted.

I built a personality that was super agreeable and likable.

The funny guy, the jokester, the yes man, the easygoing, I'll smooth it over guy.

Because I knew physically I didn't fit the mold, especially with women.

So I didn't let myself be angry.

If I got angry, I risked people pulling away.

So I swallowed it.

There's been a lot of times in my life with friends, and I use friends in quotation marks or co workers where I would be the brunt of the joke.

But I would laugh with them, I think, because if I wasn't laughing, if I was laughing with them, then maybe they weren't laughing at me, they were laughing with me.

Then I lost the weight.

And you'd think that that would fix everything.

But all that pent up anger, that aggression, that frustration, the hurt, it started to leak.

And then life piled on.

Failed relationships, cancer, disappointments.

Feeling like I'd failed as a man, as a father, as a partner.

And suddenly I realized I snap fast.

It wasn't over massive things either.

It's often over little things I snap over.

Disagreements with my spouse, that shouldn't be anything.

Frustrations with my beautiful four year old girls when they're just being four year old girls.

Scratch.

You know, the Bible has a line, everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.

Because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.

I read that now and I think, yeah, that's not me yet.

I don't blame my anger on the church.

I see it tied to family dynamics, relationships, who I was as a young man and what I've lived through.

But when you're that angry, it's hard to imagine a God who wants anything to do with you.

And then came cancer.

First diagnosis, surgery, Covid pregnancies, and the second diagnosis.

Nothing strips you like a doctor saying you have cancer, you know, during my second bout, I was bedridden a lot.

I needed something, anything to occupy my mind.

I've always loved biblical movies and shows, even when I didn't buy into the theology.

So I put on the Chosen Right from episode one.

I have to say, something shifted Jonathan Roumie's portrayal of Jesus.

I mean, he felt like someone you could just actually sit down with, someone fully human, but with this quiet, steady divinity behind his eyes, not just a stained glass face or a distant religious symbol.

There are countless scenes when you see the humanity in what he's trying to teach, his struggle, in the teaching of it, even to his apostles.

I mean, the tears and the frustrations that he would feel, the venting he would do with Ezema.

You know, I'm sure that there was a lot of literal, literary freedoms that were taken making this, and there were.

But when he's writing the sermon for the Sermon on the Mount with Matthew and how they're just bouncing back and forth on the structure of it.

It's like how I go bounce back and forth, building this podcast episode, what fits, what works.

But him knowing what message he needed to portray, I mean, I just loved that aspect of it.

Now, maybe that's how it was.

We'll never know.

I like to think that that's how it was.

I'd seen versions of Jesus who were only political, revolutionary, or only ethereal, floating God, man.

But this portrayal wove both together.

Lying there.

I remember lying there like sick, exhausted, facing my own mortality, watching this Jesus look at broken people and not flinch.

I have to say, that did something to me emotionally.

Something was softening, but my brain still had its arms crossed.

Then came more breadcrumbs.

I remember Wes Huff on the Joe Rogan podcast walking through history and evidence for so many things in the Bible.

This man, the way he speaks and the way that his method of apologetics hits that part of your brain, if you're that person.

And the fact that he's Canadian, it's great.

I mean, from what I've read, is that Joe Rogan has now started going to church since that episode.

Recently, I just started the Bema podcast.

It's teaching the Bible through ancient Jewish lenses.

If you go to the website, my website, www.redeemedandrebuilt.com in the toolbox.

That's the resources section.

In that I'll have episodes, I'll have podcasts that I like to listen to that really impact my path with this podcast.

And also books, books that I'm reading, books that I want to read.

You can go on there, look at the reading list.

I will be providing that with the newsletter as well.

What you can do is you can click on the link if you like, want to get those books through Amazon, the link is there.

Full disclosure.

You do click on that link, I do get a portion from it.

All that will do is help, you know, push this content even further.

So please go to the website, sign up for the newsletter.

It should be ready here the next coming week.

And then you'll get that in your email weekly along with updates on the the episodes coming out and deeper.

We'll go deep in the topics that maybe I want to go deeper with from the episode and I just didn't with the microphone on.

So like I said, that Bima podcast, just starting it, what it does is it breaks down the Bible.

You start at episode one, it starts at Genesis and it breaks it down in a way to let you look at it through the lens of today.

To not look at it through the lens of today, sorry, but to look at it through the lens of who it was written by and for which was Eastern Jews and they break down the language.

And I did the first three episodes and I'm telling you I'm, I'm blown away.

It's going to be a journey and I'll share it with you throughout this podcast and throughout the blogs and the newsletter.

But I'm telling you, it's fascinating.

If you're brainiacally brainy like me, please give it a listen.

And then there was the Case for Christ, both the book and the movie.

And I have to say, people like Jordan Peterson talking about scripture and Western morality.

If you haven't yet, please, on the Daily Wire, go to Jordan Peterson's Bible series.

I mean, I'm doing the New Testament and the round table that he has assembled for this for that series and how they break it down.

It is incredible.

Wes Hoff's approach to apologetics.

Using history, manuscripts, context to show that faith isn't just a blind leap, it's anchored into something.

Lee Strobel, I mean, he was a hard nosed legal editor at the Chicago Tribune, a committed atheist who thought Christianity was nonsense until he spent nearly two years investigating the historical evidence for Jesus and Ended up convinced God exists.

Now Strobl described where he started.

He said, I started out as an atheist, utterly convinced that God didn't create people, but that people created God.

That's exactly how I used to think, seeing guys like Lewis and Strobel, both former skeptics, end up on the other side.

It didn't magically convert me.

It messed with the old script in my head that said smart, thoughtful people always end up atheists and they don't.

Like I said.

Then Bhima stepped in with their ability to read that Bible in a way that made sense.

And then this other pattern emerged.

Like I said, if you judge history, including church history, purely through today's moral lens, you're always going to be disappointed.

But zoom out.

Jesus even.

Many people who hate Christianity stand on Christian moral foundations without even knowing it.

So my old atheist hero stopped feeling his comforting.

The universe is just blind in different matter.

Doesn't hit the same when you're facing your own death.

So that's how I got here.

Cancer kids, shows like the Chosen, Apologetics, History, Context.

I call myself a man standing at a crossroads.

On one side, stay a non believer, stay the skeptic, stay in control.

On the other, lean into faith, lean into Christianity.

Actually put God first, Jesus said, seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all things will be given to you as well.

That's basically the definition of surrender.

I keep hearing.

Put God first and let him reorder everything else on paper.

That makes sense to me in some ways going back into this journey again is.

It feels like what has been preached by every therapist that you go to and talk to, or any self help guru.

Mindfulness.

It feels the message sounds and feels like an ancient mindfulness.

Is that what God is?

Our mindfulness?

Step out of the constant noise.

Remember who God is, who you are and what actually matters.

But here's my reality.

I struggle with surrender.

And there's fear underneath that.

Part of it is will people think I'm a hypocrite, the guy who used to bash religion, now talking about Jesus.

But honestly, the bigger fear is internal.

Will the old me think I'm silly.

That old antitheist version of me who's still in the room sometimes rolling his eyes, saying, really, man?

Hands up, singing to the sky now.

Then deeper than that is the cost question.

If I actually surrender, if I genuinely put God first, what in my life has to change?

Because what I'm learning is as much as people say they have this moment, this over washing feeling, whether it's in their baptism or what, but I think there's an unspoken part of that that I think doesn't get mentioned a lot.

Because it's not a dip your head in water and you're done.

It's covenant, commitment, a whole life reordering.

That's scary.

Scary and exciting.

So why bother?

Why not just stay half in, half out?

Because I'm afraid of not finding redemption.

What do I mean by redemption?

It's my slogan.

Every man deserves redemption.

Every man can be rebuilt.

But what do I mean?

Well, redemption.

I mean redemption from a life I feel I've often lived poorly.

Redemption from bad decisions, from failures as a father, as a husband, a son, a man.

From anger that sometimes feel like it owns me if I don't seek redemption.

If I don't seek redemption, I risk losing everything that matters.

My wife, my kids, hearts, my sense of being the man I'm supposed to be.

There's a verse that says, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come, the old has gone, the new is here and another where God promises to restore the years the locusts have eaten, to give back what was lost and wasted.

That's redemption language.

And I believe this when I say every man deserves redemption.

Every man deserves the chance to seek redemption.

Not everyone chooses it, not everyone does the work.

But every man deserves the opportunity.

That right there is basically the heartbeat of this whole podcast, this whole movement I'm trying to create.

So where am I now spiritually?

I'm not going to pretend.

I'm not going to pretend that I've arrived.

I'm fully surrendered, no doubts, perfect faith.

No, I'd say I'm open.

I'm incredibly curious.

I'm more convinced than ever that Jesus is worth paying attention to.

And I'm wrestling with what it actually looks like to trust him.

I'm learning to read scripture in context.

I'm seeing how the teachings of Jesus shaped the moral instincts of the West.

I'm slowly moving from I control everything to maybe I can trust someone bigger than me.

CS Lewis went from atheist to outspoken Christian.

Lee Strobel went from ruthless skeptical journalist to now he's a pastor.

I'm not them.

My story's different.

But just knowing there are other ex atheists out there who walked into the light helps.

I don't think I've earned redemption.

I don't know if I can.

But I do believe I deserve the chance to seek it.

I believe you do, too.

If you're listening, and this sounds like you, you've walked away from church.

You've read the books.

You've rolled your eyes at Christians.

You've rolled your eyes at Christians.

You've called yourself atheist, agnostic, whatever.

But there's still that nagging sense that there might be something more.

That light whisper deep inside that's slowly becoming a roar.

Or maybe you look at your life and you think, yeah, I've lived pretty poorly, too.

You've messed up as a dad, a partner, a son.

You're angrier than you want to admit.

You're scared of dying with this unresolved.

Here's what I want you to hear.

You, me, we are not beyond redemption.

There's a verse that says, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Not the perfect, not the already holy.

Everyone.

You might be far.

You might be stubborn, you might.

You might be angry, but you're not beyond it.

You don't have to fake some cheesy church Persona.

You don't have to erase your doubts overnight.

You can stand at that crossroad with me and just say, if you're real, if you see me, if you can redeem what I've broken.

I'm listening.

Guys, there's something here.

I feel a slow change happening within me.

There's a war of my old self, the me that I think God wants me to be.

And it feels good.

It's scary.

But I'm ever more convinced that this is the path, which is why I saved the spirit pillar last, because this is the anchor.

I feel this is going to be the anchor for all the pillars.

I'm really excited to see where this goes and I'm glad you're with me.

So if you're willing to.

Wherever you're listening from driving, at the gym, on a walk.

I just want to end this episode with a simple prayer.

Now I want to be clear.

I'm learning to pray.

It's very uncomfortable for me, which is why I'm going to make it my tradition now.

At the end of every episode, we're going to end it with prayer.

And you don't have to close your eyes or fold your hands or do Anything special.

You just have to let these words be something you can borrow if you don't know what to say yet.

God, I don't have all this figured out.

I've messed things up as a man, as a dad, as a partner, as a son.

I've been angry, I've been stubborn, I've doubted you, I've argued against you.

But if you're there, if you're the God who gives a new heart and a new spirit, if you're the God who restores the years the locusts have eaten.

If you really can make a man new on the inside, then I'm asking you to start with me.

I don't know how to fully surrender.

I don't know how to lay everything down.

But I am at this crossroads.

And I'm asking you to show me the good way and give me the courage to walk in it.

Help me become the man you created me to be.

Redeem what I have broken.

Teach me how to seek you, even with my doubts.

And for every man listening who feels the same, would you meet him right where he is too?

In Jesus name, Amen.

Now, if you prayed any part of that, even if you're not sure you meant it all, I am so proud of you for just being honest.

This is Pillar three Faith.

Not a neat testimony, not a highlight reel.

Just a man at the crossroads.

Catholic kid, angry atheist, anti theist, cancer patient dad, school.

Grew up asking for the ancient paths and daring to believe that redemption is still possible.

Please, if this episode hit you, if you know a man who's wrestling with faith, anger and his own past, wrestling with body image, physical health, mental health, dark thoughts.

Please share this episode and all episodes with him.

Subscribe to the show so you don't miss what's coming next.

Keep an eye on the brotherhood we're building around, redeemed and rebuilt.

Because you don't have to walk this road alone.

I truly believe, truly believe that every man deserves redemption.

Every man deserves a chance to seek him.

See you next time.