Worth Every Drop

By Jonathan Henderson

I was raised to believe that there was a God and that He was a personal being. As a child, you don't really question what your parents tell you. If they say there is a jolly, three-hundred-pound man who delivers all the Christmas toys in one night on the backs of flying reindeer with one red headlight, you believe them.

When I reached adol

• Language: English
• Publisher: Worth Life Publishing
• Release date: Sep 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9798986692531

Book preview

Intro|Samurai Jesus

I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.—Jesus (John 15:15, NIV)

My friend invited me to the Getty Museum in Los Angeles to tour an exhibit by renowned Mexican photographer Graciela Iturbide. The collection, La Danza de la Cabrita (The Goat’s Dance), was a showcase of her finest and most expensive works. Now, I’m not certain how one determines the value of such photos, but I assume the artist’s popularity must be a factor. And the photographer usually earns that popularity by being skilled at capturing compelling, thoughtful stories through their lens. Iturbide is considered a master at capturing such stories, and for that reason, I agreed to attend her exhibit.

The first photograph of the exhibit was entitled Angel Woman. It was a black-and-white photo of a Seri Indian woman wearing a traditional Mexican dress, scurrying away from the camera along a desert cliff’s edge with a boombox suspended in her right hand. Our tour group seemed to be mesmerized by this picture of visual and cultural contrasts. After filling us in concerning the details of when and where the photo was taken, the tour guide asked us to share our reactions to the art.

One person commented on how the photo’s lighting drew his focus to the brighter spots in the picture. Uh . . . that’s the best you could come up with? I asked myself. Meanwhile, another person pointed to the contrast between the desert’s natural, rustic beauty and the modern boombox. To this observation, my reaction was a nod in agreement. Still another person talked about how mysterious the woman looked because her face was hidden. At that point I muttered under my breath, Somebody’s over-examining. This was way too much analysis for something so simple.

Then the guide asked me to chime in, and I couldn’t contain my satirical side: All she needs is a piece of cardboard and she’ll be able to introduce breakdancing to the people of the Sonoran Desert.

But something happened during my sarcastic leak. As I stared at the picture, my initial impression of the woman evolved. Strange as it now appears, I had formed an insightful analysis. "Actually, she . . . she looks like a he. And he looks like a . . . uh . . . a samurai! Check out the outfit. Look at the strong T shape of her upper body and the long hair. Yep, all she’s missing is a sword." Yes, I really meant it. I couldn’t help it—that’s what I saw. Needless to say, I got the cold shoulder for the rest of the tour.

See what happens when you look at a picture long enough? You see more than you notice at first glance. So why couldn’t anyone else see the samurai that I saw? Shouldn’t they have taken a harder look? Or did they just say what the guide wanted to hear? A bunch of pleasers, I tell you!

Get the Picture?

Life is a bit like the episode at the museum. We can all look at the same thing yet walk away with completely different impressions, feelings, and experiences. This takes me to the subject of this book, and what might be the world’s most enigmatic exhibit: God.

Just reading that word stirs all kinds of emotional and intellectual reactions. Is God real, or is he an invention of culture used to control and manipulate people? Is he a person, a place, or a thing? Maybe he is a she or an it? Or perhaps God is just an idea, a feeling, or a force. We may ask ourselves, is God here and everywhere, or did he birth life only to abandon it later? Does the word God make you feel anxious or hopeful? Maybe you feel love or anger. Even more confusing is that many have felt the entire range of questions and feelings. I am one of those people.

My picture of God came from what others had first shared with me. I was raised to believe that there was a God and that He was a personal being. As a child, you don’t really question what your parents tell you. If they say there is a jolly, three-hundred-pound man who delivers all the Christmas toys in one night on the backs of flying reindeer with one red headlight, you believe them.

When I reached adolescence, however, I felt compelled to question everything. I challenged the picture of God that emerged from the instructions given by my parents, teachers, and pastors. And these questions weren’t all of the trivial type, such as, Can God create a rock so heavy that He can’t lift it? Nope, they were: Why do bad things happen to good people? Does everything happen for a reason, and according to God’s will? Everything? Including all the bad stuff?

Then there were the highly polarizing views that never appeared to be questioned, such as, Trust, love, worship, and serve God, or else He’ll send you to hell. Views like that were terrifying. If God is supposed to be our caring and loving Father, how could He burn to death His disobedient children? I didn’t think the worst parent on earth would do something that ghastly. This picture was beyond toxic and left me in state of fear.

The fear of God made me feel small and worthless and that my only value to Him was worship and obedience. I’m sorry to say, but God seemed like a big bully, and pushing me around didn’t win over my heart. Sure, pushing one another down in a demonstration of strength was how my classmate Max and I became best friends in third grade, but I wasn’t in third grade anymore!

Even when I was told that God loved me, and because of that love sent His Son to earth to save us all, it still sounded fearsome and gruesome. Did God have to torture His Son on a cross, otherwise He couldn’t accept me for who I am? Why would God have to do that if He’s the most powerful being in the universe? If He wanted to save us from the pitchfork guy, then He should rescue us with His superpowers instead of some bloody, seemingly orchestrated, sacrificial ritual.

At the heart of all my questions, there was essentially just one question I was asking: Do I matter to God, or is it only what I do for Him that matters? To think that our service to Him is our only value, places us as nothing more than servants, or even worse—slaves. Yet I was assured as an adolescent that God wanted to be friends. He wanted to be my best friend, in fact. But how many friends do you have who would kill you if you weren’t their friend? Zero! You’d call the cops if that scenario were ever presented to you. However, we can’t call law enforcement on God. He is the law! And if you don’t obey His law, you get a divinely enforced death sentence.

Thanks . . . friend?

In the end, it left me stuck. How do you tell someone who can detonate you, Thanks, but no thanks? I eventually arrived at the conclusion that communicated exactly what I was reaching for: If God wants to truly be my friend, then He should be more friendly.

Faith Step

With all the unanswered questions on the table, I was at a crossroads of faith. And to be completely transparent, I have found myself at numerous crossroads of faith throughout my life as I have wrestled with my picture of God—which felt inconsistent at best, and a total contradiction at worst. Seeing visual contrasts of dark and light in the photo of Angel Woman was artistic. Seeing God as dark and light, not so much. I wanted to believe in a creator who was dependable, stable, trustworthy, understanding, and kind.

I didn’t want to hear any more talk about how I had to love God. I wanted to first figure out if I could like Him. Isn’t liking someone the first step in any friendship? So I decided to approach my faith journey as I would approach any other relationship. Step by step, I would search for answers to my questions, and if I were able to trust those answers, then I would take another step closer.

However, getting to know someone you can see is very different from getting to know someone who is unseen. God walking around in His invisibility cloak wreaks havoc for anyone struggling to believe. Before you can decide if He’s friendly, you would have to first accept that God is actually there. The Bible states, Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him (Hebrews 11:6, NLT).

This text isn’t very helpful for an agnostic or atheist. Most would prefer proof of existence before an actual search begins. However, you don’t need absolute proof of God’s existence before your search. Like any treasure hunter, you need curiosity, hope, and determination. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13, NIV).

Your very first step is one of faith. Be open to believing. If you think that is too much to ask, you have exercised this muscle before, even if you didn’t know it. Every relationship begins with a little faith—being willing to trust a little and explore a bit further. And that faith builds with each successful encounter. Your choosing to read this book means you have, at the very least, an ounce of faith; a willingness to believe there is a God.

Don’t panic, though, because that little bit of faith isn’t supposed to carry you to the end of your journey; it just needs to get you to the next faith-fueling station of your life. Just like on a long road trip, you move from station to station until you arrive at your destination. The most important step, however, is the first one. And after the first step, the next most important step is the next one. My first step of faith was to believe God exists. I arrived at this belief by observing what is considered the very first revelation of God—nature.

Natural Revelation

Nature was my first faith-fueling station. Honestly, for me, it takes a greater leap of faith to not believe there is a Creator than to believe there is an intelligent Designer of Life. My life experiences have taught me up to this point that nothing tangible comes out of nothing or is produced by spontaneous generation. If I can’t believe smartphones materialize out of thin air, how could I accept humanity exploded into existence? Even if I helped the process by throwing my phone against another smartphone, it wouldn’t big bang into a laptop computer. Compared to the circuitry and craftsmanship that goes into the creation of a computer, the members of the plant and animal kingdoms are at least trillions of times more complex.

When I observe nature, I am convinced it must have a Creator (Psalm 19:1). The Bible states, For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse (Romans 1:20, NIV).

Now, I understand there are evolutionists prepared to make an argument for a different theory on the origin of life; but at the end of the day, evolution requires just as much faith, if not more, than believing in God. Even if you have a challenge in believing in a self-existent God—a being who has always independently existed apart from anything else—you’d still have to believe in some form of self-existence in order to explain evolution. Can’t have a big bang without something pulling the trigger. So the atoms which comprise matter would have to be self-existent.

Though evolution is considered a scientific theory, many treat it as fact. Science stakes its factuality on empirical data recorded from observations and tested theories. However, speciation—like an ant turning into an elephant—isn’t observable. Theoretically, it would require millions more years than my finite existence allows me to witness.

Often people feel the debate between creation and evolution is one of facts versus fiction, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. It really is a debate of faith versus faith. In what or in whom do you place your faith? Just as no human being can claim to have seen creation, no human can claim to have observed the transitions involved in evolution. Thus, all things being equal, I have decided to believe in creation. As simplistic as this might sound, I believe there is a painter because I see the painting hanging on a wall.

Since nature convinced me that it is more consistent to believe in a Creator, my interest then turned to wanting to know what this Creator is like. However, discovering who God is through nature alone has its challenges. Though I can catch glimpses of a caring Creator by watching a lioness tenderly clean her cubs with her tongue, the same Serengeti documentary would only moments later capture the same lioness chasing down a frightened antelope and crushing its neck with her jaws. The scene is tense and violent, and I have to wonder if the Creator is dualistic—having a nature that is both good and evil.

Sure, I can hear the Circle of Life song from the film The Lion King attempting to make peace with all the violence in the wild, yet I’m certain there is no wildebeest humming that tune while its limbs are being ripped apart by not-so-cartoonish hyenas. Thus if this portrayal is true, and art is a reflection of the artist, this Artist of nature would seem to be both gentle and violent, which is hard to reconcile.

Reconciling these two opposing images of God is a true challenge of faith in His character. We would never consider a mother who systematically abuses her children, emotionally and physically, to be a good parent because she also consistently feeds and clothes them. Even a husband who had only cheated on his wife a handful of times in their twenty-five-year marriage wouldn’t get any awards for Husband of the Century for keeping a stable job during those same twenty-five years. The infidelity is just too loud and heartbreaking to acknowledge the man as a good husband. So if God is truly good, then He can’t be good and bad and still hold the title of good.

Though I was willing, without presuppositions, to accept the fact that God may indeed have two competing sides, I reasoned that it was quite possible that nature alone provides a limited scope for knowing God. I needed more than fragments in nature if I was to understand Him correctly. But where can I find this holistic picture of the Creator?

This brings me to the next faith-fueling station—the Bible.

Credible Source

If nature does not provide me with a consistent picture of God, does the Bible do a better job? Disappointingly, this is not always the case due to human interference. Like my experience at the museum, the Bible’s portrayal of God can at times appear to be subjective. That subjectivity depends greatly on one’s biblical hermeneutics—interpretation, translation, historical context—in determining the meaning of texts. You can easily defend almost any belief or practice by using a verse here and there. The reason for this is, though the Bible is inspired by God, it’s not directly written by Him. Unlike other religious books that are said to be of divine origin, the Bible doesn’t record only one individual’s account. It is a collection of books and letters, written over a period of roughly two thousand years by forty authors from three continents, who wrote in three different languages, all contributing to the mosaic picture of God (2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:20, 21).

With all those moving parts and human fingerprints found throughout the process, you may question why I chose to trust the Bible. For me, it is precisely these variables that make the Bible all the more credible. A perfectly harmonious document doesn’t solve the issue of credibility, because it can very likely be a product of conspiracy, forgery, or one’s personal agenda.

The Bible, however, is a perfect reflection of the imperfections in life. It captures real people with real flaws writing about real drama and their encounters with a real God.

For many, the human touch involved in the construction of the Bible has left it vulnerable to detractors. They’ll point to perceived mistakes and discrepancies and argue that it cannot be trusted if there are inaccuracies. They’ll use science and historical accounts to present the Bible as a fictional work. However, if the Bible accounts, differing slightly in timelines and other minor details, send us spiraling down the path of disbelief, then we might as well not believe any story, including our own personal stories. Have you ever heard your grandfather tell a funny family story repeatedly at gatherings? Notice how some details go missing and some are added with each telling. We all do this, even when retelling our own firsthand experiences. But it doesn’t make the stories any less credible. At the end of the story Grandpa still marries Grandma at the city aquarium and you’re an eventual byproduct of their love.

Discrepancies are a part of every human story, whether personal, scientific, or historical. Yes, let’s treat science and history evenhandedly when considering discrepancies. It is a fact that science and history aren’t always perfect within themselves. There are disagreements among them in various subjects. The outcome in scientific research can depend on who is doing the research, where it’s done, the presumptions of the researcher, the tools being used to measure the subject, and even who is funding the research. Science has its own cliques and sacred beliefs that no one dares to challenge. Science can be very religion-like when it comes to believing concepts and theories we have never observed or verified on our own. Instead of conducting the studies ourselves, we have chosen to trust the scientists who we’ll never meet.

History, as recorded in our textbooks, isn’t always fact either. Like science, it can also be subjective. It depends on who is telling the story, why they are sharing the story, and from where. I’m pretty certain the boombox-carrying Seri Native woman’s people would have quite a different version of American history than what I was taught in school. The point is, wherever you choose to land on the discussion of faith, science, creation, evolution, the Bible,