As a Christian is God bigger than Christianity??

I would characterize myself as a passionate follower of Jesus. While my journey is a long way from completion; there are many pockets of deep entrenched sin in my life that I habitually fall into- I find the faith of Christianity has deepened my spirituality, brought transformation and life to me and through me to others. I am also deeply aware of the reality that for many Christianity has been something that has damaged and wounded them, from the antagonism towards other faiths that led to the murderous crusades and still marginilizes many, to the cover ups of the sexual abuse, to the veneer of Christianity that characterises the worship of money of many televangelists and others.  

However I am still a Christian, but believe that the way of Jesus leads me to celebrate that there are many ways to deeply encounter God. Many Christians struggle with this comment and ask how can you say this- why are you then a Christian? I have often struggled to enunciate this clearly, but simply have affirmed my own experience of transformation, and life richly blessed in my faith. BUT I do not limit God to my own faith.

Many rejoice at this statement but in conversation I am often deeply disappointed, as I discover people hearing me saying 'anything goes', 'I can make my own faith', which at its essence reduces to an idea that I can run my life myself. This is not what I am saying, rather it is my belief that it is only when we surrender deeply to a faith tradition that we can open ourselves to the transcendent power of God. I deliberately use the word surrender as I feel that so much fundamental religion whether Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or other rests on a refusal to surrender, but rather the use of religion as a something to accommodate my will and desires. As Newsweek recently helpfully put it - "many people regard religion as a therapeutic lifestyle aid' (Newsweek June 13 2011- Mormons Rock). 

The challenge thus is to take ones spirituality- growth, nurture- whatever term you use seriously, to take responsibility for ones spirituality and to engage. The syncretic nature of modern life is to take whatever suits you as your own- as a friend helpfully puts it 'we end up reading the Bible instead of the Bible reading us'.

I have been helped by the following quote offered within Don Scrooby's blog http://seeingmoreclearly.blogspot.com/2011/06/religious-diversity-my-response.html

"If we do not allow ourselves to go down deeply somewhere, we are in danger of floating on the surface in an erratic, unaccountable and lonely way. Our humanity calls for particularity - a particular channel of grace. My own primary channel through Jesus Christ and the historical and living community that takes seriously his claimed intimacy with ultimate Truth, offers a very personal , particular "way in" to universal reality. My commitment to truth through him opens my eyes to grace everywhere. He is not someone to protect and defend. He reveals the loving light that frees me to live in the naked simplicity of nothing ultimately to protect and defend. Then I am free to claim every moment and person as friend - and to see the grace in every tradition as mine; as part of our common human treasure."