Making Decisions: Choosing Christ

The most difficult and life-changing decision I made was to become a Christian. It wasn't a Saul-meeting-Christ-on-the-road-to-Damascus kind of decision. I wish it was. It would be so much easier to explain. I mean, how can anyone not believe, after such an encounter? No, mine was a small eating away of resistance, a small niggling feeling that this was not the answer, a small reluctance to pray and then suddenly a decision that yes, Christ is the answer. How did it happen - I do not know.

I think Christ met me in my dissatisfied moments. One eye-opener for me was actually my experience in trying to teach Jenn about Hinduism. I thought about how I grew to believe what I believed and came to the conclusion that it was a kind of an immersion experience - bedtime stories from my mother and father, weekly prayer sessions singing 'bhajans' , regular communal prayer sessions at the Brahmin Association... It kind of seeps into your consciousness, and you learn bits & pieces. And I think I WAS fairly religious as a Hindu. I fasted when I needed stuff, I carried milk pot 'kavadis' in thanksgiving during Thaipusam for both my daughters, prayers on Fridays - gosh, it seems like a different world altogether now. And I look back and see a different me. And so that was what I tried to do with my children - to tell them about the religion by telling them stories. But the more stories I told, the more questions came into my mind. Because Jenn asked "why?" - something I don't remember asking my mother. I had accepted that it was so. But even as I told the stories, they sounded hollow to my ears. I couldn't continue to believe that I was entrusting my future to such human gods - gods who got angry & jealous, who had to be placated, gods who flirted... And then one day, I just made up my mind.

My decision to accept Christ was first of all, an intellectual decision. And then as I went through tough patches, I have come to know Him emotionally and spiritually. But I have also come to understand in a very real way that religion is really a matter of faith. Because there are parts of the Bible that do not stand up to intellectual scrutiny. And you just have to believe. And believing in Christianity is really a circular argument - why do I believe in God? Because the Bible says so. Why do you believe the Bible? Because it's God's Word. So the intellect alone may not give answers. There has to be faith. And that is what moves the different people who practise different religions - each of them has faith that what they believe is the right way.

Then what is different about being a Christian? Isn't it just a matter of choice? I choose to be a Christian, someone chooses to be a Hindu, someone else chooses to be a Buddhist... This is the heart of the matter. What I enjoy now as a Christian that I did not as a Hindu is an absolute loving & personal relationship with God. Before, I was afraid - there were taboos, there were 'bad' days when things could not be done, there were rituals I had to do to please god, and hardest of all, when life was really really bad, I had to live with the thought that what was happening to me now was a result of sins I had committed in my previous birth - things I could not un-do, things I had no control over. Or sometimes because the planets were in the wrong alignment and I had not done the right prayers to counter their influence. That made me feel so very helpless. But with Christ, I feel free. All days are created by God and all things happen according to the will of God. Yes, even when bad things happen to good people. The problems I have are not created by God or the result of my past birth but because of sinful decisions or choices made by men. But now instead of feeling helpless, I can turn to God. Because He comforts me, He shows me what to do, He acts in very real ways. He has even picked up my messes and made them into something beautiful and worthy of Him. This personal relationship, this freedom to talk to God, to be able to say to Him even something as mundane as "God please send me a taxi" or something as large as "God please protect my daughters from the evils of this world" - that is the result of my decision. To choose Christ.