Searching For The Truth!

Deconstruction Part 2: Counting the cost

As a teenager I carried a deep sense of insecurity. I rarely felt like I belonged anywhere. My family life was filled with dysfunction, and beneath my outward confidence was a young man who felt lost, uncertain, and disconnected.

I drifted into addiction, violence, and reckless choices. Looking back, It wasn’t rebellion. I was searching for something solid to stand on. I wanted to know who I was and where I belonged.

When I was sixteen, I discovered the hippie movement.

For the first time, I found “my people” who seemed to be asking the same questions I was asking. They questioned authority. They wanted peace instead of war, experience instead of tradition, authenticity instead of conformity.

I found my home.

My search for truth became obsessive. I believed psychedelics like LSD could open doors to ultimate reality. Every trip seemed like another step toward enlightenment. I read everything I could find about Buddhism, Zen, meditation, Eastern philosophy, and altered states of consciousness.

I wasn’t simply experimenting with drugs. I was searching for truth.

I found community among people who were also searching, and that community gave me a sense of identity. I finally felt understood.

But something inside me remained restless.

Every answer seemed temporary. Every experience faded. Every new philosophy eventually produced another unanswered question.

I was, at best, a seeker.

Then, at twenty-one years old, everything changed.

I encountered Jesus.

That experience transformed my life. It wasn’t simply a new set of beliefs. It was a completely new direction. A sense of purpose. Along with my wife Wendy and our young son, we found ourselves surrounded by people whose lives revolved around following Christ.

I couldn’t get enough.

I devoured the Bible. I attended every Bible study I could find. I listened to sermons, memorized Scripture, studied theology, and wanted to understand every doctrine I encountered.

At the time I believed I was simply hungry to know God. Years later, I realized something deeper was happening. Yes, I wanted to know God. But I also wanted certainty.

I wanted security. I wanted structure. I wanted a family.

After living with insecurity and instability, evangelical theology offered something I had never experienced before. It gave me clearly defined answers. It explained the world. It told me who was right and who was wrong. It gave me confidence that I had finally found “the Truth.”

And that” certainty” felt incredibly safe. I don’t judge that younger version of myself.

I understand him.

He had spent years feeling lost. Clearly defined doctrines became my safe place. Of course a tightly connected church community became home.

For decades I immersed myself in that world.

I became a pastor.

I taught the Bible with complete conviction.

I discipled others with confidence because I truly believed I was giving them truth.

If you had asked me then whether I would someday question the theological system that had shaped my adult life, I would have laughed.

It seemed impossible.

But life has a way of asking questions that theology alone cannot answer.

Then the certainty I had depended upon began to crack. Wendy having cancer and dying at just 45 years old tore into my safe controlled world like a sledge hammer.

Questioning everything I had come to believe opened my mind and led me into a profound season of reevaluation.

Scriptures didn’t fit together as neatly as I had been taught.

The more I studied certain doctrines, the less certain they became.

Some people I admired began asking difficult questions themselves.

What began as a few uncomfortable questions eventually became something much larger.

It became deconstruction.

That word has become controversial, but for me it simply describes the process of examining beliefs I had never imagined questioning.

What I didn’t understand was that deconstruction isn’t only about theology.

It’s about identity.

When you’ve spent decades inside evangelical culture, your beliefs aren’t just ideas floating around in your head.

They become who you are.

Your friendships are there.

Your purpose is there.

Your career may be there.

Your family relationships are often there.

Your understanding of God, the Bible, salvation, eternity, morality, and even your own worth becomes woven together into one tightly connected system.

To question one belief often feels like pulling on a thread that could unravel everything. And that’s terrifying.

People who haven’t lived inside that world sometimes assume deconstruction is simply an intellectual exercise.

It isn’t.

It’s emotional.

It’s relational.

It’s deeply personal.

You begin wondering if you’re losing your faith, your identity, or both.

People you love become concerned. Friends ask what’s happening to you.

Some try to guide you back. Eventually, some begin treating you as though you’ve become dangerous.

Not because you’ve stopped loving Jesus. But because you’ve stopped agreeing with the system.

You lose relationships you never imagined losing.

Conversations become guarded.

You discover that some friendships were built more on shared certainty than authentic relationships.

There are moments when you wonder if everyone else is right and you’re simply making a terrible mistake.

There are times when life feels frighteningly uncertain.

There are seasons when you feel completely alone.

Change is hard. Losing certainty is hard.

Losing community may be the hardest part of all.

But here’s what I also want to say to anyone walking this road.

You are not alone.

It may feel like you’ve stepped into a wilderness, but there are others there too.

There are thoughtful, compassionate people who still love Jesus but have learned to hold their beliefs with less certainty but with more faith.

There are people who value questions as much as answers.

There are communities where curiosity isn’t treated as rebellion. Where doubt isn’t considered failure. Where faith can breathe.

Finding those people takes time.

Sometimes much longer than we’d like.

But they exist. I’ve met them.

They’ve become companions on this journey.

What I’ve discovered is that deconstruction, becomes the doorway to a deeper faith.

Not a faith built on needing to have every answer.

But a faith rooted in honesty. In humility. In love. In mystery.

Today, I hold fewer certainties than I did.

But I have more peace.

I’m no longer trying to defend a theological system.

I’m simply trying to follow Jesus with an open heart.

And perhaps that’s where authentic faith begins, not with having all the answers, but with the courage to keep seeking truth wherever it leads.

The teenager who searched for truth through psychedelics eventually became the pastor who searched for truth through theology.

Today, I’m still a seeker.

The difference is that I no longer fear the questions.

I’ve discovered that faith can grow stronger when certainty decreases, I hope you have enjoyed my post! please become a subscriber and upgrade from free to paid. It is greatly appreciated.