Beloveds,

We’ve been talking a lot around here about who gets a chair.

About Whosoeverwill.

About what I mean when I say ALL.

And I realized something.

There are people Christians sometimes say are welcome while quietly hoping they will become somebody else after they sit down.

The person who walked away from God.

The person who walked away from church.

The person who wants absolutely nothing to do with organized religion.

The person who once believed and no longer does.

The person who is angry with God.

The person who isn’t sure there is a God to be angry with.

And the person who never came to any of it in the first place.

Somebody reading this may even be thinking:

Cassandra, I can’t walk away from somebody I never believed was there.

I hear you.

So instead of beginning with:

What’s wrong with them?

I want to ask a different question.

What if we actually listened to why?

I understand why some of you walked away from God.

And I understand why some of you never came.

Yes.

This Christian woman just said that.

And I think the elephant needs to be allowed to be an elephant—not quietly turned into an altar call by paragraph six.

🐘

Because there are questions.

Hard questions.

Questions people have tried to hush because they made everybody in the room uncomfortable.

Questions somebody tried to answer before you even finished asking them.

Questions somebody covered with scripture when what you needed was for somebody to sit beside you and admit:

I don’t know.

Why does God allow children to suffer?

Where was God during the abuse?

Why did I pray and still bury somebody I loved?

Why did the cancer come back?

Why did the drunk driver live?

Why did my child die?

Why did my abuser prosper?

Why was the church protecting its reputation instead of protecting me?

Why did Christians tell me God hated me?

Why was I told to forgive somebody who wasn’t sorry?

Why was my depression treated like weak faith?

Why was somebody told to stay in an abusive marriage because marriage is sacred?

Why have people used the Bible to defend slavery and segregation?

Why do wars happen while people on both sides pray?

Why do babies die?

Why do people starve?

Why do disasters indiscriminately destroy lives?

Where was God?

What kind of God allows this?

And maybe the biggest elephant of all:

What if there isn’t one?

I’m not going to answer those questions for you.

I’m not going to rush in and defend God before the question has even finished echoing through the room.

I’m not going to tell you everything happens for a reason.

I’m not going to tell you your pain was necessary.

I’m not going to call every terrible thing a blessing.

I’m not going to turn somebody’s tragedy into a sermon illustration.

And I’m certainly not going to make a hurting person responsible for protecting my faith from their questions.

Because, Beloveds?

I have questions too.

And mine aren’t theoretical.

Why did you take my mom o Christmas Morning  2016?

Why did a tornado 🌪 tear up my life Memorial Weekend 2024?

Why did I have to go through all my savings and then couldn’t find a job for 17 months!

Why did you take my wombie,  my twin a little more than two and a half weeks before Christmas 2025!

Why did I have to find out my twin passed away during Orientation  for a job that took so long to find!

And, why in the fresh hell did I have a stroke a month later!

January 21st, if you’re counting God!😠

Why have I had to wrestle with pain 24/7.

Why have I been in the blessed hospital three times since April.

Why have I scraped myself off the mat a billion times and then have my big brother decide life was done with him.

My answer, beloveds?

Because,  God has been with me through every curse word, through every hard moment, through every ghosted day.

He is My ABBA. My Father. My Friend

And you know what?

That doesn’t answer a single one of my questions.

I still don’t know why.

I don’t know why my mother died when she did.

I don’t know why that tornado tore through my life.

I don’t know why I went through my savings and waited seventeen months for a job.

I don’t know why I finally got that job only to learn during orientation that my wombie was gone.

I don’t know why January 21st came next.

And yes, God, I am still counting.

I don’t know why pain has become something I know so intimately.

I don’t know why hospitals have become part of my story.

And I don’t know why, after scraping myself off the mat over and over and over again, I had to face the loss of my big brother too.

I don’t have a pretty explanation.

And I’m not going to manufacture one because I’m a Christian and somebody thinks Christians are supposed to have answers.

I have questioned God several times since having my stroke.

I have been angry.

I have wrestled.

I have asked why.

Ultimately, I made peace with my stroke.

With myself.

Those are two different things.

Making peace does not mean I decided everything that happened to me was good.

Peace and approval are not synonyms.

Acceptance doesn’t require me to call pain a blessing.

I can make peace with what happened without pretending I wanted it to happen.

I can love the woman I am without declaring war on the woman I was.

I can have peace today and be pissed off again tomorrow.

I can believe and still have questions.

I can love God and still look toward heaven and ask:

What in the fresh hell was THAT?!

Because God isn’t an abstract theological argument to me.

He is My ABBA.

My Father.

My Friend.

And relationships have questions.

Relationships can have anger.

Relationships can have silence.

Sometimes relationships have words that will never make it onto a church bulletin.

I still believe.

But please hear what comes next.

You don’t have to.

You may have read every question I just asked and reached the exact opposite conclusion.

You may be sitting there thinking:

Cassandra, everything you just listed is precisely why I DON’T believe in God.

I hear you.

You may say:

I used to believe. I don’t anymore.

I hear you.

Maybe:

I believe something is out there, but I don’t know what.

I hear you.

Maybe you’re furious with God.

Maybe you desperately want to believe and simply cannot.

Or maybe you’re thinking:

Nothing happened to me. I just don’t believe there is a God.

I hear you too.

You don’t need a tragedy to make your unbelief respectable.

You don’t need an acceptable explanation.

You don’t secretly have to be searching.

And I’m not going to pretend every atheist is really a wounded Christian waiting for somebody to say the right combination of words.

Some people simply don’t believe.

Some never did.

The chair stays.

🪑

And some of you did believe.

Until something happened.

Or somebody happened.

Somebody used scripture to control you.

Somebody told you God hated you.

Somebody told you to remain somewhere unsafe.

Somebody protected an institution instead of protecting you.

Somebody told you depression meant you didn’t have enough faith.

Somebody demanded forgiveness while your wounds were still bleeding and the person who hurt you wasn’t even sorry.

Somebody used religion to shame you.

Silence you.

Exclude you.

Control you.

And Christians have used the Bible in the service of slavery, segregation and other forms of oppression.

We cannot make those wounds disappear by saying:

That wasn’t God. That was people.

Because people did it while saying they represented Him.

I understand why somebody might look at all of that and say:

No thank you.

And I’m not chasing you down the street carrying a Bible.

I believe.

You may not.

Those two statements can remain in the same room.

I will tell you what I believe because hiding my faith from you wouldn’t be honest.

And I will listen when you tell me what you believe because ignoring yours wouldn’t be love.

Neither one of us has to disappear for the other one to remain.

And please—

people are not exhibits in our theological arguments.

Don’t use somebody’s dead child to win an argument for God.

Don’t use my stroke to win an argument against God.

Don’t use somebody’s recovery to prove God loves them.

And don’t use somebody else’s lack of recovery to suggest they didn’t pray hard enough.

Human beings are not evidence to be passed back and forth until somebody wins.

Sometimes there is no winner.

Sometimes there is an elephant.

🐘

Sometimes there is a hurting human being.

And sometimes what that human being needs most is for somebody else to stop trying to solve them and pull up a chair.

🪑

So let me make something very clear.

You are not my conversion project.

I am not loving you so you will become Christian.

I am not loving you until you become Christian.

And I’m not loving you while secretly keeping score, hoping my kindness eventually pays off in a conversion.

Conversion is not my goal.

I’M HERE TO LOVE. PERIODT!

My faith explains why I love.

It does not determine who qualifies to receive my love.

I don’t have to abandon ABBA to make room for you.

And you don’t have to find ABBA to have room with me.

I can tell you:

He is My ABBA. My Father. My Friend.

And you can tell me:

Cassandra, I don’t believe any of that.

Okay.

Come sit down.

🪑

That’s not fake unity.

We disagree.

Maybe profoundly.

I’m not going to pretend our differences aren’t real just so everybody can feel warm and fuzzy.

But I refuse to believe disagreement requires us to dehumanize each other.

I don’t have to listen to your story merely long enough to locate the opening for my testimony.

I don’t have to solve you before I love you.

And you don’t have to become like Cassandra before Cassandra loves you.

Beloved isn’t a prize you receive after agreeing with me.

Maybe that’s what I’ve been trying to say all along when I say:

Whosoeverwill.

The chair was never a conversion seat.

It’s a love seat.

And look.

The elephant is still here.

🐘

We didn’t solve it.

Good.

I promised you I wouldn’t quietly turn it into an altar call by paragraph six.

Some questions remain unanswered.

Some of us believe.

Some don’t.

Some aren’t sure.

Some used to believe.

Some are angry with God.

Some are searching.

Some aren’t searching for a blessed thing.

And some of us are still looking toward heaven saying:

January 21st, if you’re counting God!😠

Bring your questions.

Bring your doubt.

Bring your anger.

Bring your certainty.

Bring your uncertainty.

Bring your faith.

Bring your unbelief.

Bring your story.

Bring absolutely nothing.

There is no conversion requirement attached to the chair.

Because conversion is not my goal.

I’m here to love.

Periodt!

The elephant can stay.

So can you.

🐘🪑🔒🔑

Unapologetically His.
Unapologetically yours.

loving me some you,
Cassandra

#YourLifeMattersToMe

Note: These words have been on my heart for years.  Maybe this is why life left me here after my stroke.

And, maybe, beloveds  The Universe pointed you in my direction.

Whatever the reason, beloveds, you have found your way here.

I love you and so does He.

If these words meant anything to you, take a chance and talk to me. Talk to someone. Share this with a hundred friends.

Your life matters to me. Keep moving forward. Keep looking up…