If you recognize the title of this post as the title of a song, congratulations! You, too, are officially old – or you have a sibling who is. You will also know the significance of a brand new pair of roller skates, but I digress. After all, what good are the roller skates without a key?

If you were raised in or around the Church, have you ever listened to the words of the hymns? I mean really listened, not just repeated them by rote without giving them much thought. If you haven’t, go online and find a few of them and listen closely. I suspect you will be surprised.

Then ponder for a moment the qualities of God you were taught in your youth. They may have included God as all powerful, all knowing, all seeing, absolutely good and moral, absolutely just, able to work miracles at will, protecting the people of God, and a host of others. Now I invite you to think about how those things you were taught match up with your life experience. Have you experienced tragedy, trauma, or unfairness? What about miracles?

Now I’d invite you to consider the promises you have encountered in the Bible. Do they ring true? Did Jesus not promise that whatever we ask of God in Jesus’ name will be given us? You have probably met people who end every prayer with the words “in Jesus’ name,” as if by doing so God will be compelled to fulfill our requests. Does that work? What about when an entire family is gathered around the sick bed of a loved one and they all pray for healing, but healing doesn’t come? Was Jesus lying?

Have you ever brought any or all of these issues to a spiritual teacher, minister, or leader of some sort, asking why things don’t work the way we are told they work? Have you received an answer that is some version of “God’s ways are not our ways,” or, “it’s a mystery”? As your loved one laid in their death bed after religious promises didn’t come through, did you find the “mystery” answer particularly satisfying? What about the suggestion that God’s ways are different from ours? Did that ease your pain?

You deserve better. You deserve leaders who are willing to openly and honestly discuss your questions, concerns, and even struggles with you. You deserve a belief system that doesn’t compel you to make excuses for God. “Oh, well, God would have saved Granny except for the fact that God’s ways aren’t our ways and it’s all a mystery” is about as comforting as a piece of week old cod. If your religion smells like that piece of cod, treat them both to the same fate – throw them back!