"The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound,
but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.
So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
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There is a deep, trembling need in every human soul that cannot be satisfied by mere creeds, policies, or someone else’s definition of righteousness. Beneath all our questions, beneath all the struggle and weariness, lies a profound ache, a sense that we were made for something more real, more personal, more eternal. This is where I found myself some years ago.
If you have left a high-controlled religion, or if you are searching for truth, you already know this ache. You’ve felt the pull of something truer than what you were told. Perhaps you felt imprisoned — not by a lack of devotion, but by the weight of a system that left little room for your soul to breathe as you were whirling like a Dervish trying to find something central to life.
And here is the beautiful, liberating reality: Jesus, whom God appointed as judge, looks directly at your heart. Not at the labels pinned on you. Not at whether you can recite doctrines or impress other people.
Consider Cornelius, a Roman centurion in Acts 10. A soldier. A Gentile. Every religious insider of the day would have thought, He cannot possibly belong to God. Yet what moved God was not Cornelius’ pedigree, but his sincerity, his reverence, his goodness, his quiet prayers.
And God broke into his life with a radiant message:
“Your prayers and your acts of compassion have come up as a memorial offering before God.”
That was enough. Cornelius was already seen. Known. Loved.
Peter himself had to let go of inherited assumptions and marvel, “God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean.” Here was a man who had nothing but sincerity and a heart willing to receive — and that was more than enough.
That’s the wonder of Jesus. He meets you where your humanity is most tender, in your hunger for authenticity, in your longing for something enduring in a world of shifting sands. Jesus calls Himself “the way, the truth, and the life,” knowing full well that all our questions and searching originate in the soul’s ache for the one unchanging centre.
When you strip away the noise, the fear of men, the need to fit into someone else’s expectations, what remains is a simple desire to be truly seen. To matter. To touch the eternal.
And that is exactly what Jesus promises:
“Whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” — John 6:37
He looks into the soul’s hidden places, the wounds, the fears, the unspoken longings, and welcomes you as you are, calling you into deeper life.
That is the radical heart of the gospel. Jesus is not demanding that you submit to a human structure that makes you feel uncomfortable and robs you of freedom of conscience. He is drawing you into friendship with God and Himself — into a life that transcends all the brittle rules of men.
And what happens when you embrace that? You begin to taste what John called “the light of life” — an unquenchable light that shines into every dark corner of your soul and reminds you that you were never truly alone.
That light says to you:
Your honesty matters more than perfection.
Your trust matters more than having all the answers.
Your desire to do good and just in this world matters.
And your aching questions — all those trembling whys and what-ifs — matter too, because they mean you care.
When you step away from control, you step toward authenticity, toward a life grounded in your own soul’s experience of Christ. Many who have walked this path describe a dizzying sense of freedom. Don't get me wrong, I also have an ache to be with devoted Christians, but alas, I have searched.
Meantime, I pray without fear. Read scripture as if hearing a personal letter written just for God. And discover Jesus and God present in quiet, honest places, around the dinner table, under the stars, in whispered hopes and tears. In fellow Christians I meet in life's pathways. Because Christ sends people, writers, apologists my way with specific words that direct and fill my needs.
That is what it means to live by the Spirit, alive to the voice of Christ calling your name.
So take heart. Wherever you are on your journey, whoever you are, Jesus already sees you, not through a lens of suspicion or legalism, but with deep, tender compassion.
You needn’t strive to earn what was given freely, nor hide the most fragile, honest parts of yourself, nor chase some polished image of religious acceptability. You were made for more. You were made for Him. And when you lean into that deep, soul-level hunger, that quiet pull toward what is real and good, you will find Him already leaning toward you in return. And he will lead you to where you should go in life. That is salvation. That is belonging. That is Christ, to the glory of the Father.
“The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
— John 3:8 (ESV)
“Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV), copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.”