Carrion Comfort<\/a>\u201d hit her hard:<\/p>\nNot, I\u2019ll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
\nNot untwist\u2014slack they may be\u2014these last strands of man
\nIn me or, most weary, cry I can no more. I can:
\nCan something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.<\/p>\n
She writes:<\/p>\n
Hadn\u2019t I been feasting on Despair for years? And I was starving. I read and reread \u201cCarrion Comfort\u201d. Hopkins spoke what I had never shared with anyone, what I had scarcely dared to admit. He had been where I was\u2014and had not stayed there. Hope, wish day come.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. Was there such a thing as day for me to hope for?<\/p>\n
Holly was surprised to find that her fencing coach of almost a year, Josh, was a Christian. He fit none of her stereotypes.<\/p>\n
He was a caring and gentle person\u2014though not a pushover\u2014and there was something different about him, something I had never seen before: a kind of peace. His wife, Heidi, . . . had that same underlying joyfulness. . . . [Josh] cared about me, not as a potential convert, but as me<\/i>, a unique individual, and he always, always treated me with respect.<\/p>\n
One night after a disastrous fencing competition, Holly and Josh talk late into the night. She asks question after question. Her last question was key: \u201cWhen I die, what do you think is going to happen to me?\u201d Josh initially demurs: \u201cI\u2019d rather not answer that question.\u201d But when Holly explains that she genuinely wants to know his thoughts, he replies:<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that we will come before God in judgment, and he will give each person either perfect justice or perfect mercy.\u201d<\/p>\n
I sat in silence thinking about this for a moment. Slowly, I said, \u201cAnd you believe that it would be better for me to know enough, beforehand, to ask for perfect mercy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, I do.\u201d<\/p>\n
And that was all he said. Perfect justice or perfect mercy. At that dim morning hour, and again as I thought about it later, I recognized something important: I didn\u2019t want justice<\/i>. I considered myself a \u2018good person\u2019, but in my heart I was afraid to be judged on the real self behind my outward image. Perfect justice was terrifying.<\/p>\n
Following Josh\u2019s suggestions, Holly then begins reading on apologetics. She comes to believe that arguments for the existence of God are more powerful than those against. But eventually she recognizes that, if God is Who Scriptures claims He is, He cannot be analyzed as an object. He is a Person. One day, \u201cwithout my asking, I encountered the Other, God the Holy Spirit, in a way profoundly different from evaluating him as an idea.\u201d<\/p>\n
But she has still not reckoned with Jesus:<\/p>\n
Was Jesus who he said he was? There were many miracles that I could think about, but they all paled into insignificance next to the singular miracle of the Resurrection. Had it really happened? Because if it had, then Christianity was true.<\/p>\n
Two books were especially helpful to Holly at this point: Gary Habermas\u2019 The Risen Jesus and Future Hope <\/i>and N.T. Wright\u2019s The Resurrection of the Son of God. <\/i>Eventually convinced that Jesus did indeed rise from the dead physically, in a glorified body, she had a choice:<\/p>\n
I could choose to turn my back, to reject Jesus, and in so doing reject utterly God himself. Pride urged me to do it. This was the voice that whispered: \u201cIf you surrender, you lose. Be your own self, no one else\u2019s. Be a rebel.\u201d Or I could accept defeat, lay down my arms and acknowledge Jesus as Lord. . . whatever that entailed.<\/p>\n
She did indeed lay down her arms. She ended her rebellion. She submitted to her rightful king.<\/p>\n
Holly\u2019s journey to faith in Christ is her own. Her fencing coach Josh showed great discernment and wisdom in the way he gently led her to faith; but that way is not a model for all. Some will follow similar paths; many follow completely different paths.<\/p>\n
And her book describes her continuing journey, to Anglicanism and then Roman Catholicism. (With her penchant for considering serious arguments, it would have been helpful had her coach Josh suggested she read Book 4 of John Calvin\u2019s Institutes of the Christian Religion). <\/i><\/p>\n
But praise God for His grace and mercy exhibited in the new life of Holly Ordway. Praise God that she is a recipient of perfect mercy. Praise God that He did batter the heart of this rebel against Him, that He did indeed bend His force to break, blow, burn, and make her new. May He work similarly in our friends, our families \u2013 and in our own hearts.<\/p>\n
Holly Ordway, Not God\u2019s Type: An Atheist Academic Lays Down Her Arms, <\/i>(Ignatius Press, 2014).<\/p>\n
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