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Christ is risen!
I think most would give the same answer, from to Antiochians to ROCORians to ROACians: study, pray, read the Scriptures, work out your salvation, love your neighbor, open yourself to God (be willing to go where he leads), pray some more, follow the Church's practical teachings (e.g., fasting, alms giving, etc.), read spiritual material like the lives of the saints, etc. Even Southern Baptists, Catholics and other such groups would agree with many of these.
I felt much the same way a few years ago: I had gone to a Wesleyan Bible College, and smack dab in the middle of my first year there I realised that I couldn't be a Protestant anymore. Every "choice" (ie. religious group) looked "wrong" to me. What a mess I thought Christianity was, though I also realised (somewhat superficially at the time) that I also was a mess. I think we all go through periods like that, some of us having many such periods.
Again, I think the answer is essentially going to be the same: pray, read scriptures, etc. Everyone that I've read from C.S. Lewis to John Chrysostom say this. As Lewis said in the Screwtape Letters (to paraphrase), it's when you see nothing worth having faith in, when you are so very close to giving up, but you don't: that's when Satan is most defeated. Between the tricks of Satan, and our own fallenness pulling us away from the truth, it's a rough road.
Christ is concerned with his Church. I'm sure of that. I can't prove it, and I'm not even sure that I can explain it. Heck, I am floundering spiritually, I certainly don't personally feel like I'm feeling the fruits of that care! Yet, I know it's true. If things are fallen, if things look bad, if there's division or hate or unnecessary suffering, these things are not because God is negligent. Maybe it is this struggling that will lead to our salvation? Maybe not. Maybe God just allows it because of free-will, because he refuses to hold our hands the entire way through our earthly sojourn? I don't know, but I'm sure that there is a God, and I'm sure he cares.
Will things get better or worse? I don't know. Today is possibly as bad as the fourth century (when there were numerous heresies that had a significant number of adherents), it is possibly better. We are possibly worse than Sodom (or capernaum or tyre), we are possibly a bit better. I can say that if we are in the end times, it would explain the confusion. At the end, just holding to the faith that was given to you will be all that is required for a crown. I don't know that this is the end, but this concept does give some peace of mind, I think. It reminds us that we are not required to go get a PhD in theology and "figure it all out," we are only asked to go "further up and further in" according to our ability (according to the measure of faith God gave to us).
And, as my signature on oc.net sayes, we will be judged by our place in life, and our context. So, we need most beware of that sin which can ruin everything else: falling into despair. Yes, we can ask where we ought to be jurisdiction wise, and where we perhaps shouldn't be, but the most important thing is to live the life in Christ: if we keep our own death constantly in mind (as though it were about to happen) we will not sin, and if we constantly keep God in our mind, we won't want to. I can't do this, but it's perhaps a good goal. It also gives us a context from which to view the discussions about whether there is grace here or heresy there. They are important discussions, but let's get the milk taken care of (let's pray, fast, read the Scriptures, Fathers, etc.) before we think ourselves capable of understanding the meatier stuff.
May God help me heed my own advice!
Justin
