My family was Jehovah's Witnesses, which is a really tough

Ja Rule, with honesty born of struggle and reflection, once confessed: “My family was Jehovah's Witnesses, which is a really tough religion. It kind of deterred me from religion for a long time. They still practice, but I don't. But I always remained spiritual, and had a belief that there is a God. I'm trying to find my way, you know?” These words, humble and searching, speak to the journey of many souls: to be shaped by tradition, to wrestle with it, to step away from it, and yet to keep alive the ember of faith in the heart. His testimony is not merely about one religion, but about the eternal struggle between inherited belief and personal discovery.

The ancients knew this tension. In every age, men were born into the temples of their fathers, yet some would question, some would leave, and some would forge new paths. The prophet Abraham turned from the idols of his family to seek the one God. The Buddha left the palace of his father, turning from worldly inheritance to search for enlightenment beneath the Bodhi tree. In these stories, as in Ja Rule’s, we see the same pattern: the old faith may wound, may limit, may even deter—but the spirit, restless and alive, continues to seek truth.

Ja Rule calls the Jehovah’s Witnesses a tough religion, and indeed many who are raised in strict traditions feel the weight of rules, discipline, and exclusion. Such rigor can bring structure, but it can also stifle the soul that longs for freedom. His words show us the pain of that weight, yet also the resilience of one who, though deterred from formal religion, refused to extinguish the flame of belief altogether. He speaks of remaining spiritual, of keeping hold of the conviction that there is a God—and this is no small triumph. For many, leaving religion leads to despair, but he chose instead to continue the search.

History gives us an example in the life of Leo Tolstoy. Born into Russian Orthodoxy, he wrestled bitterly with its dogmas, its rituals, and its hypocrisies. At times, he even rejected it outright. Yet Tolstoy never ceased to seek God; he wrote of his struggles, his doubts, his failures, and his faith. In the end, he too claimed no rigid religion, but a deep and abiding spirituality rooted in love and conscience. His path, like Ja Rule’s, was not straight, but it was sincere—a testament to the strength of a soul that refuses to stop searching.

And so, O listener, what lesson do we find here? It is this: that the journey to truth is rarely simple. One may inherit a creed, yet still hunger for more. One may leave behind a temple, yet still find God in the silence of the heart, in the sunrise, in the love of others. To be spiritual is to recognize that divinity cannot be contained by walls or rules, but speaks in countless ways, through conscience, through experience, through the longing of the human soul.

Therefore, do not despise the path of the seeker. Do not mock those who leave a religion, nor those who remain. For each must walk his own road to the divine, stumbling, rising, and stumbling again. As Ja Rule admits, he is still trying to find his way—and this is the most honest path of all. For faith is not a destination fixed once for all time, but a pilgrimage of the heart, renewed each day by questions, by hopes, by the willingness to search.

Practical wisdom flows from this: honor your beginnings, even if they were heavy. Take from them what gave you strength, and set aside what brought you pain. Do not let bitterness close the door to wonder. Instead, live openly, seek earnestly, and never abandon the spark that whispers there is more to life than flesh and stone. Nurture that spark with prayer, reflection, or service, in whatever form speaks truth to you.

So remember this, O children of tomorrow: whether within a temple or beyond it, whether with a creed or without one, the divine is not far away. To be deterred is not to be lost. To be searching is not to be weak. As long as you keep the flame of belief alive, you walk upon the sacred path. For the way to God is not one road but many, and every step taken with sincerity is a step toward the eternal.