hypocrisy

The next section in "Unchristian" deals with hypocrites in the church. The church is seen by many as hypocritical, saying one thing but doing another. This has been one of the objections i've heard raised, and i'd dare say the church at large has recognized this at one point or another. I remember growing up and in youth group they'd say "your friends won't want to be christians because they think we're hypocrites". And it was responded to in different ways.
Reaction #1:
Act better. Walk the walk. Be the best person possible. Let them have no room to criticize you. We're right, we'll show them we're right by our rules and actions.
There are varying degrees of prudishness and isolatedness involved in this response. However, almost no matter where on this spectrum you are, you often end up in a legalistic kind of religion..there's rules, and i must follow them. This is hardly attractive for people who are looking for a free and meaningful life. (Yes, it's true, people are not just looking for absolutes and standards!)
Reaction #2:
Yes, of course we're hypocrites. They can't be expecting us to be perfect all the time. That'd be silly. We just do our best, you know.
However, this just leads to the escalation of the problem that's already there. "Those christians say they believe this, but are totally unwilling to even try to act like it".
Reaction #3:
They say we're hypocrites. But that's just dumb. We're not. Christians are the best people I know. Besides, they have nothing to say.
Simply, this isn't going to work because it will breed more isolation and "us v. them".

At first I was worried about what "Unchristian" was trying to present as a solution to all this...it sounded a little like Reactions 1 and 2 a bit mixed. And i'm still not sure they have quite figured it out for us, but it makes more sense than the 3 above reactions.
Yes, we do believe in some pretty high standards.
Yes, we are depraved and often can't fulfill them.
That's where Christ comes in.
We rely on His strength, and continually recognize His grace and love.
And they sum it up with a quote from Tolstoy "Attack me, not the path I take. If i stagger home drunkenly, does that make the path i follow any less right?"

It makes sense, but i'm not sure i'm quite satisfied with this. Not sure what more i'm looking for.. comments welcome, as always.

parting thoughts from "revolution"

Jesus' unlikely metaphors...yeast and mustard. Jews weren't big fans of either. They rid their house of yeast, a picture of sin or evil being cleaned of their life, once a year. They also valued tidy gardens,and were forbidden by jewish law to plant mustard in the garden. (m. Kil'ayim 3:2; t. Kil'aim 2:8) Why? "I was notorious for invading the well-trimmed veggies and other plants and for quickly taking over the entire garden. (Kind of like yeast works its way through dough...hmm.)... he is using this infamous plant to describe God's kingdom subtly [my note- and perhaps not so "prettily"] taking over the world." This gets me thinking. Jesus is ridiculing the huge expectations the people had for the kingdom of God. It spreads contagiously, in ways that consume our pretty little ordered world and makes something new. Also, mustard has to be crushed in order for it to be useful, either as a seasoning or as a medicine. Yeast, also, cannot be kept separate if it is to be used in the bread... it has to be covered up by the dough, smothered in it...and then it can be infectious and spread throughout all the quantity of dough, no matter how immense; just a small amount of smothered yeast goes a long way.

Now a quote from the book on the church and the frustration that many "overchurched" people feel:
"If you have the gift of frustration and the deep sense that the world is a mess, thank God for that; not everyone has the gift of vision. It also means that you ahve a responsibility to lead us in new ways. Recognizing that something is wrong is the first step toward changing the world. So for those of us who have nearly given up on the church, may we take comfort in the words of St. Augustine, "The church is a whore, but she's my mother" [ouch! yes, i know that's strong. even i havent dared say that yet] She is a mess and has many [messy] children. But she is also our momma and managed to give birth to us and to give us enough of the truth that we have been able to ask the questions that we have..."

All in all "The Irresistible Revolution" by Shane Claiborne (Zondervan 2006) is a great read. I recommend highly. Go get a copy, read it, get mad at it, do something with it...then give it away and let it keep going. :)

Words that pierce

Now wasn't i talking about this a couple of days ago? Again i want to say more on this later. but i gotta think for awhile.
Ouch, Soren, ouch.

"The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament"
~Soren Kierkegaard, Provocation:Spiritual Writings of Kierkegaard, ed. Charles E. Moore.

pensamientos

so i've been mused on by dasganze's recent post. i've just gotten home from the sunday night service i've started going to... basically a bunch of college kids hanging out, recruiting a preacher (this service thing was his idea to start with, we run it, but need his guidance and encouragement) to teach us, and in their words, "doing church differently". it's cool. and after my first week, i was recruited to be the "worship-leader-person". which i have found that i enjoy doing. It's not just playing guitar and singing on sunday nights, it's the whole process i go through to have the music ready. It forces me to play on one instrument or another or sing or at least think about songs everyday. It makes me be creative... and i wasn't so sure i could be that. Now i find myself writing more, thinking more, chilling more. I'm sitting here listening to soft music. I've recently found joy hearing Phil Wickham and Edison Glass. I've usually listened to rockier stuff, and still love it. but it was often just to get the aggression out from all the stress i was going through. Now i'm still busy, but maybe not quite as angry. Why? simply because i now make the effort to create... and in this effort, i feel the need to be at peace in all things i do. This has led me to cut out some activities and add others.
I went to a museum last sunday, saw some abstract expressionist works from the eastside of NYC. I've always appreciated such things (or tried to). But this time i actually understood. i stood there for much longer than i usually do, definitely a lot longer than the other people who ventured to the arts centre that day. The need to express one's emotion and impressions in a more tangible way than simply speaking...in fact, sometimes to truly express requires more than just speech. I wish i had my sister's talent for painting, i'd love to express in colour. Maybe that's why i put such thought into the background for my powerpoint for the words on sunday nights... i think in colours and places. But in the lack of such, i shall express myself through note and tone, and feel with rhythm, song, piano keys, my raspy alto voice, and guitar strings.

here's hoping the proverbial pen is mightier....

whoa, it's been awhile. perhaps more of my ranting will be publicized after finals/ uni graduation. my last few weeks of being a uni student are interesting; i've noticed a few things. The one on my mind right now is being brought about by sitting in BCM today - that's baptist collegiate ministries. So, we good little christian kids all have lunch together, listen to music, and then are treated to an encouraging message by a notable speaker of the week. I've been ticked by speakers before, but today really did it for me. So, a kinda loud southern guy in a suit. Hmmm... okay. Step one: not identifying with his audience. Sure. I can get over appearances.... but his message is no better... ranting, rambling... what's he talking about? Abundant life maybe? then he talks about the ministry he's involved in... telethons with Billy Graham crusades. he asks us trivia questions about Mr. Graham, the Graham family, the number of years of his ministry, his kids, how many people are saved because of Billy....
as can be imagined, most of the college students have no idea.
His basic point seemed to be "if you're not saved, you're missing out, cause jesus loves you and died for you"
and if you are saved "hand out these billy graham tracts to people, cause they know who he is and people are more interested in what you have to say than you think. As a matter of fact, there was this one time i was in the grocery store and i was talking to this lady..." then proceeds to give several anecdotes of people he's given tracts to.
"cause there's nothing better than giving these things out to people, all the houses and cars and pleasure in the world can't compare..."
Just a few points on this one:
1)contrary to what it seems, i'm not really knocking this guy. he seemed fine, nice, "genuine" enough. but he had several misconceptions about my generation and it's view on life and faith. Maybe he should stick to handing out his tracts to people his age. that's fine.
2)but we postmoderns know diddly about billy graham and church-as-usual. And most college students dont give a darn about either. Handing out billy's tracts aren't going to do much if anything.
3)yes, we would like to invest ourselves in other people's lives, and we'd like to think that our friendship and discussions are better methods of "evangelism" than pretty pieces of paper.
4)as we grow up, we're not going to become just like you. your methods arent going to work anymore. billy's going to die. The world's not just going to change...it has already changed, and we do things differently. and the way we do things is NOT wrong or unbiblical.
5)we dont really care so much about houses and cars. this is another generational thing. The baby-boomers can be super materialistic and will say things like "ask any college student, they'll tell you they want to be rich and sucessful!" i hear that in church all the time. and i'm not so sure that's true anymore. of course, who wouldnt mind having extra cash and a ferrari? But ask us what we really want, and it's to enjoy life. We dont have to be affluent, or even own a car. we just want to enjoy what we do, where we are, and the people we're around.
6)we dont want anecdotes. we want truth.
7)let's say i'm not saved. so...i'm missing out on some intangible "love" and some dead person and handing out tracts in the grocery store. whoop-de-do. but tell me there is more to learn, more truth, more meaning, something reasonable and logical and live-able without putting on a suit and being rich and doing these churchy things.. then maybe i'm in. we can talk more about it. (please note-talk, not tracts)
8)church as usual, telethons, crusades, tracts... yeah, we don't like that stuff. at all. (back to point 4)

The stuff we're being told... again, "church-as-usual" is not reaching the unchurched of our generation. It's not even cutting it for the churched kids. Tell me you don't long for church to be more than it is? Surely you hope for more? Ok... well, i do.

Things i've noticed at work...

There's no point in working at a Christian book store if you can't find wonderful things to read. Here's what i've been drooling over:



The blogging church

read some at amazon!

















And...
The emerging church


look what google has to offer with this title!

Disclaimer: i havent read any of these yet. i'm just excited :)

I just couldn't take it...

I tried to go to church today. I really did. I got up, showered, dressed... i even got there. I talked with people. I ate the (wonderful) strawberry and blueberry muffins my sunday school teacher made. But that wasn't all that happened. First, some ladies i was talking to made reference to the clothes that some people have started wearing (jeans? shorts? t-shirts in the presence of God? no!) and i made one of the weaker arguments..."it's our hearts anyways, right?" and one of the ladies said, "oh, i suppose they should do it while they can... high school and college i mean. Because they won't be doing that once they really understand and live life a little bit!" WHAT? Okay, okay, maybe life does straighten you out and make you a bit more serious. "Well, who knows" said i. "It's my generation that's coming up next. Perhaps we'll just do things differently. Perhaps the church will change." (this was me entering my dreamy world, desiring for the church to return to the gospel and the love of Christ, not really expecting a response). But i got a response anyway... "well, i think your generation will change, and the church will be the way it is now, the way it's always been, the way it should be!"
OUCH! auh! my poor, progressive, idealistic mind crumpled in pain.
But somehow i survived, and actually enjoyed the sunday school lesson. I was of course, fuming about the state of the church, the legalism of believers, their inability to accept my "new, true ideas" (note i was thinking they were mine. or even new. First error...) We were talking about Jonah, and i was listening and thinking at the same time, so much of the lesson escaped me. But one thing the teacher said caught my attention. No, it wasn't straight out of a passage in scripture. But it challenged me. "What is it that you are not willing to do?"
Yet i still left immediately after sunday school. I was still frustrated. I knew it would get worse if i stayed. I had to get out. I had to take to heart the one sentence that had actually challenged me before i was too angry to remember it. I had to think.
I have been unwilling to give of myself. I tried, it was rejected, i take it to heart and say, "fine, if you don't want me, i'm gone". I was not willing to give up my pride and work in the church anyway. Maybe they're not listening. But they're not supposed to listen to me... but to God. Am i listening to God? I know it's not wrong for me to long for a church and ministry in which i am understood and i enjoy. But do i have any excuse not to serve God precisely where i am? no, i do not.