Everything But Jesus

I love the time I live in. I see so many positive changes in the church. Brothers and sisters more concerned with helping the poor than getting extra stuff. Different groups “laying down their arms” to try to get along with each other. True attempts to love our enemies, or turn the other cheek, or invite in the stranger. Some days it is humbling. At certain moments it is downright electrifying.

However, there is one trend that actually gives me pause. And perhaps it is just me. Maybe I am not seeing it clearly. What I have noticed is this: quite often I am seeing Christians willing to do so much wonderful ministry and service in honor of the way of Christ, but unwilling to mention Jesus.

Now, I am a big believer that we have often done evangelism completely wrong. We have been pushy. We have claimed to have in our possession the key to eternal life while acting like arrogant snobs. We have demanded belief in Jesus while refusing to live out his teachings in our own lives. We have been judgmental and hypocritical.

But as so often happens, our reaction has swung us far the other direction.

While it is Jesus that compels us to love and welcome and feed and serve, many of us have decided that mentioning Him somehow makes our service insincere. We don’t want to be seen as serving others just so they will convert. It is not that we are ashamed of Jesus, we just don’t want to be an affront to others by bringing Him up.

Yet, there are two truths I can’t avoid. 1. You don’t have to convert or come to church or follow Jesus for me to love and serve you. 2. But, if Jesus hadn’t radically changed my life, I wouldn’t be loving and serving you.

You see, while I understand our trepidation at how talking about Jesus colors our ministry, I can’t escape the fact that without Jesus, my ministry wouldn’t exist. He has saved me, changed me, healed me, and shaped me. If there is any good in me that comes out in actions toward others it is because of Christ. I am a selfish, prejudiced, judgmental jerk. That is who I am without Jesus. But I actually do try to love and serve those around me. Why? Because Jesus is changing me. It is not that Jesus “forces” me to love you, it is simply that He has changed me to the point I actually do love you.

This has nothing to do with our view of the after-life. You don’t have to be a “turn or burn” Christian. It is just unfathomable to me that I might give you money, or time, or hours of service, or even a significant relationship, but I would refuse to share the most valuable thing I have. This seems more selfish than not serving you at all.

Imagine you build a hospital. It is designed specifically for cancer patients. You make it more like home than a hospital. The needs of the family are looked after as well as the patient. Everyone who visits talks about it being the most well-run, loving, hopeful cancer hospital they have ever seen. There is only one catch…while the hospital possesses the cure for cancer, it refuses to divulge it. This would be insane!

I want the church to love the poor because that is what Jesus would do. I want us to welcome the stranger because that is a sign that the gospel it at work among us. I want my brothers and sisters to find radical ways to love our enemies and treat them as God treats us. And I want to do all of that because Jesus has a hold on me. He compels me. He moves me. He makes me unselfish and loving in ways I would never be on my own. And so, at some point, I want all those people we love and serve to have Him too.

Prostitutes and Tax Collectors

 In the gospels Jesus takes a lot of grief for who he hangs out with.  And not just from arrogant snobs.  His own disciples sometimes wonder about the company their teacher keeps.  But the accusation most frequently tossed at Jesus is that he eats with “tax collectors and prostitutes.”  That is why, when many Christian’s talk about what it means to truly follow Jesus, our willingness to associate with someone like a prostitute becomes the place where the rubber meets the road.

And yet, if you go back and read many of the barbs thrown at Jesus, they don’t mention prostitutes, but rather “sinners”.  But they almost always mention tax collectors.

When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” (Matthew 9:11)

The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.” (Matthew 11:19)

But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” (Luke 5:30)

Even more amazing is that Jesus himself uses tax collectors as examples of a pretty low form of humanity.

If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? (Matthew 5:46)

So, I guess if you really want to be a disciple, it is vital to spend some quality time with an IRS agent.  But I think we instinctively know that is not the case.  You cannot make a one to one connection between “prostitutes and tax collectors” with whom Jesus chose to associate and “prostitutes and tax collectors” today.  Rather, it is vital for Christians to discover who are our, modern-day “sinners and tax collectors.”

To do so, we must first remember what made these people so repugnant to their fellow Jews.  Prostitutes or sinners is fairly obvious. They sinned against God’s law.  But it goes deeper than that.  It is one thing to commit adultery.  It is something else to continually and willfully commit adultery.  For a descendant of Israel to witness a fellow Israelite disregard God’s law over and over again was too much.

Tax collectors were even worse.  Judea was under control of the hated Roman Empire.  The promised land was occupied by a pagan invader.  Tax collectors chose to work with and collect taxes for Rome.  They were traitors who profited from their treachery!

So you see the situation.  A good, upstanding, law-abiding Jew could have thought the following:  “We are occupied by idolators because we have sinned.  Look, those prostitutes are blatantly disobeying our most precious commandments.  It is because of sin like that we are suffering.  And to top it off those tax collectors work with our oppressors.  And they make money from it. How disgusting!”

That is why it is such a big deal that Jesus eats with these types of people.

So who today would we, as followers of Jesus, find this repugnant?  Who do we view as profiting from sin?  Who do we believe are traitors to our most sacred values?

These questions are difficult.  Our society is much more fractured than 1st century Judaism.  In America, what one person finds repugnant the next person celebrates.  This is also true for Christians.  We disagree sometimes on even what is sin.  So there may not be a particular category or type of person that fits “prostitutes and tax collectors” for us.

Instead, let’s make it personal.  Who do you find offensive and disgusting?  For some, homosexuals would qualify.  We find their lifestyle repugnant and believe they are warping society.  For others, it might be those who find homosexuality so repulsive.  For a conservative it might be liberals.  For democrats, republicans.  Look into your heart. Who do you blame for the ills of society?  Who do you think is destroying the church?  Those are your sinners and tax collectors.  And the call of Jesus is to be so kind, so good, so full of grace, that those people want to eat with you.

Now understand, Jesus never says that being a prostitute or tax collector is fine with him.  In fact, Jesus is extremely hard on sexual sin.  He is the one that not only says adultery is wrong, but lust as well.  He asks the woman caught in adultery to “go and sin no more.”  When he eats dinner at the home of Zacchaeus, a tax collector, Zacchaeus is so moved by the experience that he vows to pay back four times to anyone he has ripped off (my assumption is he makes this promise knowing he would have to do some payback).  Jesus does not eat dinner with tax collectors and prostitutes because he thinks those are worthy professions.  He eats dinner with tax collectors and sinners because He thinks they are worth it.

And that is the challenge for us.  Can we be so moved by the kingdom that we find worth in those we typically see as repulsive?  Can we love those we usually skewer? Can we be so full of grace that even our enemy must admit that we make a not so bad dinner companion?

 

 

Church

(The bulk of this was written after our worship service Sunday evening)

As minister at a small church, my times of worship too often consist of running around.  I am solving problems, coordinating people, helping visitors, taking kids to the bathroom.  I often go an entire service without actually making it to my seat.  So when I get to slide in a row next to my wife and kids, it is a wonderful, if fleeting, moment.

Sunday I had such a moment.  Only I got way more than I expected.

As I found my wife in the crowd (in such moments it helps to be married to a tall redhead) and moved onto her row, here is what I noticed.

On the row in front of us were four people.  A young married couple, holding hands.  Looked like two people in love.  And they are.  But I also know that he has truly struggled with addiction.  And she recently got out of prison.

Next to them, a man I have known for years.  He is the definition of the working poor.  Sometimes dirty, always smelling of cigarettes.  He sits on the same row where he used to sit with his wife.  She died a year ago this week.  Seeing him reminds me that I need to announce that tomorrow night we are having a dinner and fundraiser to try to buy a headstone for her grave.

Beside him, an older gentlemen.  The oldest man in our church.  He can no longer see well enough to even read the bible.  But that’s okay.  He has accomplished the task of memorizing most, if not all of it.  He bounces and claps as we sing, he doesn’t have much rhythm.  But he moves anyway, as if his loss of eyesight has made him believe that no one can see him.  Oh, that’s not the truth.  He doesn’t care because He loves Jesus so much.

And underneath their chairs is my three-year old son.  He is playing with the little bitty cars he is earning for going in the potty.

This odd juxtaposition is not odd.  I see something close to it every week.  I am used to it.  But I don’t think I should be.  There are so many places on earth where this mix would not happen.  Sadly, one of those places can sometimes be church.  As I look, I should be in awe.  For what I am seeing is what church actually is.

You see, church is not the songs we sing and the prayers we pray.  Although it is that.  And church isn’t just the people who are there.  It is that too.  But it is more.  Church is the place where the mystery of God’s work in the world is glimpsed for a moment.  Where a song of praise and a recovering addict and communion and a half-blind man and a sermon and a little boy with his play cars all somehow seem perfectly harmonious.

We too often want so much from church.  Great music that moves us.  A sermon that is funny and heart-wrenching.  People that genuinely seem interested in us.  Classes for our kids that are exciting.  It may be a lot to ask, but that is what we are looking for.

But I think maybe, just maybe, we don’t want enough from church.  Music and sermons and children’s classes don’t seem to matter when we glimpse God at work. Because in the moment we notice God’s hand we see beyond what we want, into what we truly need.  The gospel.  Made real.  Made alive.  Among us.

I am not sure this can be replicated.  That a mission statement or staff meeting can make it happen.  It is only the work of God.  The love of Christ.  The guiding of the Spirit.  But Sunday, at least for a few minutes, I got to be along for the ride.  And I knew it.

So all I could do was look.  And sing.  I looked at an addict, an ex-con, a widower, a blind man, and a little boy.  And I sang.

I look at my son and at them.  And I sing.  Bless the Lord, O my soul, O my soul.  And I look at him and at them.  And I sing.  Worship his holy name.  And the couple in front of me raises their hands as one.  Sing like never before, O my soul.  And the old man is half-turned around, clapping off-beat and smiling at me.  I will worship your holy name.

 

Schnapps Snapshot

 

One thing I have never been called is a fuddy-duddy.  A party pooper.  In general I don’t rain on people’s parades.  But a recent phenomenon irks me a little.  And at the risk of looking like a goody two-shoes I want to bring attention to something that I just don’t understand.

Lately, my Facebook feed has been overrun with pictures of glasses and bottles.  Someone is letting me know they are enjoying a beverage.  How nice of them.  Interestingly, the beverages are almost never iced tea.  Or freezing cold milk.  Or kool-aid.  No.  It is usually alcohol of some sort.  My question is why?

Why do so many people feel the need to advertise they are drinking alcohol?

Now, understand, this is not an “anti-alcohol” post.  But since most of the people on my Facebook feed are Christians, I can’t help but wonder why the need to show the world what they are drinking?

Now let me confess: I do not drink.  Personal choice.  But I also don’t post pictures of whatever beverage I happen to be consuming.  So, I really am at a loss.  All I have are theories, so let me toss out a few.

1.  Some people just take pictures of anything and put them on Facebook.  We all know these people.  There is the kite you made with your kids.  Look, a sunset.  Hey, you took a picture of a stray cat and you wanted me to see it.  This would account for a few people’s beverage photos, but it still leaves many more.

2.  Some believe this makes us relevant. There is no bigger slam for church people right now than being labeled “irrelevant.”  We want the world around us to know we get it, that we are in the same boat.  I think some Christians believe that drinking alcohol makes them appear more accessible to the non-Christians around them.  I’m not sure if that is correct (my suspicion is it makes almost no difference) but perhaps those posting photos of margaritas are attempting to reach out.

3.  Some want to show that they aren’t controlled by the old rules.  Many of us grew up in very conservative churches where drinking alcohol was sinful.  As we have matured we have come to see the complete prohibition of alcohol as another sign of the “backwardness” of our predecessors.  We see Jesus drinking wine.  We are more liberal, more free.  More graceful.  And having a beer (and posting it online) is a symbol of our growth, our freedom.

4.  Some have bought the cultural idea that alcohol is necessary. This one scares me.  Several times lately I have read posts declaring something like, “that glass of wine at the end of this day can’t come soon enough.”  Now, perhaps that is just blowing off steam.  Maybe it is just mimicking what we see and hear in our alcohol saturated culture.  Or perhaps it is the beginning of dependence.  Not dependence in the addictive sense (although we all know that is a possibility).  But rather dependence on alcohol as some type of source of meaning or comfort.

5.  Alcohol symbolizes the “good life.”  We are relaxed.  We mountain bike and hunt and snowboard.  We have a ton of friends that we meet for coffee in the morning and drinks in the evening.  A pitcher of sangria shows that life is good.  But is any of that truly reflective of what Jesus meant by “life?”

Now, I am probably completely wrong.  And I am sure I will be informed kindly if I am.  But I am not yelling “SIN!”.  Nor am I calling for tee-totaling.  I am simply asking us to look at our motivations.  To think “why am I putting a snapshot of a mojito on my Instagram account?”  “Am I posting this because I want to look cool?”  I just wonder why the need to show our adult beverage to the world?  What are we trying to say?  And is it worth saying?

You Just Had To Be There

Iconic radio personality Casey Kasem is in the news this week.  His family is in court suing one another over his medical care.  His whereabouts appear to be a mystery to the judge.  It is apparently a gigantic mess.

This makes me sad because Casey Kasem actually played two parts in my growing up.  First, he was the voice of Shaggy on my favorite cartoon; Scooby-Doo.  But more importantly, he hosted American Top 40.  This show counted down the top 40 most popular songs in America each week.  In our town, the radio show aired on Sunday afternoons.  In fact, it was a Sunday afternoon in 1983 when I stumbled upon the show while sitting in the car listening to the radio as my mother did a little shopping.  It only took a couple of songs for my life to be altered.  This was my music!  Where had it been all my life?  American Top 40 immediately became a Sunday afternoon staple for me.

The show was sometimes my only chance to hear certain songs.  I would sit, listening with anticipation, my finger hovering above the record button on my Jambox.  When Casey announced the songs I wanted I would smash the button down and preserve the music on a Maxell tape.  Now I could hear the song over and over again, always with just a smidge of Casey’s voice before and after.  I treasured those tapes.

It is probably impossible to explain to kids today how much a radio show that simply counted down popular songs could mean.  In fact, it is one of many things I can’t possibly explain to my children.  The awe the first time I saw a video arcade game.  The excitement when we got a VCR.  My thought process after I watched the first episode of Miami Vice (only 6 days, 23 hours until that comes on again!)  Actually rooting for a network during Battle of the Network Stars.

The only way for my kids to understand these things would be to experience them.  And not just watching a clip on YouTube.  To somehow go back in time, live during that era, and really experience it.  I can tell them all I want, and they can nod their heads all day, but they still don’t get it.

I think that describes being a Christian.  We try over and over to explain to others why they should follow Jesus.  We talk about benefits, and love, and grace.  And we are amazed when people just flat turn us down on our offer.  Why would they not believe something that is so obviously wonderful?  Why would they choose not to believe the greatest thing ever?

Perhaps because Jesus isn’t something you believe in, He is a person you experience. My faith is not based on what others have told me or even what I have read, but on experiences I have had.

Most of us don’t get married because we are sold on the virtue of that commitment.  We don’t seek out just anyone willing so we can experience the ups and downs of marital life.  Rather, we get married because we fall in love.  It is our relationship with another person that leads us to the commitment of marriage.  Following Jesus is the same.  It is a relationship of experiences.  That can’t be summed up, tied in a neat ribbon, and handed out.

Following Jesus isn’t something I can adequately explain or describe (even though that is kinda my job).  I just can’t quite nail it down.  You have to experience it for yourself.

Too often we try to sell Jesus, Church, Christianity, etc… as if listing their merits will eventually convince someone.  The siren call of Jesus wasn’t “believe me” but rather “follow me.”  Perhaps rather than trying to convince someone to become a Christian, we should invite them to experience it.  Try some prayer.  Join me for some acts of service.  Attempt to love your wife the way Jesus would.  And see what happens.

So we shouldn’t be surprised when someone doesn’t “get it”.  Of course they don’t.  Just as they can’t possibly get what it is like to be married to my wife.  Or adequately understand the thrill of hearing “Mr. Roboto” come blaring out of my J during American Top 40.  You kinda have to be there.  You have to experience it for yourself.

 

P.S. This doesn’t just affect how we think about evangelism.  If our faith is truly a relationship we experience, that ought to radically change how we view other Christians and the Church.  Church isn’t a group of people who all believe the same thing, it is a group of people all married to the same person.  So we are all on a journey, all at different places in our experience of and relationship with Jesus.  This should make me more gracious towards my brothers and sisters in Christ since we are all at different spots on that journey.  And maybe I should stop trying so hard to get others to experience and see Jesus exactly as I do.