Social media can be deeply distressing. So many posters are downright mean. If you disagree on an issue the broad brushing judges assign you to outcast status without any effort to understand your heart. May I share honestly what bothers me even more on social media? When those who claim to be followers of Jesus are divisive, judgemental, and graceless. How can we claim to have something of eternal value when we can’t focus on what unites us? A song from Mandisa and TobyMac came up on my playlist this week. The message is so important for all of us. Are you left?Are you right?Pointing fingers, taking sidesWhen are we gonna realize? We all bleed the sameWe’re more beautiful when we come togetherWe all bleed the sameSo tell me why, tell me whyWe’re divided. Why indeed? I am praying for leaders who will remind us that hateful rhetoric never, ever, ever changes a heart. Followers of Christ have a message of hope and light
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The title “Evangelical Christian” seems to have become a pejorative to many in the media and culture. I understand the frustration (I have written about it a lot) when very vocal or celebrity Christian leaders fail spectacularly. I share your anger when a religious person espouses hateful or judgmental comments. I grieve when an institution or leader fails to protect the innocent. Critics say that Christians have an agenda and dangerous desire to control other people’s lives. I confess that has been true for some religious types. But the followers of Jesus that I have gotten to know over many decades don’t resemble that stereotype at all. Perhaps that is why Jesus warned so plainly about the dangers of power. The selfless, giving, and caring believers get little notice in this world but I believe they are quietly and faithfully making a difference. Jesus upset the organizational chart by placing those who serve at the top. I thought about what
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One of the things that I struggle with the most in our current cultural climate is the broad-brushing by all sides. What do I mean by that? If you disagree with someone’s faith or political opinion you automatically assign to them the worst values from the most extreme people proclaiming that message. Without knowing a single thing about their story, their heart, or their background we tend to throw down the gauntlet of judgment. A lot of Christians have been unfairly targeted recently. Some deserve to be called to accountability. I have never had a problem with being honest about how I and many other followers of Jesus often fall short of representing the grace and love of Jesus. That is just a fact. That doesn’t change who Jesus is. But one heartbreaking result is that the entire Christian faith is being dismissed and denigrated by a lot of people with social media influence. With just a bit of internet
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I recently watched the movie Jesus Revolution. I was deeply moved by the main theme of the movie. It doesn’t matter how much a particular group offends your personal standards of behavior and upsets your judgemental apple cart. We, as followers of Jesus, have been commanded to love others and to share the hope we have in Him. “So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other.” (John 13:34, NLT) Not suggested. Commanded. I grew up in a church that was much like the lukewarm assembly that Pastor Chuck Smith shepherded in this story. The congregants were set in their ways and had no patience with these long-haired hippies committing heinous sins like drug use, unmarried sex, and angry protests against the government. It was true that those actions violated God’s standards for believers. Too many in the church held these young people to standards that
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A recent behavioral study reinforced something I have emphasized in my own journey. The power of simply reaching out and checking in with others is stunningly underrated as a way to love one another. An article in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology detailed how people react when others reach out to them. The authors seemed a bit surprised by their results. We kept finding that people underestimated how much their reach-outs were appreciated. We also found that one reason this underestimation of appreciation occurs is that people do not think enough about how positively surprised others feel upon being reached out to. The role of surprise is important. We found that the one situation in which people do not underestimate how much others appreciate being reached out is when the reach-out occurs in an unsurprising context. For example, if someone is expecting you to reach-out to them, then you are pretty well calibrated to how much they will
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Our canine friend Maggie recently sought us out while dog sitting a rambunctious young pup. Maggie had played some with the younger dog, patiently endured the persistent attempts to play more, and now was urging us to help her find personal space. We chuckled and Joni remarked about what a good and easy dog Maggie is to care for. Later I reflected on that comment. That was far from the case when we rescued Maggie from unknown circumstances nearly a decade ago. I reviewed her story from my book Stay. Here is what I wrote about our initial experience with Maggie. For the first two weeks Maggie was pretty well behaved. But now she is showing some decidedly less attractive sides to her personality. She is independent. She is stubborn. She is affectionate only when she wants to be affectionate. She acts out on occasion. She chews things that are not approved for that activity. I am finding out that
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I can’t remember a more contentious cultural climate in my lifetime. Followers of Christ are wondering how to make a difference in an unfriendly environment. I think modeling a parable related by Jesus is desperately needed today. You know the story well. One day an expert in religious law stood up to test Jesus by asking him this question: “Teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus replied, “What does the law of Moses say? How do you read it?” The man answered, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” “Right!” Jesus told him. “Do this and you will live!” The religious “expert” should have quit right there. Instead he did what many of us try to do when Jesus tweaks our hearts. We look for the loopholes. The man wanted to justify his actions, so he asked
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