Jesus is Not a Weapon

Yesterday I stopped by the hospital to spend some time with my dad. When I got to his room, my dad wasn't there. A few minutes later, he came rolling in on his bed, chatting away with his nurse about everything under the sun, including politics and the economy. (Fortunately, while my dad's body is in pretty bad shape right now, his mind is still sharp!) The male nurse--about my dad's age--was clearly a liberal, and my dad being the staunch conservative that he is, it made for an amusing conversation, to say the least. After the nurse (somewhat jokingly) rebuked my dad for being a Rush Limbaugh listener, my dad changed the topic and said, "Let's talk about religion." Much to my surprise, the previously jovial countenance of the nurse turned rigid, and he blurted out, "The way I see it, believe in whatever makes you a better person, but if you're going to use religion as a weapon against me, I don't have time for it."

Wow...

I was shocked on multiple levels. First of all, during the discussion on politics, it had come out that this man was a devout Catholic. Now, here he was saying that people should simply believe whatever makes them a better person. In light of the postmodern world in which we live, I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised to hear yet another universal claim about the relativity of "truth," but seriously I still find it absolutely mind-blowing that people who claim to follow Jesus Christ refuse to acknowledge that he is the only Truth. I mean, did he cut John 14:6 out of his Bible or something? I don't understand...

Upon further discussion, the nurse actually gave his definition of the Gospel: social justice. (Take that Glenn Beck!) This devout Catholic man did volunteer work with the homeless and with drug addicts over at Hope Ministries in South Bend. To him, THAT was the Gospel. And, given passages like Matthew 25:31-46 (the sheep and the goats) and James 1:27 (true religion = caring for widows and orphans), it's somewhat hard to argue against the "social gospel." However, this version of the Gospel is incomplete, and when it leads to universalism, it's VERY incomplete. I felt sorry for this man and his misunderstanding of the Gospel.

Finally, the imagery of using religion as a weapon left a deep impression on me. No matter the religious affiliation, people of religion can be downright nasty sometimes...and often times Christians are the worst. We walk around hitting people over their heads with our Bibles and preaching condemnation and eternal damnation, all the while proudly steeped in our own self-righeousness. We loathe the "pagan" much like the New Testament Jews despised the Gentiles (ie. Acts 22). Somehow, we believe that we can hate people to Jesus. (Have we cut Matthew 5:43-48 out of our Bibles?) We're so messed up...

Lord, may it never be said of me that I used You as a weapon to hurt other people...

Politics, Religion, and the Millenial Generation

I ran across this interesting article this morning about the decline of "religion" among the Millenials (the generation of young adults between 18 and 29 years old). It's worth the read, especially if you're working with young people.

But, assuming that many of you won't take the time to read the article, I'll give you a brief synopsis. According to the article, recent research has shown that younger generations of Americans are not abandoning faith--they are simply abandoning religion. And, according to some recent research, one major reason Millenials are abandoning religion is because of the strong ties between religion and conservative politics. Here's a quote from the article:

"Young Americans are dropping out of religion at an alarming rate of 5-6 times the historic rate (30-40 percent have no religion today versus 5-10 percent a generation ago)....But youth's religious disaffection is largely due to discomfort with religiosity having been tied to conservative politics."

I find it interesting that in their "holy quest" to equate right-winged conservative American politics with the politics of Jesus, the Religious Right may actually be pushing an entire generation of young people further away from the Church, if not away from Jesus Himself.

Thoughts?

Introspection on Israel: Part V

Day 3: Morning Session

My Religion Meets the Master

In the morning session on day 3, South African Mark Tittley, a big voice in the global youth ministry discussion, shared a powerful message with us about Jesus' response to religion. You can listen to this message here. For those who won't take the time to listen, the following are some of the key thoughts I gleaned from him, as well as a few thoughts of my own:

1. Jesus confronts our beliefs.

-Jesus was constantly challenging the beliefs of the people, especially his disciples. Consider the "antitheses" passage in Matt. 5:21-48 in which Jesus continually says, "You have heard that it was said...but I tell you...." Jesus saw through the disciples' faulty belief systems and cut to the heart of the issue. This is still true for us today (if we are willing to listen).

2. Jesus confronts the world around us.

-Jesus' teaching was always in direct opposition to the predominant culture in his day.

3. Jesus confronts the world we live in today.

-This includes the "religious cultures" we find ourselves in.

-We reflect our religious culture and the broader culture in which we live.

-Jesus introduced a "Kingdom of God" that was at odds with both of these cultures.

Mark's concluding message was that we have created a false dichotomy as Evangelical Christians in saying that we choose "relationship" over "religion." Was it not God who created the Jewish religion in the first place? It is not religion and relationship, then, that are diametrically opposed to one another but rather true religion and false religion. True religion has at the very root of it a relationship. False religion has its root in "the law of sin and death" (Rom. 8:2).

Sometimes we buy into this false religion...Jesus confronts this even today.