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Inconsequential Christianity

CHRISTIANITY AS A THEORY CHANGES NOTHING

Christianity as a theory is, for the most part, inconsequential.

I was driving in rural Kentucky one day and I came across this old run down store. The front porch had been hit by a large truck years before, (I was told this by an elderly gentleman who was working on the building) the roof was sagging, and there was an entire section of the wall completely knocked down. I stopped to take some photos and was struck by an image. There, in an old worn latch was a pin, locking the door.

There was an eight foot hole immediately to the left of the door (which I walked in through) where the cinder block wall had collapsed, but the door was locked. At some point that little pin was significant. A man or woman placed it there with all confidence that it would protect their stuff, and in theory, it worked, but in the context that it’s in now, it has no application.

Some of my darkest days have been when I woke up with the knowledge that most of the things I believed and said I stood for were just concepts and theories that I was not actually living, and not only that I wasn’t living them, but that I hadn’t forged any avenues to apply them. The hardest days, for me anyway, have always been church days. Don’t get me wrong, I love the Church, but so many times I am frustrated with myself when it’s all over, because I sing songs and make these incredible declarations about what I think and know about Jesus and His passion to reach the lost and help the helpless and the broken, but I haven’t and I don’t.

I have been a “professional” in the ministry field for a long time, years in fact. Those dark days were nestled right into this professional stage. For two years I lived in a church, literally, that I worked for. During the first half of that tenure I had absolutely zero impact on the world outside of the building, yet I was employed to be a “minister.” I had to force myself to find ways to connect with people who weren’t a part of our local church culture, to see people who weren’t part of the staff that I saw and theorized with everyday.

The problem wasn’t what I believed or the people I theorized with on a daily basis. The problem wasn’t church days or any of that. The problem was that my Christianity, the truths that I believed and held were out of context. There was no relevance to the Christianity I wanted so desperately to be a part of and the life I was living as a professional minister.

I found that a theory left unproven becomes a doorway to discontent. I have a friend who was also a full-time youth pastor at the time that I was going through this period of disconnect, he called it the Summer of Discontent. It was almost bizarre how similar our situations were. We didn’t sit around bashing the church, that’s never helpful. We had many conversations, however, about where we felt like the church was in relation to the world around us and how it seemed we were about the profession of Christianity as an industry instead of the possession of Christ as a lifestyle. We both felt deeply that church was about more than productions and events, but about the great passion of Jesus Christ to empower people to become who He made them to be by helping them remove (or at least control) the things that keep them distracted.

I was working for a group that was very image driven and he was working for one that seemed to be more driven by monetary gain. Image and money are important. If nobody trusts you as a spiritual entity and you have no finances to work with than you are going to really struggle to fulfill the purpose that God calls you to, but they are not the most important things.

I had a great conversation with a young Bible college student. We had lunch at Panera, which is actually a very spiritual place. There’s something spiritual about bread for me, so I go there and work and feel close to God when I see people making and eating bread, yeah, I’m weird like that. Anyway, our conversation gives me hope for the future of the Church. He has questions, like me (and probably you) about why we hold on to so many things that have nothing to do with the Bible and why we have so many theories and concepts that have absolutely no connection to real life. What gives me hope is the fact that he (and people like him) is thinking, thinking about what he believes and challenging its validity and, more importantly, its applicability.

It’s not so much that we are trying to disprove anything, what we’re trying to do is to prove that truth can be real in the context of our everyday lives, beyond a religious theory or a philosophical concept.

So many people think that Christianity is about going to church, but if it is, than it’s not about much. I sometimes dread (and this is no reflection on the church, it’s just me) going to another church service. I know we need Church and I’m not advocating that we stop having church, but I sit there and have to fight the urge to stand up and shout, “What the heck are we doing? We’ve heard all of this before, why aren’t we feeding the poor or doing something about poverty in the Appalachians?” while I run screaming at the top of my lungs out of the building.

There is an inherent danger in thinking. I’ve read history books about communist regimes that overthrow the former government of a free society. One of the first things that they do is round up the thinkers. They kill the artists and the musicians. Why? The only way to control a large populace is to create a system that makes thinking a crime and takes away the ability of the people to put new ideas into the context of their lives. Then you redefine context, making the truth you propagate the only thing that fits.

And there is the rub. Religious people hold onto things that have nothing to do with the Bible and have so many theories and concepts that have absolutely no connection to real life because their context has been redefined by a system that is more about control than it is about thinking.

This is why we have such a tremendous loss of young men and women who step out of their parents’ home and church into real life. They aren’t able to fit what they have been taught for so long into their everyday lives, because it never was part of their everyday life. It was a very small segment of their week and their whole Christianity fit into the time slot allotted by the church.

Then they walk into the arms of a college professor who challenges them to do the one thing about their Christianity that they have been taught not to do, think. So, they begin to think and usually they turn away because in their “real” life, none of it fits at all.

The job of the Church, than, is not just to try to build bigger buildings for larger congregations, but to empower men and women to think about what they believe and weigh it against how they live and what they do.

If they can’t fit it into the context of their lives, then maybe it’s not really Christianity.

Jesus kicked over tables and whipped the money changers in the temple. Why was He so hacked off? Here’s why, the religious leaders of the day had invented a new context so they could propagate their own version of “God’s plan.” They took what was meant to be a beautiful illustration of the salvation message and perverted it into a scheme where they could take advantage of the people who were coming to the temple. On the surface it was about the money, but the underlying motive, the true motive, was, and usually is, about control.

The Jewish people of that day were required to make sacrificial offerings at the temple. They would come from miles, often taking days to make a dangerous and exhausting journey. The temple priests had complete control over the acceptance of the animal that was brought to be sacrificed by the believer. Many times the priests would refuse the person’s sacrifice by citing some fictitious blemish on the animal (which was required to be blemish free by the Mosaic Law). Then they would point the weary, and typically angry, person to the acceptable and over priced animals they conveniently had for sale right there in the temple.

Not only that, but the only currency that was accepted in the temple was, you guessed it, temple money. The temple money was often valued higher than the currency the person brought from home. This translated into a loss for them monetarily as they exchanged their currency, before they could even buy the replacement animal. They had traveled so far to come to the temple that they would accept the reinvented context of the religious system and forgiveness from God became a burden and drudgery to them instead of the beautiful example He had intended it to be.

Jesus wasn’t angry because people were selling animals in the temple, it was because they had taken His word out of its true context and they forced a new and erroneous context onto His people. Remember His words, it should have been a house of prayer, but instead they had made it into a den of thieves.

They had redefined the context and by doing so they made their “truth” the only thing that fit.

Religious institutions are as notorious about redefining context as communistic governments. Religion is really about resisting change. In fact the word religion comes from the Latin word “relegare” which means to “tie fast.” Many of the traditions that are accepted as normal within a religious culture can be traced back to a redefinition of context. Here’s a humorous example: during the 1960’s there was a movement of young men and women to protest and resist social convention.

I know some of these people were simply being rebellious, but I’m sure there were some very intelligent young people who had simply come to the place where they didn’t believe and/or agree with what they had been taught and were willing to stand up in protest. This was the heart of the civil rights movement and had some very positive implications.

For many of these people the church didn’t have an intelligent response to their questions. So the protestors left. Before we judge too harshly, we should stop to consider that most of us consider ourselves to be “Protestant” in our faith. Yes, protestors.

One of the things that happened during that time in most churches regardless of organizational affiliation was strong pressure for the young men in their congregations to refrain from growing moustaches and beards. The thought behind this, of course, was to keep their people from identifying with the rebellious “hippies.” Most of these organizations relaxed their stance on this subject after the decline of the hippie era, some however, adopted this practice into their permanent church culture and continued to teach and preach against facial hair for “their” men.

In fact, I attended a church for over a decade that taught against facial hair as a matter of doctrine. I remember seeing books in the church library about facial hair. I never did read one, but I’m sure I would enjoy it. I only bring this up to make a point. I was taught early into my religious training that the reason we were to be clean shaven was Biblical. In reality, if I want to preach against something I can, if I look hard enough, find some scripture, however obscure, to back up my position.

It’s true that the Old Testament is a type or shadow of the New Testament and many of its physical examples have spiritual implications for us today. What I was taught, using this true principle, was that Joseph, one of the sons of Israel, had been betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery. In what is one of the most incredible examples of God’s faithfulness he ends up becoming the second in command in the most powerful nation on the planet. During the transition from slave to world leader, Joseph is placed in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. I won’t go into all of the details, but Joseph is summoned to appear before the Pharaoh to interpret a dream for him that his court of priests had been unable to explain.

As Joseph was being summoned to come before the “king” he shaved.

“Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon: and he shaved himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh.” Genesis 41:14

This, as I was taught, with no other reference to a scriptural basis, was why we as Christian men should keep a clean shave, because Joseph shaved before going into the presence of the “king” and we are always in the presence of the “King.”

So I shaved every day. The only reason that this teaching worked with me is because I was grossly ignorant of the Word of God and Biblical history. The way that this teaching was backed up was that we (Christians) should be submitted to those who were over us and to go against the teaching of the pastor was rebellion and rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and we all know what God thinks about those sorry witches. In effect saying that to have a different opinion or not agreeing with the pastor would put me or anybody else in hell with witches. “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog, too.”

Now, I hardly think that the wonderful man who was my spiritual leader at the time did this with malice. He was simply perpetuating the teaching he had received. You know what’s funny, though, is that this teaching is ridiculously erroneous both in its basis and its enforcement.

Let’s take the first part, Joseph shaved so we should.

Joseph was in an Egyptian prison. When he was summoned to go before the Pharaoh he wasn’t going before a king, he was going before a false god. Yes, the people of Egypt worshipped this man as “god on earth”. The Pharaoh cannot be used as a type or shadow for God because that would contradict other scriptural principles. Also, when Joseph was called to the court of Pharaoh, he wasn’t coming in as a believer of the one true God (in Pharaoh’s eyes), he was coming in as one of the multitudes of other soothsayers and magicians. He was, essentially, coming in as a pagan priest, so in order for him to be acceptable to Pharaoh, he had to shave his face and probably his entire body. It’s very likely that Joseph shaved his head, eyebrows, arms, legs and everywhere else, because many of the Egyptian religions required their priests to be completely hair free as a rite of their priesthood. Hair was considered unclean. In fact, according to BlueLetterBible.org’s online concordance, the word used here for shaved is “galach” which means “to poll, shave, shave off, be bald.”

I’m not on a band wagon nor am I suggesting that everyone should grow a beard (especially not the women, but if you have one that’s o.k.). My point in all of this is that this passage of scripture cannot be used to support a clean shave doctrine, but when taken out of context, any scripture can be used to support any doctrine. All you have to have to make this work is ignorant people who are intimidated into not thinking contrary to the leader.

Which leads to the second point, you must agree with the pastor or leader because they are in charge. At this point some of my pastor friends are going to disown me and in earlier centuries this would probably add a few pounds of wood to the fire as the witch is being burned. As Nacho Libre said, “I smell cookies.”

The church does not own the people. The pastor is not the local demi-god who has complete control of the individuals in the congregation he pastors. I purposely didn’t say “his congregation” because it’s not the pastor’s church. For anyone to say that you are a rebel because you challenge the validity of a man’s opinion or stance is to take away one of the most fundamental ingredients of true Christianity.

I am not against pastors, I am a pastor. I am, however, against religious systems that take away the right (and obligation) of Christians to think and have a voice in their own lives.

Let me put it this way, each individual believer is the captain of their own ship. The job of the church leadership is to point in the direction that God is leading the church, try to remove the obstacles in the path of the believers or give them instruction on how to navigate around them, but we have no authority to grab the wheel and push them into the passenger’s seat of their own lives.

If you don’t agree with my opinion or my personal preference (which the facial hair issue and so many other issues are truly about) and I have no true Biblical basis for my argument than you pray and do what you think God is calling you to do. I am not authorized to override your relationship with God.

When we teach people we should welcome disagreement and invite them to discuss their disagreements and go to the Word of God as the ultimate authority, always striving to use the scripture in their true context.

Then, and only then will people be able to put Christianity into the context of their own lives.

Look, the captain of the ship in the control room and the passenger playing tennis on the upper deck are on the same vessel, making the same journey and in the same peril, but are worlds apart in their understanding.

The captain knows how to navigate the ship. He knows how to read the instruments and knows the location of the vessel in reference to its final destination. His job is to know.

The passenger knows when dinner is going to be served, approximately when he or she is going to get to the destination and that someone, somewhere is in charge of the ship. His or her job, in reality, is to be blissfully ignorant of most of the details. Even though he or she is on the journey, the context of everything is different. If something happened to the captain and crew of this ship, or the passengers were suddenly placed at the wheel, they would be in serious trouble because they don’t know how it all works and have never been instructed on how to guide the ship to safety.

If we are going to see young men and women continue to follow Christ when they leave their parent’s homes and go off to college, when they take the wheel, so to speak, we are going to have to get rid of the cruise ship mentality. The church is not a cruise ship. It’s a tightly knit group of individual rafts that are controlled by their single passenger. This is less controllable for a religious leader and there is less recognition for “Captain Pastor,” but it is Christianity in everyday context.

As the church we exist in concert, like a choir. The leadership of the local congregation stands in front and leads the choir because that’s his job, but the harmony of the song comes from the people who have equal access to the music and choose to sing, individually following the directions of the composer, as much or more, as the conductor.

Besides, I have a problem preaching against facial hair and keeping my eyebrows.

Gallery Works Posted

I created these pieces using Styrofoam that I reclaimed from a construction site in Collinsville. Styrofoam is used as the base for stucco work on commercial buildings. The end-cuts and broken pieces end up in the dumpster. Since Styrofoam doesn’t decompose I would rather reclaim these pieces and use them to create art that has permanent beauty instead of letting them end up permanently in a landfill. Click on each image for a larger view. Shipping is available for an additional cost. Contact me for details: armando@heredia.ws

Tyranny at the Door is a piece I created using a solid wood door I found curbside. The door at one time was a beautifully crafted barrier to keep the outside world at bay. As I lifted the door it simply fell into pieces, Mother Nature and a million little tyrants will sometimes show us how strong we really are.

These works can be seen at Gallery 101 in Collinsville at 101 E. Main Street.

Informed Resistance

THE OVERTHROW OF RELIGION

Spiritually we all exist in one of three states, ignorant rebellion, passive acceptance, or informed resistance.

God has given us the gift of self-government. That means we as individuals create the internal laws that we use to control our own selves. (Self control is listed as one of the fruits of the Spirit, so rest assured, God is willing to help those who want to be helped.) For most of us our internal code is shaped by our environment.

If you grow up hungry in a home or neighborhood that is impoverished you can (to yourself) justify stealing to feed yourself or your family. If you grow up in a wealthy home with no lack you can justify (again, to yourself) a contempt for the poor and live in excess with no feeling at all for the hungry or the homeless.

When our internal code makes contact with an external one with which we are not familiar than we reach a crisis point. We are forced to choose one of the three above mentioned states in response.

Ignorance is the manger for poverty. Without knowledge the only perceptible savior is rebellion.  Many impoverished nations have seen bloody uprisings with thousands of men, women and children dying brutally at the hands of a civil war that replaces the current government with a new one that is, for all practical purposes, the same or worse than the previous one. Those in power continue in corruption because the masses are not educated to a better way.

Ignorance creates a cycle of bondage. Ignorant people are in a continual internal spiritual and mental war. They are constantly threatened by new and unfamiliar codes and will usually respond out of fear. Of course, ignorance makes a poor base to fight from and the ignorant rebellion usually becomes overwhelmed by their inability to overthrow the machine. Most often they fall into bitterness about their perceived injustices and pull others down and out with them.

“Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled.” Hebrews 12:15

Ignorant rebellion chooses not to attempt to understand this external code and instead begins to rise up against it. Even though we are miserable (or perhaps because we are) we defend our internal code because our identity is so wrapped up in it. As obscure as this may seem, it does apply to our spirituality. True Christianity in many ways is diametrically opposed to the internal codes that we have carefully developed, especially for the affluent American who is bombarded with the idea that success is measured by wealth, possessions and/or social status.

Jesus Christ brought a new internal code to a people who were wrapped up in external legalities.

The religious scholars leading up to His time of ministry had taken an ancient external code and internalized it to their own advantage. The common person was completely at the mercy of the Temple and its elite. The fact that the common man was ignorant was not the violation, but that they were instructed into ignorance by their teachers.

The common man had been taught that they had no direct access to God and were therefore inferior to the religious class. Remember, ignorance is bondage. Though the entire nation was in bondage to Rome, the people of the nation were in bondage to the religion of the Temple. The key to their control was in keeping the people ignorant. This same pattern was used by the Universal Church of the dark ages with much the same result.

We aren’t able to see an entire panoramic of the culture of the day through the New Testament scriptures because they are focused on Jesus and then His followers and then on the churches they established. There were, no doubt, insurrections led by ignorant peasants bent on overthrowing the religious class as well as the Roman tyranny. When the disciples were brought into custody for resisting the established hierarchy one of the Pharisees named Gamaliel referred to two previous unsuccessful uprisings by Judas of Galilee and a man named Theudas. (Acts 5:34-39)

However, most people were content to be ignorant. This state will be referred to in this writing as passive acceptance.

Passive acceptance is as detrimental (if not more so) than ignorant rebellion. It is a place of death, where a person exists without a purpose to spur him into action. I would rather deal with one hundred zealots in the midst of ignorant rebellion than with one ignorant person placated by passive acceptance.

Passive acceptance allowed the death of thousands of babies on the whim of an insecure king, remember Herod? It allows children, six times the total amount that died in the Twin Towers on 9/11, to die everyday from hunger while wealthy religions and religious people content themselves with their piety and hide behind a façade of stained glass and “holy” living. It allows people to become commodities in the trade of human slavery called religion.

Let me interject this here, religion is as much about human trafficking as the hold of any slave ship. Religion looks at people for their economic worth, willing to place them in bondage to doctrines and rules for the sake of laying claim on the tithe and/or offerings that these people will be obligated to give.

I believe that tithing and giving of offerings are Biblical mandates and a part of any healthy Christian’s life, but when that is the end purpose of the organization than that organization ceases to serve Christ and becomes the agent of Mammon.

The moment a religious entity begins to function on the basis of economics it becomes what Christ came to end.

Passive acceptance leads to cold blindness.

Truth comes in fragments, sometimes truth has thorns, sometimes it is heavy, and it rarely fits into our pre-made little fire ring, but rather than expand our ring we throw down the pieces that don’t fit and wait for the one’s that do, even if they are few and far in between. Passive acceptance preserves its internal code, but in a different way than the ignorant rebellious, it does so by merely allowing that which seems to be to be that which is. I hate to sound too philosophical, so I’ll rephrase that statement. Passive acceptance does not fight what does not fit. It simply takes on the convenient shape necessary to be accepted by the status quo.

The inevitable result is a state of inactivity that leads to spiritual atrophy. In the past sixteen years of ministry I have seen the atrophy of passive acceptance bring great people to a place of complete spiritual ineffectiveness.

Atrophy is what happens when you completely cease to use a muscle. The lack of movement causes the muscle to shrivel and become useless. This is a preventative measure designed by God to protect the rest of the body from a perceived injury, disease or infection. The damaged limb is shut off to keep the healthy parts alive.

Passive acceptance requires no movement, and no resistance. Resistance however is the basis for strength. Why is there weakness in the Church? There is weakness because it seems easier to lead a group that passively accepts the doctrines and teachings that come from the establishment. Ask any hard questions and you’ll be labeled as a rebel and treated accordingly.
This type of leadership creates a chameleonic group of shape-shifters. So, the passive acceptance that seems so appealing to those who want to control the trafficked, is ultimately what causes the atrophy and death of its constituents.

A weak nation, society, or church is the direct result of leadership that uses ignorance to control its populace. The people will fade into their surroundings and die the death of obscurity. That’s why so many young people raised in a legalistic environment (who weren’t destroyed by ignorant rebellion) so easily fall away from their “faith” when they become adults and get out from under the oppressive thumb of the legalists.

The code is completely external and they have been taught that the best response is no response. They are the epitome of chameleonicity with no identity of their own. Why are they like that? They are like that because of their leaders. They are a direct product of religion. They have no capacity for any other response. I say that men who keep their people in ignorance to bully them into submission will stand in judgment for becoming the enemies of Christ. We’ve looked for a man to call the anti-Christ, and there will come one who will embody the type, but we have overlooked the spirit of the anti-Christ that is at work amongst us already, speaking in places of spiritual authority and putting men and women into bondage for their own personal gain.

Studies have shown that well over 60 % of Christians leave their faith when they enter college. Religion shrugs its shoulders and points accusingly at the youth or cites the fact that prayer was taken out of schools in the 1960’s when in reality this is the only possible outcome of a system that is about conformity.

The dove and the fish have been replaced by the chameleon as the symbol for modern Christendom.

The third response is the state of informed resistance. Christianity doesn’t need a rebellion. The spirit of rebellion will never mix with the purpose of Christ. They are polar opposites, but there does need to be a generation of informed resistors, people who are willing to “know the Truth” so they can be set free. If ignorance is bondage, than knowledge is freedom.

The legalist will always hold as suspect the man or woman who dares to question the establishment. Young people are marked as rebellious when they aren’t willing to “accept everything by faith” and play by the rules and yet this is the very thing that will make them strong. Ask, seek, and knock, study to see if these things are so and to show yourself approved. Search out your own salvation with fear and trembling, be ready to give an answer for the hope you have. The truest Christian symbol is a question mark.

What is truth? If you take away the right to question you turn Christianity from a rushing mighty wind into a windowless room full of stale recycled air.

Are we willing to take everything that we believe and hold it in question and scrutinize it in light of the Bible? If we aren’t than we forfeit our claim to be “people of truth.” If there is any other document, manual, book or doctrine that takes preeminence over His word, than we must confess to the world, we are not Christians, we are just another stripe, shade or pattern that you are free to choose from among the many others that are available, we are not the flock of Christ, we are a group of chameleons.

Some colleagues of mine told me, tongue in cheek, that I am “the poster child for the fight against legalism.” I’m o.k. with that. I’m not interested in being a part of a rebellion, but there is a difference between rebellion and protest. Christianity cannot be another pattern or shape that I put on when I’m at church or amongst a certain set of people. If I have to change who I am depending on whom I am with, than I am not being true to Christ or His call, there should be no duplicity.

If this generation is to become what Christ called the previous ones to be than we have to let them ask the hard questions that make us uncomfortable and peel away the layers of religion that we have added to the faith. We have to be able to help them find an identity that is based on the never changing word of God. If we do this right, we will see them shed the chameleon skin and not die a death of obscurity in the land of darkness.

Christianity has never been about blending in. It has always been about coming out from among the darkness of Babylon into the light of Christ, no matter the cost, or better said, because of the cost.

From Cardboard Astronaut 2.0

The Rise of Megachurches…

This is a research paper I did for my English 101 class on megachurches.

True Christianity is about making disciples, which is a relational concept. Can the megachurch accomplish the original mission of Christ if they cannot successfully sustain true relationships? How can a message of financial prosperity, a lavish lifestyle of pastoral fame, and opulent, multi-acre “church” campuses embody the message of a peasant, homeless Messiah, with twelve intimate followers whose last command was to “make disciples”?

The key component in the term “megachurch” is the prefix “mega.” Mega defines something that is “large or great.” Obviously, a mega-church is an entity that has huge attendance and/or facilities. Fifty-three percent of megachurches have between 2,000 and 3,000 members, while some megachurches, like Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, can have congregations that boast up to 30,000 in weekly attendance and is housed in a former sports arena. (CQ Researcher. 775-776)

According to British anthropologist, Robin Dunbar, as cited by Malcom Gladwell in his book, The Tipping Point, the largest group of people who can sustain a “genuinely social relationship” is roughly 150. “The figure of 150 seems to represent the maximum number of individuals with whom we can have a genuinely social relationship, the kind of relationship that goes with knowing who they are and how they relate to us…” (Gladwell. 179)

The number 150 is recurrent in a multiplicity of groups that can be documented with solid historical evidence, from hunter-gatherer societies of Australian descent to the patterns used for military organization. The Hutterites, a self-supporting religious colonist group that flourished in Europe and later in America, would form a colony that, when it neared 150 members, would start a new colony, never growing larger than their capacity to sustain true relationships. (Gladwell. 179-180)

Megachurches, however, due to their enormous size, do not have the capacity to focus on this most important aspect and instead have embraced a modern culture of anonymity. North Park University’s McKnight says, “You can enter into the church to the degree that you want. There’s a guaranteed anonymity, if you want it.” (CQ Researcher. 784)

His position is that if you go into a church with 120 people, you can’t walk into the door without people knowing you’re a stranger. In a megachurch of several thousand, people can come and go, “with 5,000 other relatively anonymous persons, just like they do every day of their lives.” In other words, you could go to church and nobody would know the difference. Christianity is not about going to church, it is about becoming the church.

This is contrary to the mission of the Church, to be a body of believers, members that are connected to each other in purpose, passion and belief. If we create an entity that is about filling seats by offering a host of amenities and innovations, without developing relationships, we have not fulfilled the central goal of Christianity, to unite people in the Body of Christ.

The pastors of most megachurches are more like high-powered business-politicians who do not connect on an individual basis with the people who are a part of “their” church. An unfortunate result of the super-sized congregation is that the pastor’s role of shepherding is replaced by a demand for politics and public relations. Although it would be unfair to say that all megachurch pastors’ messages are developed as feel-good PR, this seems to be true on average. Messages of financial prosperity, personal fulfillment and inclusivity are the standard fare. A moment with the pastor would be more like a photo-op with a celebrity politician that might end up on the church website or television broadcast, than a personal encounter with a friend that cares deeply for your soul.

Megachurches are usually Protestant evangelical and have conservative positions on social issues. Their pastors are usually charismatic and preach the “prosperity gospel, stressing personal fulfillment as much as theology.” (CQ Researcher. 769)

Some researchers feel like megachurches are a unique response to growing needs within American culture; critics counter that the megachurches are straying from their traditional religious mission by focusing on helping congregants get rich instead of worshipping God.

While the congregations are typically conservative Protestants, many of the pastors, like Creflo Dollar (his real name), an Atlanta megachurch pastor, whose prosperity preaching and lavish lifestyle has earned the dubious title “the gospel of bling” are anything but conservative. Dollar’s travel choices include a personal Lear Jet, helicopter and two Rolls-Royces. (CQ Researcher. 782) Dollar’s “seed” ministry concept, which is the idea that giving money to “the Lord” via his ministry is the first step in opening “the windows of heaven” is very similar to the very indulgence doctrine that caused Martin Luther to begin the Protestant reformation.

Dollar, along with other prosperity gospel preachers, follow in the same vein as one of the most famous of so called prosperity preachers, Kenneth Copeland. One of Copeland’s followers donated $2,000.00 for Copeland to purchase a private Citation X airplane. “I remember Copeland had to once fly halfway around the world to talk to one person,” she said. “Because we’re partners with Kenneth Copeland, for every soul that gets saved, we get credit for that in heaven.”

Another prosperity preacher, Texas Evangelist, Jerry Savelle, perpetuated this thought at a conference organized by Copeland. Dollar was a speaker at the conference along with other prosperity preachers.
“Any time a worried thought about money pops up in your mind,” Mr. Savelle continued, “the next thing you do is sow”: drop money, like seeds, in “good ground” like the preachers’ ministries. “Stop worrying, start sowing,” he added, his voice rising. “That’s God’s stimulus package for you.” (Goodstein. Nytimes.com)
An indulgence is “in the Roman Catholic Church, a declaration by church authorities that those who say certain prayers or do good deeds will have some or all of their punishment in purgatory remitted.”
“In the Middle Ages, indulgences were frequently sold, and the teaching on indulgences was often distorted. The attack by Martin Luther on the sale of indulgences began the Reformation.” (American Heritage)

Megachurch pastors who preach this prosperity gospel are not conservative Protestants; they are excessive businessmen, selling indulgences and tricking their congregants into buying the “favor of God.”

“This [is] a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach; Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous;” 1 Timothy 3:1-3, KJV

The Scripture uses an interesting word in this admonition to those who want to lead in the church, lucre. Lucre is translated from the Greek word “aischrokerdēs” which means eager for base gain, greedy for money.” (blueletterbible.com)

Their message and the application of their lifestyle disqualify them from the office they hold. Why then do people flock to them? As in the classic Clinton campaign phrase often re-quoted in reference to politician’s ability to gain office though under qualified or corrupt, “It’s the economy, stupid.” They are rich, so they must be right.

Megachurch pastors have a delicate job on their hands. Their most important job is to keep the people happy. In The Deviant’s Advantage, the authors explore the path of ideas from their inception on the fringe of society to their acceptance as a part of “social convention.” The risk involved in an idea on the fringe that initially catches people’s attention has to either be tamed or removed for the idea to gain the acceptance of the larger community. Harley-Davison, an American motorcycle company, at one time was synonymous with outlaw bikers and renegades, but is now the very expensive bike of choice for doctors, dentists and lawyers. The change came through an intentional repositioning of the identity of the motorcycle brand, and the removal of many of the perceived risks of being involved in the “biker” culture. (Matthews/Wacker. 19)

The very ideas of Christianity, self-sacrifice, repentance, and moderation are controversial and can even be divisive. In a small intimate group of believers, these ideas, though uncomfortable at times, can be accepted and applied through teaching that includes dialogue, trust and accountability. In a mega environment, these ideas, in order to become social convention, must be removed. The result is a feel-good, get-what-you-want, “religion of materialism and status to self-absorbed consumers.” (CQ Researcher. 785)

In conclusion, the mission of the church is not now, nor has it ever been, a means for men and women to make themselves wealthy, famous, powerful politicians. The number of people who come together, if there is no vehicle for meaningful relationships, becomes about the pastor’s ego, not the needs of the people who are drawn into his arena.

The church should be a place of love, healing and comfort, but not void of doctrine and scripture that challenges its congregants to repentance. The megachurch creates a climate of anonymity. “No change necessary here, if you don’t like it, don’t come back, we actually didn’t know you were even here.” I haven’t found that instruction in red letters, noted to be the words of Jesus Christ, anywhere in scripture.

Works Cited
The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition.
Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005. 12 Nov. 2009.

Blue Letter Bible. “Dictionary and Word Search for aischrokerdēs (Strong’s 146)”.
Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2009. 12 Nov 2009.

http:// www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm? ~Strongs=G146&t=KJV >

Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point.
New York, London, Boston: Little, Brown, and Company. 2000.

Goodstein, Laurie “Believers Invest in the Gospel of Getting Rich.” New York Times.
15 Aug. 2009. 07 November, 2009

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/16/us/16gospel.html

Greenblat, Alan and Tracie Powell. “Rise of Megachurches” CQ Researcher. 769-792

Mathews, Ryan and Watts Wacker. The Deviant’s Advantage.
New York: Crown Business. 2002.

The Faith of Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes is the single most profound literary influence on my faith in Jesus Christ. I know, it sounds crazy, but it’s elementary, my dear Watson. (It’s funny, Sherlock only said this once in any of the original stories, he also didn’t wear that goofy hat but it was used in an artist’s rendering and there you go.)

The incredible observations made by Sherlock Holmes point me to a greater truth than what is happening in the plot of the story. There is a secret in those stories, a spiritual secret that whispers in the background and beckons us in the shadows of Watson’s descriptive narration.

Sherlock Holmes walks in revelation, knowing through keen observation how things happen and why people have done things and where everything is going. Poor Watson is in the dark most of the time and in the end, after Sherlock explains everything he sees it and remarks how simple it all really was.

Of course I know that Sherlock Holmes isn’t a “real” character and his life is the creation of a very imaginative author, and that, my friend, is the point. You see, Sherlock is based on the image of a real character, fleshed out in a time frame with a beginning and an ending. His sole purpose is to reveal the wisdom of his author’s foreknowledge. We are “alive” in this world to choose where we will spend eternity in the “real” world. Jesus Christ is the author of our “story.”

“Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2 KJV

A side note, the reason we have a hard time hearing God speak through literature or art is because we have, in our compartmentalized thought process, relegated Him, The Author and The Artist, to Sunday sermons that are usually shouted by red faced preachers who think that volume can make up for substance. Sorry, we’ll go back to Sherlock.

Sherlock Holmes lives a life of design, with no random chance and no coincidences. You know why? It’s because Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of the series, knew the end from the beginning. He went into the story knowing the answer to the mystery and he revealed it through his character to the world a little at a time.

That’s us, you and me! We are created in the image or likeness of God (Genesis 1:26) and His intent was that through the church the manifold wisdom of God would be made known. (Ephesians 3:10) Jesus Christ not only knows the answer to the mystery of life, He is the answer, and He’s using us to reveal Himself to a world that is as clueless and blind to the facts as the pompous inspectors that begrudgingly employ Holmes or even Watson himself.

Just like the Baker Street team, you and I have had what seemed to be the most bizarre coincidences, random happenings and unusual circumstances happen in our lives, and as fragments they made no sense at all, but then we come to the understanding that our lives are a story, written by an Author that knows the end from the beginning and everything becomes clearer.

“Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:” Isaiah 46:10 KJV

The more I read, the more I am convinced that God not only exists, but is in every minute detail of our lives. The smallest coincidence, the most obscure pieces of evidence are pointing, declaring, proving that He is and is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

“But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.” Hebrews 11:6 KJV

The word “seek” in this passage of scripture is from the Greek word “ekzeteo” which is a compound word. “Ek” is a primary preposition denoting origin… out (of place, time, or cause; literal or figurative) and “zeteo” means “of uncertain affinity.” (blueletterbible.org) Affinity is an attraction between two elements. God placed within us an inherent desire to know Him, to scrutinize Him, to hold him up close to our faces and put a magnifying glass on Him. To see how tall He is by looking at the distance between His footsteps, to understand His vocation by looking at His hands.

“And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.” Zechariah 13:6 KJV

To seek Him is to find the secret place where the attraction becomes so strong, that you become one with Him. Jesus said, “ And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one” (John 17:22 KJV) Jesus was from that secret place and He dwelled in perfect unison with the Father.

Here’s the difference between us and Sherlock, he sees and observes. We pass by the same truth everyday, but fail to comprehend it because we look at it, but we don’t look into it. We are caught up in all of the distractions, but he has a single purpose, to unveil the mysterious. Every detail along the way is only pointing him to that one thing. I love how he is able to take the most foolish things (in and of themselves) and diagnose the character, habits and other details about a man or his circumstance and leave his clients and colleagues confused and bewildered. How does he do that? Simple, the author reveals it to him and through him.

The same thing happened to the prophets of the scripture. God peeled back a part of the veneer called time and revealed to those characters in the story a future event, sometimes just an allusion, other times a picture that was so detailed the prophet had no capacity to adequately describe it. Actually, He still uses the same modus operandi, using some obscure passage of scripture preached through the frail lips of some flawed preacher or a word from a friend or stranger that speaks to your present situation. That’s time within infinity. Here’s how Paul described it to the church in
Corinth:

“But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:” 1 Corinthians 1:27-28

At first glance Sherlock’s world seems more finite than ours. You can read the last chapter of “The Final Problem” when Sherlock tumbles into an abyss and dies along with his arch nemesis today and then read about how he and Watson met tomorrow. That’s how eternity works. Look, if there is no time in eternity, than time cannot be an event, it must be a place, like a book on a shelf. We think God is writing all of this as we go along and He’s surprised when we do something great, make a mistake or even sin on purpose, but to Him it’s already done. Who knows how many times our chapter has been read and re-read by God, or even ourselves. Whoa, that’s a little hard to wrap your brain around, but think about it. If we are someday going into eternity, than what does time have to constrain us from pulling the Book off of the shelf and reading it? He does it in Revelation:

“And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” Revelation 20:12

Of course that brings up issues like predestination, but we’ll tackle that at another time.

The most profound concept is not the fact that we exist or that God does, but the fact that you and I will one day step out of this story, this place of finiteness and see Him, The Author, face to face. That would be like Sherlock Holmes stepping off of the page and sitting down for a chat with Arthur Conan Doyle and as absurd as that sounds, that’s what the Bible points us to. We don’t know what we’ll be like, but we’ll be like Him, wow.

So what is this story that He’s writing? Why a love story, of course, or maybe it’s a mystery, although sometimes it really feels like a tragic comedy. It’s everything, sometimes all at once, sometimes one genre or another, but it’s definitely about Him saving His Bride, that’s us.

And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him; Hebrews 5:9

So, as Sherlock Holmes says, “Eliminate all of the impossibilities and whatever remains must be the truth, however improbable.”