Mainstream Christians, most generally protestants, don’t seem to have gotten much further in spirituality than the Jewish Pharisees who Jesus so scorned. Their lives are dedicated to buildings they call ‘my church’ and a group of people they again call ‘my church’. They gather as pockets of Elitist groups scattered in a community, each smelling a little different, preaching the salvation of Christ but portraying pictures of judgment and condemnation…their disposition arrogant…their agenda their own need for self gratification, and corporate glorification.
These are the people who use the word church countless times in their conversations. “I go to church”, “… at my church”, "Oh, I have to go to church...", “You ought to go to church...”, “I was at my church...”, “Well, in my church”… that word 'church' seems to be a panacea for everything. It’s their badge for the world to see … it is a symbol of where they are mentally, it is their crutch that carries them limping through their life…they use the word ‘church’ like the angry, misguided and hurt use the word the 'F' word in every sentence… it is the panacea for thier hurt. It is their badge for the world to see…it says this is who I am mentally...it is a crutch that carries them limping through their life. It seems insane but they are both the same…their egos are screaming for the world to notice them. The former out of a need to be seen as and feel like they are upstanding and good, and the latter out of the need show their pain … both are egocentrical in nature.
Mainstream Christians generally play at spirituality, busily sawing through the air with their gestures of service. Boasting of church services, church programs, food baskets, and mission trips and for what? So they can go to bed at night their egos satiated, for now they certainly must be good in the eyes of God? Yes, just like the Jewish Pharisees, going to church and complying with all the conventions of the Christain Religion will lend to a sense of well-being. It is human nature to feel good about oneself when engaged in something meaningful and the church ideal feeds that sense of security that 'all is well with my soul'. Yes, when going about church service, it lends people a sense of their own worth and one has attained the highest status when deemed a 'good Christian' by peers. Don’t misunderstand, it is good to do things that are beneficial but that in itself is spiritual emptiness, it is spiritual counterfeit.
And to these people, I can envision Christ saying, “You’ve got it all wrong, this is not what I meant. You are so focused on your need to feel good about yourselves and creating a public image for display, you are so busy listening to yourselves and your empty teachings that you can’t hear or experience God.”
Sadly, the church is still the sham it was … it is a haven for power and arrogance…and all who don’t practice the rituals and conventions of church going, and who don’t saw through the air with church sponsored programs, baskets or mission trips are held with suspicion or worse dismissed altogether. They are blind to those who quietly live seeking the will of God, serving the needs to which they are directed without public notice or serving in ways that have no grand platform.
When the going gets tough and the rubber hits the road when you feel you’ve been wronged or you have wronged another do you, are you able, will you be able to follow the teachings of Christ or do you follow your ego? Do you want to set yourself aside in order to resolve a conflict or a hurt? Do you want to accept not understanding another way of thinking without judgment? Do you want to look for God in everything…even what you perceive as ugly or evil or doctrinally incorrect? Do you want to embrace the teachings of grace? Then seize each present moment as though you were Christ. Don't be so busy as not to notice what seems most insignificant. Look at the cashier, the waitress, the stranger you just passed. Look at them as human to human not at what function they are performing. Accept delays in plans, destroyed agendas as opportunities with God...don't talk, just listen and watch. Be brave enough to encourage resolution where there is conflict. Be open to listening where there's a difference of opinion - you may hear the voice of God. Resist condemnation when another doesn't fit your expectations for condemnation breeds contempt and destruction. Grace encourages healing. Be that smile of encouragement, that healing touch, that moment of acknowledgment, not that nail sticking out of a board.
For you who wants to take inventory and be aware of your personal shortcomings you have as a human without fear or blaming, for you who want to be brave enough to look in the mirror and admit to the pain and suffering your human ego has created, for you that want to look into yourself and confess to your part in a situation which has caused suffering, for you who want to be willing to lay down your ego for the sake of another, and for you who wants to understand that God is bigger than what you learned in Sunday School, that God is more than what is stated in your church's doctrine, that God can't be defined by what anyone ever learned in seminary, and operates in ways that your mind cannot conceive, here is the gate to the kingdom of God. Walk through, therein lies your spirituality.
Buche De Noel cake
8 years ago
1 comment:
Justin had an interesting idea once: That Jesus's sacrifice was not that he died for people's sins (Because, really, what does that even mean?), but that he allowed himself to become a figurehead for a religion that was incongruous to his teachings. What is the better litmus test of one's spirituality: To do good or evil whenever either suits you, or to consistently do evil and be deluded enough to think you're doing good.
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