For many years I’ve been disturbed by the numerous conversations I’ve held with youth leaders regarding the young people leaving the church post-graduation.  As with many I held to the thought it was youthful rebellion and in time many would return. I’m not so sure that that is true anymore.

            I recently came across a growing movement outside the church realm know as the Un-Christians.  These are young people who have grown so disgusted by a church that is so indoctrinated in the causes they oppose that they no longer can tell you what they support. Instead they speak in clichés and platitudes, with condescending voices that look down at any one who opposes them or will not conform to their position. Unfortunately they take the same position with sinner or saint alike.

Recently the author Anne Rice very publicly announced her decision to leave Christianity.  In her statement she continued to say that Christ would be the center of her life but, in her words, “It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group.  For ten years I’ve tried, I’ve failed. I’m an outsider.” Of course by that night bloggers all over the Internet were trumpeting her return to atheism with contempt and glee.  The fact that she said the exact opposite was forgotten.  Who cares what truth is as long as your agenda is moved along.

John 8:12 (NKJV) ¹²Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”

            This passage has become a very deep personal journey.  It’s a journey that has cost me church members, friends, and the general acceptance of extremists in the Christian church.  It has cost me these things because I feel more compelled than ever before to be able to articulate and walk out the things that I believe. It is all too easy to become one more angry voice screaming the gospel of hate, but it is a dangerous and lonely road to believe that if Jesus was here He would lump them together with the religious establishment that He worked so hard to reform in the Gospels.

            So today I’m going to put a document on paper and into the free hands of the Internet. It is a statement of my convictions and beliefs. I imagine my critics may take this as proof that I have compromised and I am in theological error.  For the rest I hope you see it as one man’s attempt to speak life, because life comes from what you are for not the things you are against.

The “What I’m For” List

I’m for the sinner, the broken, the wounded, and the defenseless. I’m for the hungry, the poor and the destitute. I’m for the homeless and the wealthy. I’m for the criminal, the soccer mom and the cantankerous old man who drives to slow and always seems to be in front of me. I’m for my president and elected officials even if I didn’t vote for them and maybe never will. I’m for my critics and will bless those who curse me. I’m for social justice as well as the preaching of the Gospel. You can’t truly have one without the other. I’m for little boys getting in fistfights because someone said something about their momma on the playground. I’m for Democrats and Republicans and those who bravely try to stay independent. I’m for the single parent, the divorcee and parents who work so hard so that their children don’t have to know just how hard things really are. I’m for smooth jazz, love songs and slow dancing with my wife under the moonlight. I will pray for the peace of Israel but I will also pray for peace for their Arab brothers. I’m for religious freedom even for those who don’t worship the same god that I do. I’m for long dinners spent with old friends. I’m for women being used in lead roles in all five positions of the five fold ministry.  I’m for not touching God’s anointed, because I’m not the one to judge who the anointed are, and God’s not telling me who is. I’m for the homosexual, the sexually confused and the adulterer who has destroyed theirs and the lives of their family by their sin. I’m for the black man, the brown, the yellow man, the red as well as the white because the Gospel is for all people and is bigger than the cultural walls that divide us.

Today I reject the gospel of hate. The angry self-righteous words of those who scream for conformity over unity, ideology over discourse, and homogenized groups over any diversity that may challenge the norms of what they think they know. Most of all I’m for the one named Jesus. The one who when handed the opportunity to render judgment on a guilty woman caught in a horrible sin, chose not to pick up a stone but instead reached down into the dirt and restored the dignity and hope of this accused and guilty one that the religious were trying so hard to take. Today He is still giving that empowering grace. That’s my Jesus, that’s my God, and that is what I am for.

For a short time in the afternoon my wife and I wandered the streets of the island. The center of the small town on Isla Mujeres is one shop after another of people selling various items and small restaurants dispersed throughout between the many shops. The streets are narrow and packed with tourist from all over the world and the sound of Spanish music provides the soundtrack for the experience.

  I’m not sure when the experience began turning for us from one of pleasure to one of sadness, but we began to notice things which our eyes could not turn from.  Behind the brightly painted buildings of the street we started to notice the squalor of housing that those who sold to us their trinkets would return to at night.  There were stores with only a husband and wife operating it, with posted business hours of 14 to 16 hours a day. Or the two small children who played in the back of the truck as their father worked his day as a guard of the gate at the back of a hotel.  Maybe saddest of all was the quiet desperation I’d see in the faces of men and women hoping we’d enter their business and make a purchase and the resignation when we did not.  I found myself thinking in the shadows of the paradises of this world, you will always find the poor and abused who keep it running on their backs.

Some of you probably will tell me that I’m too sensitive. This is the way it is in the Third World.  These are the fortunate ones.  Maybe you’re right.   Yet I can’t shake the feeling that Jesus would want us to notice these things because it’s where you would have found him if he were there.

I am more and more convinced that Christianity is so much bigger than the Sunday morning experience. If we are to truly be like Christ we must feel like Christ. The message of the Gospel has always been easier accepted by the poor than the rich, and yet so much of the American church experience is being directed to the accumulation of wealth.  Is it just me that thinks we have grown terrible out of balance?

A passage from an autobiography of the great revivalist George Whitefield speaks to this issue so directly. This man who repeatedly was attacked and barred from the pulpit found his way by following the hard road. Listen to his words.

Before long, however, a scheduled execution brought it about. Whitefield’s heart had been broken by the coalminers at Kingswood, Bristol – men as violent as they were vulgar. Once the date for the hanging had been set the miners began anticipating the celebrations surrounding the entertainment.  When the murderer “cheated” them of their amusement by committing suicide, the miners dug up the corpse and partied around it.

They and their families were 100 percent illiterate, stuck in a degradation that defies description. Whitefield walked among them, in full clerical attire, and began speaking to them from Matthew 5:3  “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Thoroughly despised and contemptuously shunned, these people found in Whitefield someone who loved them and therefore did not fear them. Grimy with caked-on dirt and coated in coal dust as they were, Whitefield wrote of them in his diary that as he preached he saw “the white gutters made by their tears down their black cheeks.”

            I ask you today… when was the last time you really saw the people in the shadows?  The people who the Bible calls the least of them?   I believe that if we could again see as God sees this country would experience one of the greatest revivals to ever happen.  Instead of us being worldly minded we would again be Kingdom minded and the effect on society would be astonishing.

            God help me to have your eyes.  Help me to smell the lost, desperate and broken as the sweet perfume they are in your nostrils.  Change my heart to one who chooses to walk in the shadows because there I will find you; changing lives, bringing hope, and healing the broken.

Isaiah 61:1 - 2 (NKJV) ¹ “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; ² to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn.”

This scripture in Leviticus has helped me to put into perspective a recent law in Arizona that is being called the toughest immigration law in the country. In essence the law allows law enforcement to ask people for identification that authenticates their citizenship even without a crime being committed. Although those who wrote the law insist that racial profiling will not be targeted, how else can this be viewed when Arizona is bordered by Mexico and so many people cross into our country without proper approval from this country?

            I’m not naïve to think that illegal immigration doesn’t present tremendous problems in certain states. The arguments used by proponents to immigration do have merit. We can’t financially support those that come into our country and utilize the services of our country while not paying into the same tax system that citizens do to fund such services. Eventually we will run out of money if this is allowed to continue. The problem that I have with this is that it misses the point of what makes America tick. This is a great country and there are countless people who will risk death and imprisonment to be part of it.

            What is an American? We are the mutts of the world. We have so many different types of blood running through our veins that those who prejudice against the foreigners are hypocrites. This is the most unique country in the world because there is not native race outside of the American Indian who can claim the status of being a true American. We all have our roots somewhere else.

            That brings me to my point. In the law the Jews were told to leave the corners of their fields for the poor and the foreigners. I believe this was two-fold. One was that it was a moral provision to take care of these people. The other was that it was to leave a testimony of God’s grace to those who received the blessing. In the world that the Jews inhabited, friendly relations with foreigners was important because those who you took care of today may be needed to protect you tomorrow.

            The Jews were known by their God. He defined them. It was vital to God that He be known as a merciful and giving God. It also helped to ensure that the Jewish people would survive. What other nation has been afflicted such as the Jews, yet they remain one of the strongest and most feared nations in the world. People have risen to their defense time and again.  I would suggest that this understanding that you have to take care of more than your own has played no small part in their endurance.

            The Arizona law is flawed in that it opens a door for many innocent people to be harassed because of the color of their skin. You would think we would be past this point, but we are not. Even more than this flaw, is the image that it presents of an America that is hard-hearted and oppressive. Our forefathers gave up so much to find their way to America. We opened our door to people from all races and walks of life. No one was turned away because we understood that our country was worth the risk to get to.

            At the Statue of Liberty you can read these words on the grand lady who overlooks the great entry point to our country at Ellis Island.

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

            I agree that we need a plan to allow for legal immigration into our country. It has to be thoughtfully constructed and implemented. The Arizona law in my opinion is an ugly law that has huge potential for abuse. Even more than that is my opinion that as a Christian I can’t support something that makes the alien even more unwelcome, afraid and hopeless.  

            A year ago my doctor had given me the news that my physical condition was not the best. He mentioned that I was a 42-year-old man whose body was much older than those 42 years. Even though I had heard this conversation before, and those who love me had asked me to change, I want to tell you the reason that finally gave me the courage and strength to stand up and fight.  It was quite simply this…I was tired of the pain.

            The pain in my body was increasing daily.  My knees hurt, my feet hurt, my back hurt, and most of all my self-esteem hurt.  It was the pain that caused me to take a good hard look at myself and chose a new path for my life.

            It’s interesting how we react to pain.  Pain has a way of transforming our lives. We mark our lives by before the pain and the time after the pain.  For some pain signifies a time of evaluation and change, for others it becomes the all-consuming place that drags their life to a standstill.

            I am reminded by Paul’s words that “His grace is sufficient.”  These words were spoken after Paul had prayed that God would remove the cross that he was carrying.  Most theologians believe this to be a physical problem that caused Paul to suffer.  He prayed three times with no answer before he wrote those words.  The bottom line for Paul was that God would get him through his pain or remove it … but he wasn’t going to stop his life.

            Paul teaches us an important life lesson in his answer.  We will deal with suffering in this life.  It is going to happen.  Whether it be physical or emotional, pain happens.  The big decision is what will you do with it.  Does it become your identity or is it a part of your life that you deal with and grow from?  When we chose to deal with it instead of it dealing with us, the door for God’s involvement is opened.

            God’s way may not be ours.  We usually want a quick fix and off we go. God’s way may be for you to travel with the suffering for awhile.  Pain can indicate a deeper problem that needs to be dealt with.  If we live life on fixing the symptoms, the root of our troubles can be missed.

There are times that the pain we live with can be changed.  For me it was a lifestyle decision that has been a blessing personally and for my family. That choice cannot be made by anyone else but you.  God will help but the decision starts with you. So I ask you today, what choice will you make?  Will you choose life or continue to embrace your pain?  The ball is in your court.

Glenn Beck:

I’m begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them . . . are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words ’social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!

The preceding quote was recently spoken by the conservative radio and talk show host Glenn Beck. I have tried to stay out of issues that define the political right or the left as I believe my responsibility is to be a preacher of the gospel, not a political commentator. That being said, because conservatives and their politics tend to be the prominent voices in the American church this quote deeply disturbed me due to its potential to be treated as a Biblical position that scripture repudiates repeatedly.

I have watched the American church for decades work to mobilize itself as political force in this nation. It has chosen the moral high road of the Bible using it to push agendas and candidates who support their causes. It has been my observation that as we have become more politicized our effectiveness at impacting culture through conversations pointing to Christ has diminished. Pollster George Barna has done numerous polls that show that in America today there are less people who call themselves Christian than ever before, and our church attendance on any given Sunday bears witness to these facts.

To this I do in a small way agree with Mr. Beck, in that social and economic justice have become code words for certain groups within the church to rally their troops to causes which are suspect. For some, the call to take a stand for these causes is a backhanded appeal to our government; an appeal to provide more assistance in areas that the Bible has commanded the church to be first responders…to the poor, the elderly, the widow, the homeless, and the fatherless.  That being said, when a man with the influence of Mr. Beck makes a blanket statement, without the theological background to support his claims, the potential impact on those who believe that his voice is to be equated with the voices of the men and women God has placed in positions of leadership within the church, is perilous. Even more troubling is how many Christians who will rush to support the words of a talk show host yet know nothing of the words or actions of respected Christian leaders such as Jakes, Warren or Franklin.

Mr. Beck’s position on social and economic justice is rooted in the conservative political position toward these causes. From a political position what constitutes justice can be argued both ways – but from a Christian position there can be only one response to the need for justice.

Isaiah 1:16 - 17 (TMSG) ¹⁶Go home and wash up. Clean up your act. Sweep your lives clean of your evildoings so I don’t have to look at them any longer. Say no to wrong. ¹⁷Learn to do good. Work for justice. Help the down-and-out. Stand up for the homeless. Go to bat for the defenseless.    

Over 120 times the word justice is found in the Bible.  Isaiah so very clearly spoke to the Christian call to work for justice in chapter 1 of his book. Look at his words. Learn to do good, work for justice, help the down and out, stand up for the homeless and go to bat for the defenseless.  How can these words be anything but a call for all Christians to do the exact opposite of what Mr. Beck suggests the church should do?

Do we even dare look at the life of Jesus?  One of His miracles was to feed 5,000 hungry people by “taking” a young boy’s lunch.  Shouldn’t those 5,000 have been self-sufficient enough to have baked their own bread and caught their own fish?  Nevertheless, Jesus regularly went to those in need and offered them help. Yes his main mission was Salvation but He also understood that we live in a hard world and a Christian without compassion for those whose lives cry out for justice is just another empty voice and the Heart of God is not in them.

My fear for the Church is that we are sheep who have lost the voice of our Shepherd. Rather than listening to the Truth, we are listening to those who are leading us farther from truth not to the truth … because God’s heart is not in them.  Never confuse the road of politics and culture with the way of Christ.  They will always eventually head in different directions eventually.  Politics are men and women attempting to solve humanity’s problems on their own. Ultimately, then you must make the choice which direction you will follow.

To subscribe to Mr. Beck’s position is to cut the heart out of Christianity.  Do unto others as you want done unto yourself.  Your answer may be “I don’t need anyone’s help, I’m strong and self-sufficient”.  To you I can only offer the staggering statistics of Americans who are in desperate need today who never thought they would find themselves in this position.  How quickly life can change.               

Christianity when at its best has always shone the light on injustice. Christianity, when at its best, has not only just demanded action but has been the first into the fight. Whether over racial injustice, feeding the hungry, or caring for the poor, Christians have been acting like Christ and making a difference in this world since the beginning of recorded time.  We can in no way back away from the cause of justice, social or economically, than we can deny the virgin birth.  It is fundamental to our faith.

May we take this moment to sit together as brothers and sisters and ask some hard questions? Who speaks for God? Who speaks for Christians? It might be easy to follow a flame-throwing media star, whether from the right or the left, but let us make the harder choice to follow the lead of dignified men and women, whose only qualification is a heart whose purpose is to further the cause of Christ.  They walk the narrow road where true justice can be found and the question of “What would Jesus do?” is answered.

            For much of the event I was able to stay to my corner and mingle with people who knew nothing of the underlying currents.  A smile, a wave, a few words, and I just kept moving, trying to end the evening without a confrontation.  Alas, God has always had this way of making me face the uncomfortable things in my life by bringing a conviction that overwhelms any personal discomfort I may be feeling.  This was one of those times. 

            Toward the end of the evening the antagonist, at least in my eyes, was walking through the room.  I leaned to my wife and asked for her advice.  She looked at me and said, “You need to talk to him.”  As much as I love my wife, I wished she had said something else, because now, not only did I have conviction from God in my heart, but also the confirmation from my wife in my ears.  That my friends, is a powerful combination.

            I nervously approached the man who on one hand I knew I owed a lot, yet on the other hand felt justified in being betrayed by.  I had no idea what I was to say, but knew that I was at a crossroads moment in my life.  To say I was in conflict is an understatement, because the history between us was undeniable, and not very good.  It is this conflict that is responsible for overwhelming the small voice of God leading us to closure from moments in our lives that are not nearly as clear as we may think they are.

            As I stood there waiting for him to turn, I prayed…what am I suppose to say?  He turned and looked at me and the ten years between us faded away.  What came out of my mouth was not what I had expected this moment to be all the times I had envisioned it.  I looked at him and said “I’m sorry, I was wrong all those years ago and I ask your forgiveness.”

            Those who know the circumstance would probably wonder why I did what I did.  They might remind me of all the events that led up to my decision those years ago.  They might remind me of the loneliness of losing a mentor in my professional life.  They could even point out the fact that I had been loyal right up to that moment that I wasn’t and every word they would say would be wrong but it wouldn’t change this fact.  God wanted to close a door to the past and the only way for it to happen was for me get humble, not defensive while trying to justify myself, and ask forgiveness.

            The man stood for a moment, then reached out to hug me and said something I hope to hang on to.  He told me that he was too old to hang on to old offenses.  He just didn’t have the strength or time to waste energy on hurts in the past.  He forgave me and said he was proud of me.  That I had grown up well.  As sure as I write these words, I heard the door close in my mind and I knew that the grips of a past hurt were gone forever.

            It may seem that it was a one-sided conversation and that for true closure to come I would need to have my feelings be acknowledged and an apology be reciprocated, but that would void the lesson.  God doesn’t ever ask us to do something and then says our obedience is only required if certain conditions are met.  He just asks us to obey.

            Paul wrote of a work started and finished by God.  I wonder how many of us get into the process and never see it finished because we put conditions on our surrender.  Our past can become a deep abyss that holds power to drag us down at will, even though God has promised us freedom in Him.  Sometimes the thing that frees is the thing we don’t want to do.  It is in the still small voice of a loving God that closure can be found.  Not every step is fun.  Not every step is easy, but the reward of doing the right thing can mean better days are still to come.

            Some of you may accuse me after you read this of being an apologist.  You may tell me that I am blinded by the accomplishment and that we have to take the person in their totality to have an accurate picture of a person.  You may even tell me that the darkness in a person’s life will always put out the light.  As a reasonable man, I could not argue your point, but I do choose to disagree with your position.

            To me it seems that our culture in America has become more vicious by the year.  We build people up only to tear them down.  It has become sport to pick apart the shortcomings in others and to make sure that everyone is made aware of those things.  It seems to me that as a people, this spotlighting of others, especially the well-known, has become a great way to deflect attention from our own lives.

            Two scripture texts that come to mind that I would like you to consider today are “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” and David’s cry “Search me oh Lord.”  Both of these speak to a fundamental truth about humanity; none of us are quite what we project that we are.  Behind every life are secrets that we pray can remain a secret.  Your wife or husband may know.  A parent may be in the loop, a trusted friend or advisor, but we all have had moments that we are thankful have not defined us as people.

            I am not trying to say that a person’s character is to be overlooked or that mistakes cannot taint their accomplishments, because they will.  I would like to suggest that part of living a life of grace is to see the value in people separate from their failings.  If God is to be the judge, then He will determine the final outcome of a life.  That to me is freeing to appreciate the accomplishments of a life in spite of their mistakes.

            I believe it is fair to look at people and wonder if they could have accomplished more if they had allowed God to help them have victory in their secret lives.  We can by observation learn how to avoid traps that may threaten our own destiny.  The accomplishment can be learned from and appreciated, but in no way does the life have to become a personal role model for our growth.

            The old song says to “Turn our eyes upon Jesus, look full into His wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace.”  To summarize my thoughts, I have grown weary of the constant drum beat of those who are always focused on the twig in the eye of others and miss the log in their own.  How can we be called people of grace and mercy when from our mouths comes anything but that?