The Battle

I’ve stopped writing for a while for several different reasons.  Number 1: I’ve been having some trouble putting things into words, so bear with me on this one. Number 2 and the biggest reason: I’ve been labeled the “radical college christian kid.”

This is a battle that I’ve been fighting for a while.  It’s a battle I’ve been fighting with you.  A battle that says we’re failing as the Church.  We’re running from our short-comings, hoping that if we ignore them, maybe they’ll go away. Here’s something interesting…they’re not.  We’re still ignoring sin in each others lives, keeping the secrets to feed the ability to keep on sinning.  We’re still not being the Church…

Believe it or not, there are people who don’t like my message. Recently, people have gone as far as to tell me I’m “preaching the wrong kind of gospel, one that screams condemnation and not Christ’s love.”  Allow me to take this time to fully explain my position.  I will admit, maybe Christ’s love isn’t always accurately reflected in my blogs.  My mistake, a sinful one. Here is the issue though.  I believe that Christ’s love is a MAJOR part of the Gospel, but I feel like one can’t fully appreciate God’s love without the other half of the Gospel: God hates your sin.  I believe that God can still love you while hating your sin.  God can still love you, yet HATE what you’re doing.

Here’s where I feel like the Church (notice the big “C”…not just one congregation, but the church as a whole) has messed up.  We walk around, wondering why so many “Christians”  believe they can be lazy and  have to do nothing with their faith.  We wonder why no one will fill leadership positions.  We wonder why people won’t share their faith.  Here’s the answer: we told them they didn’t have to!  We’ve taught that the Gospel is all “roses and butterflies,” that there is no “God hates your sin and when you ignore His voice” part.  We’ve forgotten that the Gospel is offensive!  Any message in which you’re told you’re not good enough on your own is going to strike a nerve, but we tend to leave that part out.  We’ve left out the part about serving Jesus with your life.  No wonder we all just sit around and stare at each other.

Let’s take a moment and look at some of Christ’s last words before ascending BACK into Heaven.

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” -Matthew 28:19-20, NIV

I want to concentrate on one word in this passage.  Look at the word disciple.  If you’ll remember, the disciples were a group of regular guys who made a pretty radical decision.  Here’s my point: Jesus’ disciples didn’t say, “Yea, Jesus…We believe you’re the Son of God.” and keep on fishing.  That wouldn’t have been good enough.  They dropped everything and followed Jesus in their EVERY decision.

Those are the kind of people we are to be bringing to Jesus’ feet.  The kind that drop everything and follow Jesus with their ever move.  Yes, the disciples messed up…A LOT!  Heck, one of them BETRAYED JESUS, but Jesus made VERY clear when they were wrong.  He made it clear that those behaviors weren’t good enough and that things needed to change.  HE CALLED THOSE MEN OUT! Although Jesus still loved his disciples, He hated when they were sinning.

Let’s put a nice little bow on this scattered message.

We’ve done this to ourselves.  We’ve spread a Gospel that’s not complete.  We’ve told people that saying they believe in Jesus is all it takes to live a life that reflects God…fail.  We’ve covered up sin in our lives with secret after secret…fail.  We’ve forgotten our responsibilities to encourage one another, love one another, and hold one another accountable…fail.  We’ve forgotten that our job is not to produce church go-ers, but disciples…fail.

Let’s face it.  We’ve said for too long, “Yea, Jesus. I belive you’re the Son of God.” but kept on fishing.

To put it quite bluntly, that’s not good enough.