Tag: bible (Page 4 of 4)

Why Modern Christianity Makes People Vomit

March 8, 2016 / ckratzer / 170 Comments

It’s not a new revelation that modern Christianity is on the decline, especially the American brand. There are growing numbers of good, thinking people who are vomiting out the spiritual elitism, arrogance, and religiosity that oozes out of the pores of countless Christians and their church culture. Yet sadly, as many that yell “fire” in hopes to solicit a cure, most Christians simply resolve to bury their heads in the sand and cling to their black and white, cut and paste spiritualities. Like Linus with his blanket, nose-blind to their own reality, many Christians refuse to let go of the very things that make them stink—sending many, kneeling to the porcelain altar, vomiting it all out.

There are real reasons for all the upchucking— many that are hard to hear, but nonetheless, true. I don’t pretend to believe any of this will make much of a difference, only that someone should have the guts to unveil the true reasons for all the spewing.

We Know You are Faking It- When the Christian life is centered on one’s spiritual performance, the best anyone can do is pretend— we know you’re pretending.

What you are proclaiming as the cure is really the poison. Your focus on sin, sin-management, and personal, spiritual improvement only imprisons people to the futility of their efforts to get better—leaving them addicted to the lie that if they would just try harder, pray longer, or do more spiritual things, one day they’ll arrive. We see you drink in the motivational messages, the calls to “get radical” for Jesus. We hear the fear tactics and religious prescriptions, the weight you place on guilt and shame. We see the wads of cash you lay down for the latest “to do” books on Christian living and the conferences that peddle them. It’s all about you and your quest to become somebody for Jesus.

Yet, we aren’t fooled, for all the WWJD stickers lining your bumper, we see that nobody is living it like you pretend to be. We are wide awake to the spiritual game of competitive Christianity you are playing.

The truth is, your faith is undoable, leaving people with the only thing left to choose— look the part, go through the motions, and hope nobody sees behind the veil to the ghost town of your spiritual life. There should be no surprise to see countless people simply opting out, realizing it’s more genuine to stay home than it is to be a part.

Grace is the only power that changes anything. Grace proclaims it’s not your performance that defines you, it’s Christ’s. Grace awakens us to the reality that we are already whole, complete, sanctified, justified, pure, holy, righteous, and saved—with no reason for any sense of guilt, shame, fear, or condemnation dwelling in our lives. The very things your modern Christianity are trying to work into our souls are the very things Jesus erased. The Gospel of Jesus is all Grace, or it’s not all Gospel. Grace levels the playing field—none are better, only different.

Yet sadly, Grace isn’t sufficient for you. You’d rather play a losing game and gather others around the misery of your hopeless spiritual plight, while believing its salvation—addicted to the Law you are pimping as Gospel. All, while the spiritual and moral decline of those under your legalistic chemtrails increases all the more as they breathe in your toxin—sending the masses vomiting to the hills.

You Say Stupid Stuff You Think Is Spiritual- The talking points you’ve cocked and loaded for any given moment, the spiritual cue cards ready for the perfect “Christian” response, the cheesy Facebook memes with outdated fonts and clip art, all leave people inwardly concluding, “Gag me with a multi-colored pitchfork.”

We can tell, though perhaps your intentions are good, you don’t have much of a grasp on the script you are repeating, and for some, there’s a sure void of genuine heart behind what rolls off the tongue. Things like, “I’ll be praying for you,” “God will never give you more than you can handle,” “You just need to press into God more,” “Hate the sin and love the sinner” all render people flat and spiritually comatose.

Chances are, it really wasn’t about actually praying, and even if you do pray, does that mean God will now magically release a blessing on one’s behalf that He was withholding in wait for your petition? Who’s in control of God anyways? You? God? I have a hard time believing a pithy little statement asserting what “God gives you to handle” is going to resonate with a dying cancer patient and their desperate family. Does God really “give” that stuff out anyways, and out of the goodness of His little heart, stops just a wee-bit short of “too much?” Besides, how exactly does one “press into God” more? Is there a special valve you push, some hip-posture you take? What does that even mean?

How about just genuinely caring about people beyond a prepackaged response, getting involved in their lives, walking with them a mile or two, and leave the Christian talking points on the pew.

You Suck At Being Human- It’s pretty obvious, at least the impression you create— you care more about rule-keeping, creed-following, and church-life than you do about real people, especially those who are offensive to you.

Surely to your surprise, when onlookers observe your Christian life they conclude that becoming more like you is a downgrade, not an upgrade. For to walk upon your path and adopt your values is to become more judgmental, arrogant, phony, exhausted, and legalistic —loving less, enjoying less, and being free… less.

It’s all a drag, a constant spiritual skate on thin ice— parsing every word and action. You boast of a freedom that looks more like prison. You can’t love simply for the sake of loving, there always has to be a catch— some kind of condition, restriction, or spiritual agenda. It’s all so complicated and involved. Line after line of fine print— swimming in a sea of forever pretentiousness.

Why can’t you just be human?

Like Jesus.

Your Worship Is Empty- For all the subwoofers, intelligent lighting, video packages, church-franchising, and skinny jeans, as much as you may have a heart to “reach” people, you come off like a microwaved hamburger; done on the outside, still frozen in the middle.

Sure, people come, and it all may be musically, visually, and architecturally impressive, but a show never changed anyone; at least, not in the right ways. Where are the choruses, “My life sucks right now, and so does God?” I know, that would be too raw and real to where many are truly at I guess— doesn’t fit a starch-ironed, pleated theology, or look good on LED-shaded projection screens. Since when is a healthy faith journey simply a matter of inspiration, cutting and pasting bullet-points, and conjuring up the determination to give another college-try at becoming a better, “sold-out-for-Jesus” person the upcoming week.

By the way, how’s that going for you— all the “becoming a better person for Jesus” stuff? Well, I can tell you— the world sees, that behind all the religious theatre, it’s not. Nobody is getting fooled, but you.

Why? Because light shows, movies, television specials, clever spiritual acronyms, inspiration, and self-determination never changed anyone. Only Grace can, and does.

Shows are easy— loving people, giving Grace, being real… much more messy—all that money can’t buy.

The world is insulted that you approach them like a commercial audience to be inspired into a sale. People are too smart for that, and quite frankly, too valuable and filled with divine dignity to be belittled by your spiritual snake oil.

We see the show, but not near the genuine, humble love for people. That’s why we vomit it out. Away from us you evil doers, you worship God with your lips, but your heart is far, far from Him.

You Think You Have It- So drunk on the sound of your own voice, as if God allotted you exclusive awareness to all things Bible and its proper interpretation, you cling onto your truth as if the Deity has trademarked your understanding. No room for questioning, no room for thinking, no room for living to the beat of an alternative drum—if only to assimilate us all into the collective of your spiritual Borg.

You are always right; a true, genuine follower of Christ—everyone else, some shade of rebellion and unfaithfulness—desperately in need of your discipleship. We, the wayward, dwelling somewhere in the darkness cast by the throne upon which you sit— as you spray on your favorite morning perfume, “Arrogance” by Chanel Evangelical, we can’t help but be confronted by the stench that falls. What you smell as flowers, we smell as feces.

It’s all so convenient, so intoxicating— that you have “it,” and everyone else, by your declaration, does not. Oh, how our gag reflexes can’t help but spit out that attitude, and all that comes with it.

You See People As A Project- We are the potential notch on your “conversions” belt. Like Chia Pets, ordered for a rainy afternoon, you pour yourself into our lives for one underlying purpose— to see, if upon us, your ideology will grow.

Everything you do, even the love you express, has an agenda in the shadows—not that we become fellow “learners” with you, but rather, that you are the “learned,” and we are to learn to be as learned as you. Your’s is not an introduction to Jesus, but an induction into religion.

We sense the fingers crossed behind your back, hoping that by your efforts and clever ministry strategies we might start saying the right things, doing the right things, believing the right things, all because you befriended us in fulfillment of your pre-packaged, purpose-driven mission statement.

It’s what you think you are supposed to do, but ironically, what we see Jesus never do—treat people like a project.

You Read Into A Book And Turn Off Your Brain- The Bible is everything to you— and by “everything,” I mean everything.

It’s your salvation, justification, license for condemnation. It’s your indoctrination, discrimination— not the just the Bible, but your literal, black and white, leather-bound approach. Like a deer caught in the high-beams, you’re entranced by its religious capacity to condemn and self-justify— blocking your ability to see its Light and rendering you as an obstacle to God’s intention.

Whatever lines you auto-tune to echo what you want them to say— those becomes undebatable to you— more definitive and directional than Jesus Himself. To you, the Word hasn’t become flesh, He has become fine-printed in the nuances of your interpretation.

Forget all the science the screams for an old earth. Forget the eyes that clearly see evolution within Genesis creation. Forget the brain in which a God who is Love can’t compute a God of eternal, tormenting hell. Forget the grey, the mystery, the journey, the humanity within every word and page. Forget those, who lives were immersed with Jesus, yet completely missed His essence because they had their heads buried in the words.

You personify the Bible as God’s plan to turn off a thinking brain and a beating heart— best used to win arguments, justify hate, and draw lines in the sand as to who is in and who is out, right and wrong, and good or evil.

What God created to be a launch pad to a Jesus encounter, you have reduced to a roadmap from Jesus, declaring of which, you hold the navigation key.

All your Bible-thumping, memorization, proof-texting, and debating squeezes the abdominals to a full-on upchucking.

You Unify Around What You Are Against- The motto of the sum of your Christian philosophy, “Don’t drink, don’t chew, and don’t go with girls that do.” Don’t do this, don’t do that, we are against this, and we are against that.

Nothing enflames the passion of your cause more than to discover a new enemy. If you can’t find a real one, you simply string one together—homosexuality, liberality, wars against Christianity, prayer in schools, transgender equality—always some ax to grind. Nothing takes the wind out of your sails than to be absent of sin-targets for which to take your self-righteous aim— those who sin differently than you, your favorite sitting duck.

It’s all so obvious as you live out your religiosity, love is an accessory, and apparently so is giving a damn. Satisfied with taking shelter behind the walls of your spiritual pride, you refuse to reexamine, to fully consider, “maybe we’re wrong.” Besides, there’s way to much too sin to point out to ever begin to look at your own.

Communing around the sacraments of your hate, you hijack Jesus, and make him the hood ornament of your world bulldozer— known best by all the things you are against, not the common sense, Jesus-things you should be for… unconditional love, grace, humility, selflessness, serving, sacrifice… and on, and on, and on.

All, while more and more good, thinking, love-believing, grace-intoxicated, Jesus adoring people, vomit it all out of their mouths— and rightly so.

Get in line behind Jesus, all ye fellow heathens, He is joining us—leading the way of gag…

“I know you inside and out, and find little to my liking… you make me want to vomit.” -Jesus (Revelations 3:16 MSG)

If You Were Truly Conservative, You Wouldn’t Be Anti-Gay

February 14, 2016 / ckratzer / 4 Comments

You’ve stared down the aisle of homosexuality, perhaps taken a few steps of examination. It didn’t take long for the reality to overwhelm. The issues are complicated with lots of moving parts. From terms like LGBTQ to issues of biology, from political creeds to long held theology. You’re trying, you really are.

With an inner heartbeat pulsing toward love, if only to be free, yet chained to prescribed understandings of an ancient text, lines drawn by the God of your faith upbringing. At best, you’re now straddling a fence. Who’s right, who’s wrong? Bending and twisting, juxtaposing Grace and truth— two chopsticks in hand, insisting that one must be the fork and the other the spoon. Perhaps, the tension is too much, you’ve insisted on landing—the road most traveled, the familiar path. Determined, that as far as God is loving, He is also condemning of all things LGBTQ. One big mess of sin, a grotesque abomination, some foreign reality to God’s rendering that requires transformation. Not just a fork, not just spoon, but a knife, declaring gay doom.

Where you are is where you are, not going to debate that.

But on top of it all, the icing on the cake, you’ve boxed up all your concrete conclusions, wrapped them in black and white paper, and packaged it all as being “conservative.” The genetic codes of your believism, your safe and sure home base. Declaring the inside scoop to a sacred text, years of ecclesial tradition. Self-proclaimed protectors of Christian values, the clear and plain teachings, not to mention… God-inspiration. This is America, the Jesus-sanctioned nation. “Oh-o-say can you see…”

Keep on singing, why stop there. Not just defining what’s in some “conservative” box, claiming it as your own. But labeling all those outside it, throwing shade from your man-made throne.

The hymns of your condemnation. You’ve made it all so loud and clear. To you, I’m a slippery slope pastor. The rest of us, lost and wayward Christians. Heretical to the nines. We’re all just one of them, those liberals, bending to the sway of culture, watering down, sponging in a bath of perversion. Gently tickling, feathering the ears of all that would listen. To make it feel so good, to feel so easy. Living in the grey, postmodern relativism, all with the agenda, to do Satan’s bidding. Looking down your nose, patting me on the back, hoping one day I’ll graduate from this gay-affirmation. Sometimes with words, other times with silence, you say I’ve sold out a sovereign God, joined a long list of false prophets, blinded by culture’s coercion. I’m just another one of those misguided progressives, who simply can’t handle truth.

Well I don’t know who you think you are, but in my humble opinion, you’re way off base. Quite frankly, not even on the planet. You have no idea, not a clue, the journey I have taken, and that of many others.

So, I sure hope you have your adult diapers on, because here comes the truth. My gay-affirmation didn’t come from smoking some kind of progressive liberality, it actually came from the incense of my deep seeded conservatism.

I love Jesus, the Bible, and truth just as much as any other. It’s out of an ardent, soul stirring quest to get this right, that I have come to this LBGTQ-affirming conclusion.

I’m determined, to conserve the singular essence of God who is love, nothing more, nothing less. While you take your liberalities, dancing far outside the box, making Him into a schizophrenic, condemning monster of multiple personalties. I’m holding fast, staying close and true to His clear delight and hand in all creation. While you take your liberalities, twisting, bending, fabricating God into a human-hating, sin-focused old man, sitting at the edge of heaven’s seat, licking his chops for the moment to show the unrepentant the back of His eternal hand.

I’m determined, to conserve the seriousness of the Bible, its sacredness and divinity. While you take your liberalities, raping it, reducing it into a text that should be understood, in all things, only literally. As if God gave you the Bible as a whore of words with which you can simply have your way. Making it all seem so black and white, so you can control, manipulate, label and sway. Adding words, translations, and meanings, stripping them from their context. Treating the Bible like a three-ring circus, parts that seem to light your enemies on fire, gaining the height of your attention, even the rise of your entertainment.

I refuse to play these religious games, to have my faith spoon fed, joining in lines of religious herds, feeding from the trough of self-righteousness.

I’m determined, to conserve the person of Jesus, the only Word of God, who for the joy set before Him, the entirety of humanity, endured it all. His Gospel of Grace, His message of peace. The goodness, value, acceptance and pleasure He takes in all that He has created. The very One who declared our leather-bound Bibles aren’t our salvation, often reinterpreting long held beliefs, always to the displeasure of the religious.

I’m not going to stand aside while you play eternity games with people’s lives. While you hijack the Gospel with your no-gospel Gospel, and pimp it as life. Making “church” into a club of like-minded people whose greatest spiritual gift is to talk amongst themselves and judge the world. Turning Christianity into a moral play, and you, the holders of the script. Scaling the heights of true liberality, truth twisting, backsliding, all while you’re pointing fingers. Puffed up with arrogance, you call it “conservative,” lifting yourselves as the keepers of all that is God’s intention and will.

Well, I’m not buying it, and countless others are beginning to see behind the curtain. You aren’t a conservative Christian, you are a convenient Christian. Anything to keep power, privilege, and authority— the trinity of your ambition.

Creationism, racism, nationalism, fundamentalism. Homophobia, xenophobia, misogyny, all bare the stench of your true liberality, moving so far away from the heart of God, Jesus, and the faith diary of His people. It’s all so convenient.

You are about as truly conservative as crayons taste like their colors. Spiritual shape-shifters, blending into, and making fit, anything that furthers your agenda— the one thing your brand of “conservatism” is good at accomplishing, the conserving of your own religious, self-righteous bigotry. A condemnation in your heart, seated deeper than any scripture.

For if you were truly conservative, you wouldn’t be anti-gay.

You’d stay so close to His nature, His heart, the person of His son Jesus. The thought of moving even just one step from His expanse, the incomprehensible essence of His ways. Seeing His image, his hand in all creation. The science, the biology, the complexity of it all. It would all be enough to give you pause. To stand in one place, on one thing alone… love.

From there, you could not be budged, you could not be moved.

Convinced that God is in all, and that God is good.

He is greater, His love higher, and his affirmation, universe reaching.

Everything His hands have made.

For if you were truly conservative, you wouldn’t be anti-gay.

You’d be like Jesus, and Jesus alone.

Believing in love… all the way.

Before You Take Your Life: 5 Things Every LGBTQ Person Needs To Know Before It’s Too Late

February 2, 2016 / ckratzer / 6 Comments

Your life. It feels like there is no hope, trapped in a well of darkness, no way out. You pray to make it all go away, if only tomorrow never dawned. The constant ping of pain ricocheting within your soul, torturing your every breath. It’s all you can do, to put one knee in front of the other, crawling down this path of living hell.

Nobody seems to hear, to understand, the screams screeching from your soul. All alone on the stage of life, if only to be heard. Crushed by the weight, drowned out by the volume of culture’s condemnation, sinking their bigoted teeth deep down, piercing your every hope. You’re slowly dying, a song inside, afraid to be born.

Not to mention religion, the Christianity that is forever assaulting you. Hate-bombs exploding. Discrimination, isolation, marginalization, shrapnel-packed spirituality. Vests full of death, waiting to be triggered, disguised as children of Light. Your every step, paralyzed in a mine field of ignorance, arrogance, and evil. Terrorism pimped as Truth.

It’s hell, it’s all hell. And you’ve had enough.

I’m not on the same path as you, but I do know what it’s like. To come to the wall, to the place in my mind, heart, and soul that concludes, this is where it has to end. I can’t take it, I can’t make it, anymore.

I’ve been that close. Looking my wife and my children in the eye. Just a trigger, a pill, an exit door away. That was me.

I am begging you, don’t do it.

Before you take your life, give anymore seriousness to the thought. Before you make your plans, plot your course.

There’s some things you need to know, you have to know, before it’s too late.

You are so Beautiful. You are the smiling gleam of your Creator’s eye.

There’s nothing wrong with you. No sin to manage, no stronghold to overcome, no flaw to repair, no tangle to unweave. The heavens declare, you are the joy of the Father, beautifully and wonderfully made. No if, ands, or buts. You’re not a question waiting for an answer, a disease searching for a cure. You are a statement from God, the period at the end of His sentence… everything He makes is good.

God loves you, completely, thoroughly. Not out of some divine obligation, but out pure, radiant pleasure. Everything about you, His hands have made. You are the intentionality of the Creator. Loaded with sacred purpose and design.

To lose you, would to be to lose Himself.

You, are that beautiful.

Religion Has This Wrong. The problem isn’t you, the problem is us.

The Christian track record is sure.

We are the authors of more confusion, division, and death than any other. Much of church, flat out sucks. Harboring some of the most bigoted, racist, discriminating, judgmental, over-fed people on planet earth. And quite frankly, they like it that way. Hell hath no fiery like an arrogant fundamentalist.

History tells the tale. Wrong about simple astronomy, wrong about black people, wrong about women; wrong, wrong, wrong. Now, leather-bound, name-engraved, wrong about you.

Those people condemning, reclined in their clubs with crosses on top. They’re wrong. Utterly, completely wrong. They are not Jesus, and they are not His heart for you. Close your ears, board up your soul. What they have done with the Bible, those six verses. It’s all wrong. Intentionally or not. Twisting, rewriting what God inspired for good, using it for harm.

Run from it, all of it, emancipate your heart. Don’t let their voice to you, become your voice to you. It is not of God, it’s of pure evil. Spit it out, every last drop.

Religion, has this wrong.

Your Struggle is Real. You didn’t ask for this, you didn’t choose it.

You’re not making this up, looking for a quick fix of attention. This isn’t some drama you’re orchestrating, sucking people in. The pain is real. Your heart is not a fool.

Your plight is genuine, deeply personal, uniquely individual. Those are real scars, fresh from the floggings. Those are real haunts, spinning in your head. Those are real cries, real blood gushing from your eyes. Nothing small about it.

No need to convince, no need to explain, no need to give reason, justification, permission for your pain. Who you are is who you are, where you are is where you are, what you are going through is what you are going. No need to pretend, to amend, to edit for for your audience. Just be you.

There are many who get it, who know it to be true.

The struggle is real, that’s all there is too it.

You are so Loved. There are lovers amidst the haters.

Maybe you didn’t get it, not from the people who should. But there is so, so much love, from people who do.

You are not alone, countless others are walking this out. Day by day, step by step. Ready to journey with you, intertwine their story with you. Curse dark skies with you, wrestle out depression’s claws with you. Stomach rejections’s vomit with you, dine at homophobic tables with you. Beat ignorance’s chest with you, pull back the knife in your hands with you.

Nothing is impossible when love is the answer. You are so loved.

Feel the hands reaching out, the hearts wide open. Hear the voices weeping… “You are deeply loved.”

God loves you. Everything about you. I love you. Everything about you.

You deserve to be desired, and all of heaven desires you.

You are so loved.

There is Hope. You have a song to sing.

A beautiful, strong, elegant, human, cosmos-penetrating hymn of life. Your life.

There is nothing more tragic than to die with your song still inside. For heaven’s sake, stand up, take your place, and frigging sing it. Be who God created you to be, with all abandon, without restraint. For such a time as this, you have been created.

It feels like the end, but this is just the beginning. Set aside everything that holds you back, believe in the beauty of all that you are, see the horizon, filled with promise. For your life is nothing less than the life someone else needs, to live theirs.

There are good people, good churches, good communities. More and more, it’s getting better. Because of you, it gets better.

Be brave, sing your song, live your life, embrace its worth.

Be brave, I say, and live.

There is hope.

You are hope.

I beg you.

Be brave, and live.

Resources for your journey:

Chris Kratzer: 980-295-0230 // ckratzer@ymail.com

Article “A Six Pack of Gay Affirmation: The Clobber Passages Revisited”

Article “Be Brave: God’s Ardent Message To Every Gay Person and The People in Their Life”

Book “Torn” -Justin Lee

A Six-Pack of Biblical Gay Affirmation : The Clobber Passages Revisited

December 6, 2015 / ckratzer / 14 Comments

In the biblical book of Hosea, chapter four, the writer experiences God speaking, “My people are being destroyed from a lack of knowledge.”

It’s interesting to me that God doesn’t say, “Hey, you know what? It’s because of sin that you’re being destroyed.” The text doesn’t even say it’s because of temptation, not even because of Beyonce’. No, the writer experiences God declaring, “it’s all about your ignorance.”

Interesting, very interesting.

So here we are with the issue of homosexuality.

No surprise, this is a topic that has been baked in a good bit of ignorance. And I, once a willing cook in the kitchen of bad theology, and even worse… bigotry.

That all changed, however, when I revisited the Bible with a new heart, and with new experience and information.

I pray that process happens for you.

There are a mere six passages in the Bible that specifically deal with the issue of homosexuality. I’m going to deal with five of them; line by line, verse by verse. One passage is basically a repeat of another (Lev. 18:22, 20:13).

Some people call these verses the six “clobber” passages because people use them to clobber homosexuals and homosexuality declaring, “See, it’s clear as day, black and white. God hates homosexual. Homosexuals are sinners. They’re all going to fry in hell.”

Good times for sure.

Yet, the very passages so many want to use to condemn homosexuality, I believe are actually a six-pack of biblical, gay affirmation.

Yup, a six-pack of heaven-crafted, delicious, biblical gay affirmation. Intoxicating, with God-authored freedom and validation. Detoxifying, with truth and fresh revelation.

So, belly on up and drink it in…

Bottle One : Sodom and Gomorrah Summer Ale

Genesis 19. It’s a sad story. A story about a guy named Lot.

There’s a backdrop to this.

Lot is Abraham’s nephew, and Abraham and Lot became very successful. They acquire all kinds of cattle, herds, and people. Bucket loads of stuff. Soon, they realize that sticking together was getting to be too complicated. Running into each other, conflicts emerged.

So, Abraham spoke up one day and said “Listen Lot, we need to go different directions here. I love you, but we’re just on top of each other.” Abraham, being a humble guy, continues “Look at the horizon Lot, pick a spot. You go there, and I’ll take what’s left.”

Lot gazes his eyes upon the cities of the plains, which are Sodom and Gomorrah.

Soon after, he enters into Sodom and Gomorrah and quickly realizes it’s a pretty nasty place. The people are clearly in significant violation of some of the most important ethical and moral issues of that Hebraic context… hospitality, gluttony, and arrogance.

About this same time, God visits Abraham and whispers, “Hey Abe, I need to clue you in a bit about something that I’m probably going to be doing here. That city, where Lot is hanging out, their lack of hospitality, all their arrogance and self-centeredness. I’ve got to end this thing.”

Abraham responds, “Hey God, could you hold off here, give Lot a heads up?” After some discourse, they finally come to an agreement where God sends a couple angels into Sodom and Gomorrah to let Lot know what’s about to happen.

That’s where we pick up the story…

“That evening the two angels arrived in Sodom, while Lot was sitting near the city gate. When Lot saw them, he got up, bowed down low, 2 and said “Gentlemen, I am your servant. Please come to my home. You can wash your feet, spend the night, and be on your way in the morning.”

Right off the bat, a big deal to the Hebrew moral code was the issue of hospitality. Probably the most important, ethical issue of the day. Lot is trying to honor this tenant .

They told him, “No, we’ll spend the night in the city square.” 3 But Lot kept insisting, until they finally agreed and went home with him. He baked some bread, cooked a meal, and they ate. 4 Before Lot and his guests could go to bed, every man in Sodom, young and old, came and stood outside his house 5 and started shouting, “Where are your visitors? Send them out, so we can have sex with them!”

Did you read it… “Every man in Sodom?”

Now let’s just use our brains for a second. You can be sure “every man” was not homosexual in orientation. Our national percentage here in modern 2015 is less than two percent.

But this isn’t about percentages, this isn’t about homosexuality, this isn’t about heterosexuality, it’s about something much larger. Read the text, this isn’t an invitation to engage in mutual, consensual sex. No, this is all about one thing, and one thing only… gang rape.

“6 Lot went outside and shut the door behind him. 7 Then he said, “Friends, please don’t do such a terrible thing!”

A “terrible” thing? Why is this terrible? Because this has nothing to do with consensual sex, or even sex at all. It has everything to do with malicious, victimizing, violent rape. That’s why.

8 I have two daughters who have never been married. I’ll bring them out, and you can do what you want with them. But don’t harm these men. They are guests in my home.”

It’s so amazing to me what we have done with this story. Somehow, we have made it all about homosexuality, which it is not, and overlooked the obvious corruption of Lot, who is willing to hand over his two daughters to be gang raped.

Are you kidding me? Handing your daughters over to be gang raped?

Sadly, when people typically think of Sodom and Gomorrah, they never think about that. In fact, when Lot and his daughters depart out of the city, they decide to repay their father and rape him. Nice, right? Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth… rape for rape.

See, this is not about homosexuality, this is about harm. This is about rape, this is about sexual violence.

The evil aggression is dripping off the pages…

9 “Don’t get in our way,” the crowd answered. “You’re an outsider. What right do you have to order us around? We’ll do worse things to you than we’re going to do to them.”

Here again, these violent demands to commit violent rape are coming from all the men of Sodom, not the gay community. And certainly, this is not a consensual arrangement being desired. No chance, no way.

“The crowd kept arguing with Lot. Finally, they rushed toward the door to break it down.10 But the two angels in the house reached out and pulled Lot safely inside. 11 Then they struck everyone in the crowd blind, and none of them could even find the door. 12-13 The two angels said to Lot, “The Lord has heard many terrible things about the people of Sodom, and he has sent us here to destroy the city. Take your family and leave. Take every relative you have in the city, as well as the men your daughters are going to marry.”

For God, when He hears the name Sodom, He has an entire list of “terrible things” in mind. Yet, interestingly, on that list is not homosexuality.

In fact, Ezekiel 16:49 declares, “Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.”

“Overfed,” are you kidding me?

We Christians, who for many of us, our favorite past time is to stuff our faces at the local Golden Corral to the point of chosen obesity after Sunday morning preaching. Seriously? We are looking for a condemnation of homosexuality in this passage that just isn’t there, while completely turning a blind eye to the “overfed” sin that God makes clear is certainly there.

This is not a text about homosexuality, especially homosexual orientation.

This is passage about the condemnation of violent sexual behavior. A condemnation of evil, father-daughter relationships. This is a story about the breaking of strict, cultural rules of hospitality.

That’s the context, that’s the issue. Nothing more, nothing less.

In fact, when Jesus spoke of Sodom and Gomorrah, He did so to the disciples stating that if one goes into a town and people don’t receive them into their homes, it would be better for Sodom and Gomorrah on that day of judgment than it will be for the inhospitable. When Jesus, four times in the Gospels contextualizes the issue of Sodom and Gomorrah, He never mentions homosexuality. Rather, over and over again, He highlights the critical issue of hospitality.

The men of Sodom and Gomorrah were not homosexually orientated, loving men. They were men who gathered outside Lot’s door, leaving their natural, heterosexual orientation to rape people as an act of humiliation and emasculation.

This a story of deviant heterosexual males who were hell-bent on humiliating strangers by treating them as women. The evil desires of those men had nothing to do with genuine love being expressed between members of the same sex.

Dr. Richard Haynes of Duke University, who is actually anti-gay, says the following…

“The Sodom story is actually irrelevant to the topic of homosexuality. The attempted gang rape in Genesis 19 shows the depravity of the Canaanite people who lived in the cities of the plain but there is nothing in the passage pertinent to a judgment about the morality of consensual homosexual intercourse.” Dr. Richard Hayes –Duke University

Bottle Two : Leviticus Lager of 18:22

“You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female: it is an abomination.” Leviticus 18:22

So here we are in Leviticus. Don’t be afraid, drink it in…

The scholarship yields overwhelming, affirming evidence.

The biblical, ancient, near Eastern context, as best we can investigate, was not familiar in any way shape or form with homosexuality in the sense of a defined sexual orientation a person embodies intrinsically. In the biblical assertion that “a man shall not lie with a man as one lies with a woman” the disapproving assumption was, a man would leave his natural attraction towards a woman and emasculate another man.

Here again, this text is about a forced act of humiliation and revenge. Not homosexuality.

In fact, there is am entire holiness code at play here.

If you keep reading further in Leviticus, (most stop after reading this singular verse) not only is the act of “a male lying with a male as with a woman” articulated as unorthodox, but all sexual acts that do not lead to procreation are declared an abomination.

Ruh, roh Scooby.

The Hebrew understanding of the time was that the male seed contained everything needed for human life. No knowledge of eggs or ovulation. It was assumed within the culture that a woman only provided the incubating space.

This was once an Aristotelian world where he, one of the most brilliant minds of the millennia before Christ, suggested that a male seed exclusively produced a male being. Where did women come from? The same place that malformations came from. Genetic syndromes, those are all cousins to a female. Aristotle suggests that a male produces a male, but sometimes things go awry and a female is born.

Folks, this is the context here. And if you take a text out of its context, you can make a con out of the text. To waste of male seed during a menstrual cycle, engage in autoeroticism. All was equivalent to murder because of the wasting of the male seed.

Yet, if you still believe this passage is somehow addressing homosexuality, of which Moses and the Leviticus code had no knowledge. It doesn’t even mention female-to-female activity. Why? Here again, homosexuality is not the issue. Moses knew nothing of this, as we do today.

In fact, if you believe this Leviticus stuff somehow addresses homosexuality, then you have to believe it all the way. So when later, the Leviticus code dictates that all kinds of like behaviors are punishable with death. Now you are going to have to jump on board with ISIS to align with this interpretive thinking.

But, let me suggest, before you start killing all the homosexual people you believe this passage is addressing, you are going to be dead yourself. These same passages forbid many sexual practices and declare them to be punishable by death. Practices that are very likely accepted and practiced by you. Yes, you.

One example. If a bride was found not to be a virgin before marriage, you simply brought her parents up on charges, as women were seen as property. She was taken to the city gate and stoned… to death.

Now let me ask you, how many homosexual condemning females are out there who have had sex before marriage? How many homosexual condemning husbands are out there whose wives were not virgins at marriage?

Need I say more.

If you are looking for a condemnation of homosexuality, you are going to have to belly up to a different bar.

Drink it in, Leviticus Lager of 18:12.

A condemnation of homosexuality? It’s just not there.

Bottle Three : Romans Imperial Stout

1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. 21 For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. 22 Professing to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. 24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. 25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. 28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, 29 being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; 32 and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

Now even if you just skimmed this passage, it’s obvious that within these verses is contained a long list of problems. Yet, many Christians, when they think of Romans 1, conveniently dismiss issues like gossip or slander, or any of the other many behaviors listed. Rather, this passage has become the biggest clobber text of those who desire to condemn one thing and one thing alone… homosexuality as a sin.

Yet ironically, Paul does not even begin to indicate the issue of homosexual orientation or homosexuality. We know from history that Paul didn’t have any sense or knowledge of the idea and reality of homosexual orientation.

In fact, if you know any gay people, you know that as early as they can remember, they didn’t choose their homosexuality. With tears running down their eyes, they beg to be understood, “Why would I ever choose this, in such a hateful world, why would I ever want to be gay?”

Some committing suicide, others dealing with severe depression. The hell that we have brought upon so many with this passage (and others) from Scripture is disgusting at best.

Folks, homosexuality isn’t an issue, it’s not a debate, it’s people. Living, breathing people. Beautifully and wonderfully made… gay. No choice, no sin, no different than the color of your skin.

Paul had no reference for homosexuality, for homosexual orientation, or for romantic love between two people of the same sex. None.

In fact, it was Paul, in a pre-scientific world, that reported he had an experience where he went up into the “third heaven.” Yet, we know now, that reality does not exist. Paul however didn’t, because he had no reference for that. It was a different day, in a different time.

Paul once acknowledged…

“From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way.” 2 Corinthians 5:16

Paul is admitting that he not only once understood Christ incorrectly, he confesses that he also misunderstood humanity. Am I making a case to discredit Paul? No, but rather showing that contextually, this was a much different time with a much different window to the world.

What Paul is doing in this Romans text is simple. He is condemning those with a heterosexual orientation, which came “naturally” to them, who were acting in homosexual ways.

The text says plainly and clearly, they “exchanged, gave up.” You can’t exchange or give up what you don’t already have… heterosexuality. Their set, disposed, natural orientation… they exchanged that for homosexual acts. They went beyond their heterosexuality, out of power, hate, anger, or lust and acted homosexually.

Paul new nothing of people who for them, “leaving” would mean leaving their natural homosexual attraction to exchange it for heterosexual attraction.

I don’t know about you, but I have many gay friends.

Some have asked, “Chris, when did you decide to be heterosexual?” “How would you like me to read you Romans 1 and then ask you to exchange your heterosexuality for homosexuality?” “Go over Chris and hold that man’s hand and kiss his lips. Do it, turn the switch, flip it over. And if you can’t, you are the evil, God hater of which this passage is speaking.”

In fact, in 1 Corinthians 11, Paul, using the same term “unnatural,” said it was unnatural for a woman to cut her hair and pray without a head covering, and for a man to have long hair. He said it was “unnatural,” the same term he used in Romans 1.

Yet, apparently we are very approving of those things now.

Paul later said it was “unnatural” that the Gentiles be included in the church. Really? You know who the Gentiles are, don’t you? You and me.

With new information, revelation, and experience, Paul realized on several occasions, in regards to some very important spiritual matters, he was wrong. Flat out, wrong.

But even if you still believe somehow Paul is condemning homosexuality, you better keep reading.

For the point of Romans 1 was to describe the evils of a Roman world. Even calling out an unspoken referencing to people like Gaius Caligula who, along with others, practiced most everything on the list of evils in the text. Additionally, making a reference to the Levitical list Paul’s Jewish audience would have known.

Yet, the Romans 1 passage goes on, referring the reader back to this long list of atrocities…

“Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.” Romans 2:1-2

Yes, you read it correctly. By our judging of anyone whom we think is on that list, we are actually practicing those very same things. That, my friends, is what you become.

Don’t you just hate it when the Bible gets in the way of our self-righteous, condemnation.

In fact, there is a real sense that when we ask gay people to leave their natural homosexuality and exchange it for heterosexuality, we are admonishing them to do the very “unnatural” thing this passage declares as evil and terrible.

Take a moment, and drink all that in.

Bottle Four : Corinthians Chocolate Porter

“Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals.” -1 Corinthians 6:8

Bottle Five : Saint Timothy IPA

“9 realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers 10 and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, 11 according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted.” -1Timothy 1:9-11

The words here in both passages (above) that have been translated as “homosexual’ is the Greek word “arsenokoites.”

This is a hard word to translate to say the least. So difficult, that overtime the treatment of this word has moved from translation to interpretation.

In fact, this word “arsenokoites” is so complicated that before 1946, no Bible translation had ever translated this word to read “homosexual.” I’ll give you a second to try pick up your jaw.

Before 1946, the word “homosexual” was not even in the Bible. No place, no where.

Only starting in the mid-20th century, several translations of 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10 were changed to read “homosexuals” will not “inherit the kingdom of God.”

A clear move from a translation to an interpretation.

In fact, the word “homosexual” wasn’t even an actual word until the middle 1800’s.

The word “arsenokoites,” many new testament scholars agree, is rarely used even in secular writings, and does not refer to homosexuality, nor even homosexual activity.

Martin Luther, the Church reformer, translated these same passages to mean “boy abusers.” He understood “arsenokoites” as a reference to pedophilia.

In fact, before 1945, nearly every bible translation interpreted “arsenokoites” as something to do with prostitution, pedophilia, and the like.

Even the KJV did not translate “arsenokoites” as homosexuality, but rather in terms of elite, oversexed men abusing themselves with boys, girls, or animals. It was a practice widely accepted by rulers and ruling men of the day.

Therefore, through the use of these two passages, Paul is bringing a strong condemnation on primarily elite men, who had never been confronted before, for leaving what is natural to them and sexually abusing just about anything they could find. Primarily, pedophilia.

And let me tell you, there is a big difference between pedophilia and homosexuality.

If you knew the kind of sexual practices that were going on during Paul’s time in the Greco Roman world, it was disgusting. Old, perverted men were treating boys like pigs.

The people of this day didn’t have a heterosexual, homosexual perspective. It wasn’t them over here, and those over there. No, they had a heterosexual context where people exchanged that orientation and used acts of homosexuality to overpower with domination, humiliation, slavery, rape, and temple prostitution.

We should all praise God for condemning those deplorable acts, but we have today with homosexuality, is completely and utterly not the same.

And because of this, in recent years, many New Testament scholars have been pushing back against these translations. All because this word “arsenokoites” being translated to mean “homosexual” isn’t a translation, it’s a blatant, biased interpretation.

Drink it in…

Same-sex relationships, based on orientation, between equal-status partners weren’t on the radar screen at all. Neither the word “homosexual” nor the concept it represents existed when the Bible was written.

It is high time we recognize, like Paul and others were willing to do so, we got it wrong.

“My people are being destroyed from a lack of knowledge.” Hosea 4:6

Drink it in, drink it all in…

Sodom and Gomorrah Summer Ale

Leviticus Lager of 18:22 (20:13)

Romans Imperial Stout

Corinthians Chocolate Porter

Saint Timothy IPA

…a six pack of biblical, gay affirmation.

Stay thirsty my friends.

Stay thirsty.

Don’t Homophobe Me, If You Don’t Know Me

December 1, 2015 / ckratzer / 0 Comments

Since becoming a defender, advocate, and voice for the LGBT community, I have been the toilet in which many have squatted their negative feedback. There is nothing like a good online, comment-section spanking. Or, walking through a local store only to bump into the disapproving glares of those who were once friends.

Yet, my experience, just four months into this gay-affirming, homosexual-loving journey as a pastor, dwarfs in comparison to what the LGBT community endures every moment of every day.

Sadly, the emotional, spiritual, and even physical carnage caused to supporters and members of the homosexual community is almost exclusively generated by Christians. Go figure.

Even more disturbing is the glaring reality that Christians who take a condemning posture against homosexuals and homosexuality, often have little to no personal, relational connection with people in this demographic. They harbor great energy and willingness to condemn homosexuality intellectually and biblically, but distance themselves from any personal interaction of meaning and journey with homosexual people. Keeping everything in the comfortable and familiar confines of debate land.

This is a deeply troubling reality. Ideas, creeds, perspectives, and alike are all very important. Yet, in my experience, debate is primarily used by those who simply want to assert opinions and convince themselves they have position over another. It is the mind games of small minds. Loaded with information, lacking in transformation. Debate is an effective way of dealing with the issues without the issues dealing with you.

Nowhere is this more evident than with homosexuality. Hiding behind laptop screens. Endless circular arguments. Statistics, studies, and biblical texts, keeping the heart at a comfortable, sterile distance. Church committee task forces, Sunday sermons bent on defending long-held positions. All requiring little to no soul process, faith, and receptivity to the Spirit. As Jesus admonished, one can diligently search the scriptures, debate issues of the mind, defend human, hermeneutic tradition and completely miss the heart of Christ at same time.

Perhaps that’s the whole idea. Heaven forbid Jesus gets in the way of our ignorance, bigotry and misguided theologies.

In fact, I’ve come to a place in my own ministry where with some people who want to criticize and debate me in regards to homosexuality, I enforce what I call “The Rule of Six.” Before I am willing to take one step further in debating the mere six bible passages relating to homosexuality, I suggest the person first develop genuine, meaningful relationships with six homosexual people. There’s a revolutionary concept. As those relationships emerge, there is a much better chance we can come back to the biblical texts with an open mind and heart, ready to consider afresh the Spirit of God on this matter. No, it’s not a hard and fast rule, but the idea is extremely important.

Until you have a truly genuine, open-hearted relational connection to homosexual people, you disqualify yourself from the debate, and from a position of criticism and condemnation of gay people and their supporters.

Don’t homophobe me if you don’t know me.

Have you taken the journey of a homosexual? No.

Have you taken the journey of a person who has become a gay-affirming, homosexual loving pastor? No.

Have you truly immersed your heart into the stories and experiences of people who are homosexual? Probably not.

Have you thoroughly studied out the issue of homosexuality, openly listening to voices that speak directly against your anti-gay stance and biblical interpretations? Probably not.

Chances are, you don’t know homosexuals, you don’t me, and you really don’t know this issue. You may know of them, you may know of me, you may know of this issue. But you do not know, because you do not know.

The longest distance between two points is a shortcut. And try as we may, there are no shortcuts with homosexuality.

The truth is, it’s only when we humbly connect with homosexuals and homosexuality at a personal level that minds begin to change from the heart outward. Only then, do we become willing to rethink long-held thoughts. Only then, do we start looking for ways to affirm instead of ways to condemn. Only then, will what we see and hear in front of us, through the stories and journeys of living, breathing gay people, show itself to be nothing like our spoon-fed biblical view of homosexuality.

I know, you can’t wait to write in the comment section below that it’s not necessary to look at other vantage points, nor engage in meaningful relationships with homosexual people for you to know God’s heart on the matter. It’s all so clear to you, and such things are below you.

Maybe you should pump the brakes a bit, because that’s what Paul, the biblical writer thought. In the limited landscape of his perspective and experience, at one point, he had determined that it was “unnatural” for the Gentiles to be included in the Kingdom. However, upon further information and personal experience, he later determined otherwise. Completely changing his view. He realized, he was wrong. Thank God, because guess what? We’re the Gentiles.

See, it’s easy to take shots at people we aren’t willing to sit down with. Condemn things we don’t fully understand, and reject that which challenges the very foundations of our spirituality, humanity, and theology.

There are a lot of string attached and a lot at stake. The costs of being a gay-affirming, homosexual loving person can be great.

Yet, at the end of the day, at least have the integrity to study the issue out, going far beyond the intellectual all the way to seeing through the eyes and heart of homosexual people and the LGBT community.

I double-dog dare you. Walk a mile or two in their shoes. Open your soul, humble your mind, build some relationships for crying out loud. Then, and only then, wherever you land at any given point, you do so from a genuine, humble journey of listening, relating, considering, and experiencing the issues as openly and fully as possible. Heart to heart, hand to hand.

Until then, don’t homophobe me if you don’t know me.

Not me, not my gay friends, not the gay community.

If You Really Were “Unashamed”

October 9, 2015 / ckratzer / 2 Comments

Rallying kids to bring their Bibles to school, Facebook status pictures declaring “I’m a Christian,” Sharpie pens used to write “I am unashamed” on a hand or two. Really, this is the best idea we can come up with to present Jesus to our planet?

I know, you feel attacked as a “conservative” Christian, believing there is a growing “war” against your flavor of faith. You fear you aren’t getting your “way” in American culture, and in your mind, it’s all going to straight to hell… homosexuality, gun control, religious discrimination, loss of “family” values, and on and on. Shoot, old episodes of “Leave it Beaver” are even hard to find these days. Stop the madness.

And then, your freedoms. As if somehow they are under vicious attack as well. Last time I checked, you can still pray, worship, study, and do everything Jesus exampled. No, not where separation of Church and State applies. It’s been that way for how long now? But evidently, that’s not good enough as you conclude your leverage and influence is slipping. Truth be told, the rules have long been bent on the side of extending Christian favor in American society. That things are perhaps leveling a bit is truly nothing to get your panties in a wad. In fact, it presents great opportunity, maybe not for your religiosity, but for Jesus. Besides, worst case scenario, don’t we believe in the God who holds all the stars in His hands? What posture of fear or angst could we ever take if we were truly “unashamed?”

Do you really want to represent Jesus like that spoiled kid in the sandbox who always has to get his way, whines when he doesn’t, and pushes people around? Do you think we Christians getting together and standing sideways against the world as we declare our “unashamed” Christian allegiance, is making any impact at all? Congratulations, you are “a Christian.” We get it. Your Facebook status, twitter tags, t-shirts, and body art declare it. Applause, applause, you got your kids to carry a Bible to school. Wow, you are so faithful and uber-devoted. Your “Braveheart” battle field defense of team-Christian has even Mel Gibson taking notes.

Though it may look and feel all Jesus-serving to you with high-fives and spiritual pats on the bottom from your church-peeps, the rest of us aren’t fooled at all. Nope, we’re actually repulsed. And quite honestly, we are ashamed, not of the Gospel, but of your religious, elitist, pretentious, “I am… unashamed, a Christian…look at my Bible… blah, blah, blah…” stand against the world and all that you deem wrong, offensive, or unfair. Your version of Jesus and His Gospel has become so “spit it out of my mouth” worthy. I’m struggling for words right now to describe the taste on my tongue, so how does “crap” sound to you? Defensive, self-serving, arrogant, religious.

If you really were “unashamed” of the Gospel…

Your outward obedience and spiritual show would be flat out nothing to you, and the spotlighting of Jesus’s obedience, the complete sufficiency of His Grace, and the beauty of His perfect love would be everything.

You’d be licking your chops for opportunities to declare to the world, “we are unashamed of you.” Writing it on the hearts of every kind of person of every kind of lifestyle, skin color, creed, status, morality, nationality, or background. Not resting until all are aware, and never forget the Father’s true heart for them.

You’d care less if the world is accommodating your Christian agenda and values, giving them fair play and perpetuation. Simply serving people, unconditionally without conditions would be opportunity overflowing.

You wouldn’t be so cocked and loaded to defend Christianity, rallying the troops to demonstrate your resolve. To simply be Jesus to your neighbor, defending the poor, the marginalized, and the ones so confidently deemed to be sinning. That would be your cross.

You’d be far less interested in appearances, people knowing you are a Christian and a devoted player on the team. That people would see Jesus, His ardent delight in them that compels His eternal smile and forever embrace. That would be heaven to you.

Things like “bring a Bible to school” would be so less attractive to you, and show itself to be ridiculously self serving and lame, while washing the feet of those you least like and who are least like you would become so compelling.

If you really were “unashamed” of the Gospel…

You’d be brave with Grace, believing it all the way, daring to live it… all the way.

You’d be reading the world, the Scriptures, and the issues of our day through the lens of Jesus.

Jesus who is Grace, and Grace which is the Gospel.

But perhaps there in lies the crux of the matter… maybe it’s more like you are “unashamed” of club-Christianity, but Grace is another story.

Grace disturbs you, it shakes your foundations, it levels the playing field, and renders all your religious posturing and precepts as gonging, clanging cymbals… out of beat. A Grace that strips all the religious playing cards out of your hands and in return gives you plowshares. But you want to point fingers, not plow. You want to proclaim your faithfulness, not plow. You want to protect your agenda, not plow. You want to promote your ideology, not plow. You want to perpetuate your brand, your team, your institution, not plow. And then you wonder why so many don’t respond to your religious, Christian whistle blows, follow your cadence, or stay committed to marching in your band.

The more you religiously declare “I am unashamed” the more you in fact show yourself to be “ashamed,” not of your religious allegiance, but of a Grace that renders your allegiance as filthy rags, and admonishes you to serve rather than be served, love rather than label, and accept rather than condemn.

You see the house of cards your conservatism has built falling to the ground, one scriptural contextualization, one church statistic, one condemning, bible thumping Christian at a time. And so your best idea is to dig your religious heels in the ground, do something that looks and feels spiritual to show the world, you still mean business, and your God isn’t dead. All while, refusing the cure… Grace.

At best, your freedom to be religious has been challenged here and there, but not your freedom to be Jesus, if it’s Jesus you are truly “unashamed”… to be.

Get Off My Back and Open your Ears, You Bible Thumping Jerk Weed

September 12, 2015 / ckratzer / 5 Comments

Ain’t going to lie, I have grown so tired of people getting all up in their Bibles in order to get all up in my face.

Pushers and pimps of their packaged prescriptions on what “the Bible says.” Facebook pics with font abusing, clever little sayings touting their position on what they are against, fresh off the leather-bound, name engraved, coffee table press. For Christ’s sake, clip art and sun ray scenes are so 80’s. Enough already, people. Enough.

Rubber hammer them in the knee cap with a theological thought outside the black and white… and bam… there goes another knee jerk, Christian shoe up in your crotch. Their Apollo 13 wired spiritual capacitors can’t compute, overrun with revelation that doesn’t fit their denominationally predefined algorithms. Brain sparks fly, neck veins flare, alarms sound, “Houston, we have a problem.”

Yes, we do have a problem, damn straight we do, starting with the fact that exhibit “a,” the Bible doesn’t “say” jack squat. Hello, hello, is this microphone on? I think I recall Jesus saying repeatedly regarding the “Bible” of His time, “You have heard it was said, but I say unto you.” Notice, He doesn’t declare,”it” said, he says, you “heard” it was said.

Why? Because the Bible doesn’t “say,” … it reads. The mistake being made (the only mistake being made) Jesus pointed out to those gathered, was in their hearing. Oh snap, I hate it when Jesus rounds third base.

So let’s get real Christian. In fact, here’s an example.

Throughout the New Testament, new experiences with people are the driving force that led key Christians to ask the question, “have I read this right?” No, it’s not some scholarly, exegetical orgy of dissecting a text that leads to the reexamination of a life issue, but rather new experiences with life, relationships, and flesh and blood that lead people like Peter and Paul to deep, theology altering questions of understanding regarding “what the Bible says.”

It was a sad state of affairs that the Jews, who experienced Pentecost and were the first Christians, did not believe the Gentiles could even receive the Gospel. Talk about inclusion issues. In fact, the growth of the first church was exclusively of Jewish people. So much that Peter had to have an experience with God where He was led to begin to reevaluate his reading of a Biblical text about clean and unclean foods, a metaphoric communication of deeper issues regarding Jews and Gentiles that was about to play out.

Enter Cornelius.

Cornelius, a Gentile, was led to Peter because of his rumored spiritual experiences. Peter could not begin to fathom, it was so way beyond his window of perspective, that Cornelius could experience God. But once their bumpers were in the same parking lot, face to face, relationship to relationship, Peter was blown away by Cornelius’ receptiveness and spiritually capacity. After picking his jaw up off the ground, Peter, going against his original reading of the Biblical text, shared the Gospel and “boom, there it is,” new life for Cornelius.

Let’s just make sure you are getting the picture here, until that experience, Peter adamantly believed, along with the Jews, because of the way they “read” the scriptures, that the Gentiles had no access to Jesus and the Gospel, and even withheld the waters of Baptism because so.

Oh and by the way, the Gentiles, comprised of like 99% of the rest of the world. Yes, the Gentiles are you and me. Thankfully, Peter, Paul, and others, had the kahunas to ask the question, based on new experiences, “have we read this right?”

Truth be told, the more time spent on your high horse riding people like mules, using the Bible to try to kick and whip them onto your agenda… the more your ears are closed, your heart is hardened and life experiences lose their Spirit-led capacity to hold you over the text, demanding you ask one of most important questions… “have I read this right?”

So, get off my back (and everybody else’s) and open your ears. Cause right now, you got “jerk weed” written all over your forehead. Your ignorance is making a circus out of this Christian thing and missing the heart and the spirit of Jesus and His Gospel. Come down from your pride, get outside your “church world” fence, and actually sit at the table of the people you hate, and the issues they harbor that you are so against.

Maybe then, you can hear the megaphone of Jesus trying to break in and penetrate over the noise of your evangelical earphones… “you have heard it was said, but I say unto you.

Jesus loves Tattoos

May 10, 2014 / ckratzer / 1 Comment

Christians who harbor a religious, legalistic spirit love to tout what they are “against” in the world. I am sure some are well intentioned and simply want to be faithful, yet many live their lives examining the lives of others to see where they line up or don’t line up to their understanding of the Bible.

One such area some Christians stand against is the issue of tattoos.

It’s interesting to me that most of the bible passages people use to bash other people with for doing something they don’t agree with are often taken out of context. As the saying goes, “if you take the text out of the context, you will make a con out of the text.”

If you take a passage from the Bible out of context or don’t see how certain words have been translated over the course of time in interpretive ways, you can make the Bible basically say just about anything.

So let’s take a look at the one passage in the Bible that some believe deals with the issue of “tattoos” today.

Leviticus 19:23-28 “When you enter the land and plant fruit trees, leave the fruit unharvested for the first three years and consider it forbidden. Do not eat it. 24 In the fourth year the entire crop must be consecrated to the Lord as a celebration of praise. 25 Finally, in the fifth year you may eat the fruit. If you follow this pattern, your harvest will increase. I am the Lord your God. 26 “Do not eat meat that has not been drained of its blood. “Do not practice fortune-telling or witchcraft. 27 “Do not trim off the hair on your temples or trim your beards. 28 “Do not cut your bodies for the dead, and do not mark your skin with tattoos. I am the Lord.

Seems pretty straight forward right? “…do not mark your skin with tattoos.” Not when we come to understand that though all the Bible is written for us, not all of the Bible is written to us. Furthermore, to assume that what was meant by a term in its Biblical/historical context is what it should mean for us today is a very dangerous interpretive tactic.

Thus, the importance of context. This passage in Leviticus, including the surrounding verses, is specifically addressing the pagan religious practices of the people living around the Israelites. The focus here is prohibiting cultic worship and witchcraft. God does not want them engaged in the same religious practices that could lead them away from trusting Him as the One true God.

Furthermore, check out verses 26-27, “Do not eat meat that has not been drained of its blood. Do not trim off the hair on your temples or trim your beards.” Obviously many Christians today eat meats and don’t groom like Sasquatch and in doing so are not participating in cultic worship and witchcraft. In the context of Leviticus 19, these customs were associated with pagan rites and rituals. Today they are obviously not.

Tattoos of today are dramatically different than they were for those of Leviticus 19 in purpose, meaning, and practice. Today, tattoos are an artistic means of self expression and bodily ornamentation. It would be nearly impossible to find a Christian today who doesn’t modify their appearance for beauty or expression in many ways such as fashion, makeup, plastic surgery, haircutting, coloring, tanning, weight loss, body-building, piercings etc. Many of these practices were associated with false religions in Old Testament times, but in our context today, they do not create nor symbolize an automatic connection with evil or pagan religion. The context today is entirely different for us and for God. Tattoos today do not link the wearer to cultic worship practices as they did in the context of the Israelites of Leviticus 19.

Yet another reason to believe all people, including Christians, are free to tattoo their bodies is that New Testament believers are not bound by the Old Testament ritualistic and purification laws in order to establish and maintain a relationship with God. If we were, we would also be shackled to rules that would restrict shellfish, pork, hairstyles, certain fabric combinations, and even eating cheese.

Some people feel that changing the body somehow defiles God’s creation. So, does piercing ears, correcting a physical abnormality, cutting hair, clipping our nails, getting a tan or using an orthodontist also defile God’s creation?

The fact that some Christians avoid getting a tattoo and project their belief about tattoos onto others because they are trying to impress God, maintain their relationship or good standing with Him, bolster their spiritual pride, or want to condemn or judge others is all the more reason why Jesus in fact loves tattoos. Religiously and legalistically spirited Christians love to try to find biblical perches from which they can stand over and against people. Fortunately, Jesus is the ultimate perch destroyer as He levels the playing field by making faith and the Christian life about His performance, not ours; His righteousness, not our religious rule-keeping. Jesus especially love tattoos because now they represent the freedom He purchased for all people to live under Grace, not Law; His righteousness, not rule-keeping.

Getting a tattoo certainly isn’t for everybody, and anyone can use a tattoo to communicate things that are not good nor of God. But tattoos in and of themselves are not evil nor unfaithful.

The refusal to get a tattoo for so called “Christian” reasons should be seriously examined for underlying spiritual pride, idolatry of religious performance, and legalism. The avoidance of getting a tattoo because “I want to be a faithful Christian” may just be a matter of Biblical misunderstanding or could very well be a spiritual veil to a life devoid of Grace.

Dispelling Fears about Truly Loving Homosexuals

April 3, 2014 / ckratzer / 4 Comments

I hate being put into any one camp as a Christian, but I consider myself (for conversation’s sake) to be a conservative Christian. I greatly value the Bible, and consider it to be God’s Word. I take sin seriously and desire to be a person of Truth.

For me Grace and Truth are not two separate things, like Grace is the nice side of The Gospel and Truth is where we get to point out people’s sins and stuff. Grace and Truth are not a reference to separate things or two aspects of one thing, there are a reference to one person, Jesus.

That might help to explain why this whole “lifting out” and “above” of the homosexual issue is both disheartening and disturbing to me as a Christian. The more I read, the more barbaric conversations I see and hear between Christians about homosexuality, the more I sense that the controversy among Christians surrounding homosexuality is much more driven by fear than by most anything else. Why else would one sin (for those who believe it is a sin) be given so much more blatant attention and bias than all the others?

I think we need to start with the common ground that we all as Christians love Jesus, want to be faithful, and don’t want to be a hinderance, but rather a help to the cause of Christ. I have a hard time thinking of too many Christians I know who don’t have these intentions in their core. Perhaps there are some, but few and far between.

Beyond that common ground, there are a host of issues that have come to the conversation table that have resulted in a wide variety of differing views about homosexuality. Many of them, I suspect, are motivated by fear, particularly among many evangelicals.

It’s interesting to me that the bible doesn’t call us to tolerate people who sin differently than we do, but to love them. If Jesus merely had lifted a standard of “tolerating” as our template, sadly much of the Christian community still wouldn’t get a clean pass, as we can’t even act “tolerating” to homosexuals in our churches and Christian organizations . But the standard is even greater, it’s love, not tolerance. Love doesn’t erase people, look away, simply tolerate their existence, treat another’s sin as more sinful than theirs, or judge, condemn, or send to the curb as second class citizens or no citizen at all. This is not love.

For many, they are truly afraid of truly loving homosexuals. Why?

Let me identify and help dissolve some of the fears behind an unwillingess to truly love homosexuals, or even just tolerate them.

Fear 1: If we truly love homosexuals, we won’t be faithful in defending what the Bible says about homosexuality.

Let me put your heart and mind at ease, or make you really angry… your choice. The truth is, no one truly defends what the Bible truly says, they defend what they believe the Bible says. It’s not the authority of scripture that they are truly defending, it’s the authority of their beliefs about what scripture says that they are ardently trying to defend. Need proof?

Lets just take an issue far more major, essential, and important than homosexuality… like “salvation.”

There are large evangelical, biblical, scholarly people who believe that salvation is a gift from God given to all people received by personal faith in Christ. According to their beliefs, God loves everyone, wants everyone saved, and provides the way through Jesus for them to be saved, through faith. Anyone can believe and receive this gift of salvation. This group can line up many bible passages that they claim to be authoritative proof that their belief is right and faithful to God’s Word.

But did you know there is also an equally large group of evangelical, biblical, scholarly people who believe that salvation is a gift from God given to some people and not to others as He predestines some to enjoy heaven and some to burn in hell, giving people no choice in the matter whatsoever. In fact, according to their beliefs (including popular pastors like Francis Chan, Mark Driscoll, David Platt etc.) even people who want nothing to do with God, God regenerates and makes them unwillingly believe in Jesus through “irresistible grace” so that they go to heaven, but God withholds doing this for others, and thus, they sadly go to hell. They too, line up their bible passages they claim to be authoritative proof that their belief is right and faithful to God’s Word.

Obviously, using the very same Bible, these two large groups who each claim to be biblical, conservative, evangelical, authority-of-scripture loving Christians have come to two very, very different conclusions about the central foundational issue of Christian salvation. In fact, each group often declares the opposing group as not submitting to the authority of God’s Word and faithful interpretation. They both claim that what they believe is what the Bible “plainly teaches,” that theirs is the absolute truth of God’s Word, and that they are the true guardians of the authority of God’s Word.

This is just one example of so many examples of how Christians who claim to be bible-authority loving, evangelical, and faithful have come to very different conclusion/beliefs about what the very same bible says or doesn’t say on essential and non-essential issues. Who truly can claim they have got it right and are in sync with the authority of the Bible? Obviously, both can’t be right and true to God’s Word?

Now we arrive at homosexuality. An issue that many Christians would say is a slam dunk, cut and dry issue. Surely, we Christians, who easily can get the whole issue of salvation right (lots of sarcasm intended) have the inside scoop to what the Bible truly means about this issue. You can see in how we have handled the central issue of salvation so well that certainly, we can handle the simple “pop fly ball” of homosexuality (more sarcasm). Besides, we are the authorities of the authority of the Bible, can’t you tell by how many denominations with entirely different beliefs we have? Trust us, we know what we are talking about and know the plain truth about what the Bible teaches, especially about homosexuality.

The truth is, as with the issue of salvation, there are biblical, scholarly, Jesus-loving, conservative people whose views and understanding about what the Bible truly says about homosexuality are greatly differing. Each brings their Bible, passages, word studies and lexicons to the table and having read the same Bible conclude very different understandings, each one claiming they are the authority on the authority of the Bible and what they believe is the plain and faithful teaching of God’s Word.

I am not going to get into that debate only to say that there is one, and both sides feel just as biblical, scholarly, faithful, and Jesus-loving as the other.

My point is this, if you refrain from truly loving homosexuals, letting them in you church, sitting besides them in a small group, hiring them in your company, or allowing them involvement in your ministry because you fear in doing such things you are not defending what the Bible says about homosexuality, what you are truly deliberating over is not what the Bible truly says, but what you believe at that moment the Bible says.

What if you are wrong, what if you got the interpretation wrong and in the meanwhile you isolated, condemned, and marginalized an entire people-group in the process when you shouldn’t have? What if you have made an idol out of your understanding?

Jesus once addressed this type of issue to people who wanted to place their stances on the Word of God over their stance with people.

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life” (John 5:39-40).

I love what Steve McVey says of this passage and issue…

“They had their Bibles in hand and studied them much. In fact, they could quote most of the Old Testament, but Jesus said they simply didn’t get it. While they professed to be focused on living by the teaching of their Bibles, Jesus said they were missing Him.

There are Christians today who talk more about the Bible than they do Jesus. That should be a red flag. The Bible is not an end unto itself. Nor is it a guidebook or a handbook for living. The Bible is a grace book that points us to Jesus Christ. He is the end that we pursue. If we are not led to the person of Christ and to faith in Him, like the Pharisees, we are missing the whole point of the Bible. I realize this viewpoint may be uncomfortable for some people. It may sound to you like I’m minimizing the place of the Bible in our lives, but I certainly hope not. Remember, this is coming from somebody who has spent his life studying, emphasizing, and teaching the Bible! I love the Bible more than I have words to express. But it’s a paradox. As much as I love studying the Bible, and as much as I love teaching it and helping other people discover how great a blessing it is, learning the Bible is not the main thing. As we live in Him and He lives through us, we will approach the Bible in the right way, knowing that Christ is our life source, and the Bible points us to Him.” –McVey, Steve (2011-02-01). 52 Lies Heard in Church Every Sunday (pp. 79-80). Harvest House Publishers. Kindle Edition.

The Bible is important, no doubt, but the truth of the matter is, we should be very careful not to lean on our own understanding to the point we are willing to miss the heart of Jesus for truly loving all people. None of us are truly the authority on what’s authoritative in the Bible. This is what the Pharisees were never willing to do, that is, to come down from their religious pride they would call “faithfulness to God’s Word” and stand with people.

Christians are great at claiming “authority” when they feel their throne lowering and their control slipping away. In contrast, when Jesus used the fullness of the power of authority, he washed people’s feet. When we Christians use authority, we tend to erase and marginalize people and people groups.

This must come to an end if we are going to have a voice that has influence in the world.

Fear 2: If we truly love homosexuals, we will be condoning homosexuality.

Jesus was not afraid to associate Himself with people whose lives were sinful and questionable at best. If you believe all homosexuality is sinful, it may also be that you join those who believe the same and fear that drawing too close and giving them equal respect, involvement, friendship, employment, acceptance, and/or love might mean you are or appear to be condoning homosexuality.

Recently, World Vision, a Christian organization explored this issue by changing their policies to be open to hiring homosexuals in their workplace. Later, after Christian pressure, they changed back to their original policy to not do so. The main issue it seems is that many Christians insisted that to hire homosexuals was to condone sin and a sinful lifestyle. Many would say that homosexuals are not just sinning, but living a lifestyle of choosing sin willingly without any sense of repentance.

Here again, I am not going to get into the issues of whether homosexuality is a sin or not or that people who are homosexual are committing a lifestyle of sin by their rebellious choice.

However, I do wonder if companies like World Vision treat other sins like they treat the believed-to-be-sin of homosexuality when they hire and manage people. Do they check to see if all the fat people they hire are fat for exclusively medical conditions beyond their control rather than being an issue of gluttony? If so, how is that determined? Do they interview and explore every divorced person’s marriage history, determining if the divorce was biblical or not, because many would say that remarriage after an unbiblical divorce is adultery, a sin? If so, who makes this determination?

But let’s take things even a bit further. The truth is, every Christian has an area where they are knowingly sinning and even unrepentive, just like many Christians would declare homosexuals are doing. Yup it’s true! Don’t believe me, read on.

The bible teaches, “If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.” -James 4:17

Many Christians know they should be obeying speed laws, never running red lights, should be tithing 10%, should have constant pure thoughts, should never covet their neighbor’s home, should be completely satisfied with their own looks, giving to the poor, should care for orphans and take care of widows, should not have selfish thoughts, should have faith instead of worry, pray without ceasing, and the list goes on and on and on. There is so much good we ought to be doing that no one could measure up.

Yet, are you repenting (a concept most evangelicals mistakenly believe means to “change your ways”) right now of all the good you ought to do but are not? You aren’t repenting because to do so would take every moment of every day as there is always something good you know you should be doing but you aren’t.

But if you are going to live by the notion that unrepentive, repeated sin is the crossing line that determines whether loving, welcoming, including or hiring a person is condoning their sin or not, than your “not doing the good that you ought to” is not only sin, it’s an unrepentive lifestyle of sin of your free choice that you and every Christian is living right now! You should never be hired, included, accepted or welcomed because you are living in sin, and we can’t condone that!

Btw, I was just wondering, how many times do you commit the same sin before it becomes a lifestyle of sin? 2 times, 5, 1o? Who makes that determination anyways?

Furthermore, if this is the line of believing you are going to take, then every person Jesus interacted with and even those He called as disciples He did so as an act of condoning sin. Peter , for example, had it in his heart the capacity and later the actions of denying Jesus, and Jesus knew that long before it ever even happened. Was Jesus therefore, condoning his sin? He ate and drank with sinful people, was He in doing so condoning their sin? He even called/hired broken, sinful, lifestyle-of-sin type people onto His team, was He therefore condoning sin?

It was only the religiously-spirited Pharisees who would draw this ignorant conclusion of Jesus and condemn Him for doing so. It is the same today.

Imagine if World Vision had taken a stance like this… We want to hire every qualified homosexual person we can find, not because we agree with everything about them or their lifestyle, but we would rather have them around the influence, safety, and care of the people of Jesus than the world. We believe we can do a better job of loving them and coming along side them as we all grow in Grace than anyone else. And what better way than to work side by side together, doing life. We want them to be exposed to the life of Christ in us (if they aren’t already) and the Holy Spirit around us that they might have every opportunity to consider the claims of Christ and their true identity and life in Him. We will let the Holy Spirit be our judge and jury and us their friend and coworker. We will trust the Holy Spirit with any change that needs to take place in any of our lives, and to protect our reputation and character as an organization. We do not see their employment as a threat to the integrity of the Gospel nor our Christian organization, but a result of it.

In fact, I would suggest that companies, churches, and organizations that withhold the full Grace of the Gospel, or communicate any hint of the Law to homosexuals through not welcoming, including, valuing, respecting, hiring, or empowering them is doing far more to condone their sin (if that is what you believe) than by bringing them into the arms of your love. The Bible clearly teaches that it is the Law that entices us to sin, not Grace. Giving Grace and acceptance does not condone sin, it is in fact the only Gospel chance, through the Holy Spirit, for true change to occur. It is God’s kindness that leads to a change of mind (what repentance really means).

If you are truly afraid of condoning sin, then welcome, love, respect, hire, befriend and involve homosexuals in your life, ministry, or organization. To not do so condones far more sin. Trust God with your reputation, and Grace to manage and influence people… Jesus did.

Fear 3: If we truly love homosexuals, we won’t be taking sin seriously.

Sin is serious, there is no question about that. But, how we go about taking sin seriously is even more critical.

The truth is, Grace and Grace alone is the solution to sin. Jesus was and is the solution for all sin, and He is Grace. Grace is not a new theology, program, or fad, He is a person, Jesus.

We are not the solution to sin. The Law shows us we can never solve the problem of sin by any effort or aspect of our lives and living. Alone, we are powerless against sin. Jesus alone, is the only power to overcome it. God took sin so seriously that He dealt with it completely and eternally through Jesus knowing we are powerless against it. When we harbor any level of belief that any aspect of our performance can resolve issues of sin in ourselves or others we are in fact not taking sin seriously, but rather minimizing the seriousness of sin down to a level of human ability to resolve.

The Bible shows us that the more we focus on sin, the more we will sin. Yet, the more we focus on Jesus, the more we will understand our true nature and identity in Him and therefore live victorious lives.The best way to take sin seriously is to take the finished work of the cross seriously. Taking sin seriously means to stop focusing on sin and place your focus on Christ and what He has done for you and to you. And not just you, but everyone.

As Christians, taking sin seriously means doing everything we can to help people experience the Grace of God through Jesus Christ, the only solution. As Christians, our identity is secure in Him, and His Grace is what promises to carry out the good work in us. Taking sin seriously means trusting Grace completely. We should never fear sin or sinful people in such a way as to keep us from befriending, hiring, welcoming, or involving homosexuals (if you believe homosexuality is a sin). In fact, what we should fear is not taking sin seriously enough to manifest the remedy to sin, the Grace of Jesus Christ and the companionship, friendship, and fellowship of His people whether in the context of a church, organization, or a company. We in fact minimize the power of sin and compromise the Gospel when we think that we can marginalize certain sinful people in the work place, a Christian organization, or the church and yet consider them our mission, as if keeping them at arms length, compartmentalizing them, and hoping they get our message from a distance is the best strategy for the Gospel. Do we truly trust Grace to be the remedy for sin or would we rather have people working, living, involved, and empowered by the world as if the world were a better place for people to work out this sin issue in their lives? Is sin serious enough to us to manifest what Jesus has done about it and our trust of the power of the Gospel in us and through us enough to walk along side of it without fear of contamination or reputation? If you truly believe Christ lives in you and as you in this world, contamination and reputation are much more likely to become an excuse than a real concern.

Now more than ever, preaching the Gospel means being the Gospel. You can’t be the Gospel through mere words, you can only be the Gospel of Grace through being, walking, befriending, and doing life with people. Just like Jesus did. If the mere message was enough, Jesus would have merely passed out teaching tapes. The Gospel was never intended to merely be a speech, but to be a stance with people. And not just select people, but broken, hurting, confused, difficult, dirty people who sin differently than you.

When God manifested the reality of His taking of sin seriously, it resulted in the serving of people infected with the very thing He detested by coming out of heaven and walking, hiring, befriending, involving, empowering, and ultimately dying for them.

Taking sin seriously is not in what you are willing to disapprove and disassociate from, but who you are willing to be the Gospel of God’s Grace with in life, work, church, and friendship.

Fear 4: If we truly love homosexuals, we might start attracting too many gays.

Yes, I have heard pastors, ministry leaders, and Christians vomit this kind of sentiment, “what if we start attracting too many gays?”

Really? I am sure before Jesus left heaven to be born on earth, God’s last words to Him were something like, “Hey Jesus, Son, old pal. Whatever you do, make sure you don’t attract to many sinners, I have no clue what to if that happens, it would be a huge mess.”

I suppose I can understand the anxiety, sorta. Ministries, churches, Christians, and Christian organization are under a lot of pressure. Unfortunately, mainly from other Christians. We Christians are experts and flogging each other, with a little bit of salt in our hands to rub on afterwards . So, I can understand the anxiety, but I don’t necessarily agree with bowing to it.

It’s amazing to me how ill-equipped many Christians, ministries and churches feel in ministering to people whose sin (if you believe homosexuality is a sin) is not only different from theirs, but believe its presence automatically threatens their reputation and integrity. Sure, some are more than willing to allow homosexuals into a worship service, event, gathering, or to have a doughnut together at the church cafe’, but the idea of including them as valued parts of your organization or ministry sends many into a tailspin of fear.

Why? Because of several of the fears already addressed previously in this article. For many churches and ministries, they see themselves more as an institution to be maintained rather than a mission to be extended, and at the end of the day, preserving their institution is more important than standing true to their mission. They are willing to be misunderstood and rejected by the people they are supposed to reach in the process of making sure they are understood and accepted by the people they wish to keep… Christians, Christian donors, Christian supporters.

What are we going to do with the homosexual visitor who wants to become a member? What do we do with the homosexual member who wants to volunteer? What do we do with the homosexual volunteer who feels called to lead? Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

Here’s what many do, we welcome them enough to feel good about ourselves, but politely (or not so politely) keep them at a distance so that they don’t threaten the other ways we want to keep on feeling good about ourselves… you got is, church politics, christian politics, ministry politics, denominational politics etc.

There are legitimate concerns about involving people into areas of volunteering, employment, and leadership. We must be discerning and wise. But anyone can have an agenda, selfish motive, lack of character, illegal background etc. Is homosexuality in and of itself an automatic disqualification from being volunteer, employment, or leadership material? On what grounds? Sin? Willing sin?

Yes, we Christians with our churches, organizations, and ministries want to have our cake and eat it too. We want to say homosexuals are a part of our mission (if you believe they need to be seen as a mission in the first place) but not have to deal with the unfortunate mess integrating them into the life of your church, ministry or company would entail in our Christian culture today.

Unless of course, they clean up and repent of their ways, then they are one of us! If they join us on the evil, spiritual seductive treadmill of self-improvement where God does His part and we do our part, then they are one of us! If they hate themselves but not knowing exactly why like we do, then they are one of us! If they join our hypocritical plight and become inspired by message after message of the things they need to do and not do to be a better Christian and act like they are actually making any progress when they really aren’t, then they are one of us! If they reject their sexual orientation and claim it’s all a choice like we believe it is, than they are one of us. By the way, I was just wondering, if you are a heterosexual, when did you choose to be heterosexual? Just curious. If they just get an accountability partner, those precious little spiritual gems, then they will be one of us!

No wonder why the real concern shouldn’t be about whether we will attract too many homosexuals, it’s will we attract any at all? And if we do, will they even stick around long enough for us to know their story. I know, we hope not, and may not even care. That could get too dirty for our porcelain Christian life, ministry, or church.

Besides, why would they want to become any more like us and believe more of what we do? Why would they want to join our futile, self-focused, performance-driven so-called Christian walk that never gets truly any better but rather just pretends like things are. Why would they want to get involved in our church where what we are against is far more important than what we are for, where the Holy Spirit’s ability to change people has been replaced with rules, regulation, guilt trips, and fear. Why, why, why?

If you, your ministry, or your church fears attracting too many gays, let me put your mind at ease, trust me you won’t! And thank God for that! They would do better to go straight to hell, the place many have likely deemed they are all going anyways.

Fear 5: If we truly love homosexuals, we will be adapting to our culture.

One of the cries I often hear from those who seem to want to condemn all homosexuals to the fires of hell and claim that the Bible is perfectly and unquestionably clear that God feels the same is that if you disagree, have questions, harbor doubts, or just aren’t sure about the whole matter, you are not only just “adapting to our culture,” you are not staying true to the authority of God’s Word.

I truly believe that there is little cultural influence in the hearts and minds of those who humbly and truly wrestle with the issues surrounding homosexuality. For both the homosexual and the one who wrestles with what one as a Christian is to believe and do with this issue, the depth of struggle, inner debate, spiritual searching, biblical study, and desire for truth is far deeper than one merely bending to the winds of culture.

People are discovering firsthand, not primarily through cultural experiences, but personal ones, that this issue is much more complex than meets the eye and the black and white tunnel vision of those who are quick to cherry pick their way through the scriptures in order to build their case for what they are against in life and in the world. Furthermore, Christians are coming to realize there are other credible ways as to how one could interpret the biblical references to homosexuality than merely what has been commonly offered. It’s not just clear, cut and dry. These are not far-fetched, doing a “dance around the truth” kind of exegesis exercises being done, but real, faithful biblical scholarship by people who are just as serious about Jesus, the Bible, and sin as anyone else.

I am sure there is a homosexual agenda in both the Christian culture and our culture at large, but there are also a lot of other agendas within our Christian culture. Agendas are not new. And I would dare to say it is not agendas that are driving the reevaluation of this issue, but rather compassion, and biblical revelation.

If Christians were continually prone to merely adapting to culture and that was the driving force behind the questions people are posing to what has previously been accepted and taught as the plain, clear truth about what the bible says about homosexuality, than I am curious as to why for the past 15 years, our culture has become much more health, weight, and nutritionally fit minded, yet the church is clearly not adapting to that much.

Don’t worry, if you wrestle with what the bible says about homosexuality and how to handle this issue in the lives of others, chances are strong that you aren’t merely adapting to culture, but working through issues that are much more complicated than that. Furthermore, you are trying to navigate the application of the Grace growing within you. Grace has filled your heart with wisdom, compassion, and truth. And looking at the world through the eyes of Jesus has begun to look much different from when you merely saw it through the eyes of “church”, “religion”, or “legalism.”

Keep growing in Grace, perfect love casts out fear.

Are You a 21st Century Pharisee?

September 21, 2013 / ckratzer / 3 Comments

I don’t suspect this post will be popular nor well received by some in the “Christian” camp, maybe even by many. But, neither were Martin Luther’s 95 Theses. Is this a kind of “Kratzer Manifesto?” Who knows, probably not. But, for sure, it is with strong conviction that I write.

I believe, from personal observation and experience, that our current Christian culture in America and abroad has been infected with epidemic proportions of the religious spirit manifested by the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. And yet, for most believers, we are so entrenched in it, we don’t even realize the religious stew in which we soak.

It was the Pharisees who leveraged Judaism into their own self-righteous system of rule keeping, regulations, self-improvement, condemnation, political structures, and inside handshakes. In many ministry contexts today, we could simply take these same realities and put the title “church” over them and the descriptions would equally apply. Many churches of our time have knowingly or unknowingly created and given harbor to the modern day, 21st century Pharisee and then given them the title “Christian.”

In fact, let’s look at several of the defining characteristics and distinctions of a 21st Century Pharisee lest perhaps maybe you (or I) are one of them?

o.o1 Memorization verses Meditation – In our Christian culture we have determined that memorizing Bible verses is automatically a worthy and necessary pursuit in the Christian life. There are entire children’s ministries that revolve around having young people memorizing Bible verses, complete with memorization competitions. What could be wrong with that, right? Almost everything.

Unfortunately, the benefits of memorizing Bible verses has skidded off the road into a ritualistic activity of self-righteousness that is purposed on one-uping other Christians, arming for debates, and confronting sinners or those who disagree with you. The truth is however, the Word of God memorized alone merely brings us up to the level of Satan himself, who knows the scriptures back and forth as every good Pharisee did as well. It is a disturbing trend to see people viewing scripture memorization as a spiritual work-out and assume that if you memorize some Bible verses you are growing spiritually. Surely, in many Christian precincts, we have made an idol out of Bible memorization and turned God’s Word into peacock feathers we put on display that others might admire and yield to our spirituality. To be sure, memorization alone has never moved one single Christian forward in their walk, and in fact, has surely moved many backwards.

It is interesting that the Bible never specifically instructs us to “memorize” the Bible, but rather speaks frequently about “meditating” on God’s Word.

Memorization is something people do to pass tests and regurgitate information, “meditation” is what people do to encounter God and be transformed by His personal revelation into their lives. Meditation is reading and learning a verse(s) repeatedly, bringing it to mind and heart over and over again, asking God to personally speak revelation into their lives. It is an encounter with God Himself for the purpose of revealing Himself into one’s life personally and uniquely. It is a matter of heart, hearing, and being encountered by the living God on a personal, transformational level.

It is no wonder that the religous spirit of the Pharisees puts such value on memorization, it’s all about passing tests and giving them. They did this to Jesus repeatedly and are certain proof that one can memorize the scriptures and never encounter God. But, you cannot meditate on His Word without a personal encounter with Him.

The Pharisees memorized words on a page, the whole Torah in fact. But not revelation from God. Words only take reading (or hearing), memorizing only takes remembering. Revelation takes an open heart, postured in faith and expectancy with a personal connection with God.

The purpose of God’s Word is to lead us into experiencing God’s revelation personally for our lives and living. Meditation provides for this, memorization alone does not. Modern day, 21st century Pharisees memorize, in their minds, what is written, followers of Jesus receive and remember personal revelation in their heart. Big, huge, cosmic difference!

o.o2 Discipleship verses Identity in Christ- Obviously, discipleship as “learning” is a valuable Christian experience. We all need to learn from God and others.

But what many today call “discipleship” has taken on the garments and perfumes of the religious Pharisees. We have turned “learning” and being “learners” into a gnostic-type process of ascent. With “accountability partners” and “motivational conferences” to do better we have turned “learning” into a spiritual treadmill, striving and trying to become a better person.

In most Christian circles, “discipleship” starts from the premise that there is “someone that you are not, who you need to become.” Therefore you need to come to these classes, attend these groups, listen to these cd’s, and take on these practices and behaviors in order to “become a fully mature person in Christ.”

Yet, living from our “Identity in Christ” begins from the premise of being more fully who you already are in Christ through faith. This is a huge distinction, and radically changes nearly every dynamic of the Christian life and how we “spur each other onto good works.” Moving from a child of God, to a son or daughter, to an heir, priest, and king in the Kingdom is not a process, it is in fact, a reality already established and accomplished by Christ for those who believe. In Christ, there is no “growing more,” there is only becoming more of who you already are through faith in Christ’s performance in your life, not yours.

Today’s “discipleship” places a certain amount (if not a large amount) of faith and reliance on one’s ability to do better as a Christian. However, living from our “Identity in Christ” seeks to increase one’s placing of faith and reliance on God’s work and will in or lives. It is not a pursuit of becoming, it is a growing faith in who we have already become through and in Christ.

Modern day discipleship merely ends at what Jesus has done FOR you, but living from our “Identity in Christ” continues on to what Jesus has done TO you. “Discipleship” focuses our consciousness on what we need to do better and aren’t doing right, “Identity in Christ” focuses our consciousness on the author and perfector of our faith, what He has done to make us right and how to live rightly from who we already are and have in Him.

Therefore, today’s “discipleship” stresses producing fruit, as if producing fruit is something we could actually do. Yet, living from our “identity in Christ” stresses bearing the fruit God produces.

It is now easy to understand how the discipleship mindset of the Pharisees involved levels of ascent, information to be mastered, numerous hoops to jump through, and a hierarchy of the “learned.” Today, you can see this same mindset in churches through various forms. To be sure, our basic concept of modern day discipleship approaches people and the Christian life as program of progression through steps, rules, formulas, and “to do” lists. Yet Jesus said in contrast “my yoke is easy, my burden is light” in direct reference to his discipleship process, of which His performance is the process, not ours. Jesus’ work on the cross is the discpleship program and process, faith is what receives it.

If there is any process to the Christian life, it is in being more of who we already are, all through faith, not “becoming” through trying harder and doing better. Faith in Jesus’ life in you is the key, not formulas for making your life like Jesus.

o.o3 Obedience verses Faith- On a deeper level, there is a reason why we have taken a performance-driven approach to things like discipleship.

First, it is perhaps because we don’t fully believe in and trust God’s work in us. For many, the Gospel just isn’t sufficient enough, there has to be something we must do or can do. To leave our lives and living completely in the hands of His performance and not ours is seen as a risky concept. Surely, the same Grace that saves us, can’t be the same Grace that sanctifies and secures us. Though not many would say it that way, when push comes to shove, that’s what they believe.

Second, it’s because we believe and have somewhere have been taught that the foundation of the Christian life is obedience. To be sure, we have become Christian-centered Christians. Our performance is our preoccupation. The Christian life is all about what you do and don’t do.

Third, a performance-driven approach to the Christian life appeals to our flesh and culture. We love to feel the adrenaline rush of feeling like we have accomplished something and that our lives and destiny our in our hands.

Unfortunately, these three reasons have become the faulty foundations from which we live and teach the Christian life. In short we believe that obedience is the root and faith is the fruit of the Christian life. This is modern day Pharisee-mindset at its finest.

The truth is, the foundation of the Christian life is faith, and the fruit is obedience.

This foundation shift changes everything.

Following rules, list of “to do’s,” striving to be better, trying to do better, recommitting your life to Christ, pledges, resolutions etc. all have never truly moved people forward spiritually. They only served to create a self-serving facade of a spiritual veil to an empty life. In truth, they are modern forms of the Law, aimed at engaging your will to change your life.

The reality is, the Law was created to show you and I our will can’t change anything, no matter how hard we try. Yet, the Pharisees used it as a way to indoctrinate people into the self-righteous, never ending treadmill of religion. The same thing is happening today in modern Christianity, only we have given it new names like, “discipleship”, “Christianity, “spiritual growth.” Just browse the aisles of your local Christian bookstore and you will see the performance-driven mindset we have made of Christianity and the Christian life. And the deeply, tragic reality is, we are addicted to it.

Yet, the truth is holiness isn’t a lifestyle you choose to live by, it’s an identity you to choose to receive through faith. The obedience of the New Covenant is an obedience of faith, not rule keeping. The Law only serves to actually entice us to sin more, not less. Rather, it is the Grace of God that teaches us to live rightly. Faith is the root, obedience is the fruit. A person with an obedience problem is a person who has an identity problem. They don’t know what Jesus has done TO them, and/or believe it. Disciplship isn’t about a process of becoming, it’s an awakening to who you already are in Christ, and believing it. It’s all about His performance, not ours.

o.o4 Membership verses Manifestation- Where I would agree that in church-world, uniting people around shared vision and values is highly important. Unfortunately, in most church settings the concept of “membership” has taken on a whole other life and purpose. In fact, it hasn’t been until recent years that the concept of utilizing membership as a tool for church unity has existed.

Rather, in most churches, church membership serves several other purposes… it show who’s “in” and who’s “out,” it’s a means to get people to commit to your brand of church, it identifies people who are “trusted” to serve, it’s a status from which members declare and receive certain “rights” and “privileges,” it’s a way of tracking people and charting trends, it is a status that makes one feel they have accomplished something of value spiritually and are “covered” in that area of their life, and it’s a number used by pastors and leaders to gauge success.

In this way, “church” has become much like a club you join. There is little difference between the basic concepts of membership at a local church than there is at a local YMCA. The consumerism mindset of our American culture has found its way into the “church” and church membership is just one example. Pastors use it to bolster their egos and members use it to legitimize demands, benefit from privileges, have their say, attain status, and put a notch on their spiritual belts.

Yet, it’s interesting that the concept of membership in the Bible is not specifically present, and the closest we get is with groups of Christians gathering and serving together with shared vision and values, nothing more nothing less. Obviously, the New Testament is not meant to confine churches and limit the freedoms to what is possible, but I would suggest that what we have made church membership into is nothing less than yet another example of the modern, 21st century pharisee-mindset at work. What could be more legalistic than to make “church” into a club with a cross on top where some are “in” and some are “out” complete with inside handshakes, politics, levels of status, special privileges, and a process by which you can feel righteous in your life, all through a simple church “membership.” Jump through the hoops, and you too can have one.

At a core level, followers of Christ should not be identified by nor take their identity from any form of membership, but rather should be manifesting Christ (their true identity) and partnering together to share the Gospel and build the Kingdom. Instead of merely attending and being a “member” of a church, we should be “being” the church to the world. Enough with superficial, spiritual club memberships that turn the Christian life into something one attends, gets involved with, and earns their place in one or two days a week. Lets get back to the heart and be people of the “The Way” as we spend our time manifesting the Grace of Jesus to the world, individually and together. Let’s not let our preoccupation be with “what’s in it for me” but rather, “what is in me that I need to give to the world.” The church was never meant to be a club, but a conversation of believers with the world about the Grace of God through Jesus Christ. Meeting together was never meant to transform into melding together through traditions, memberships, and institutional mindsets. The church becomes the hope of the world when we Christians see ourselves as the manger of the Gospel, not a member of a religious organization.

o.o5 Law verses Grace- Truth be told, most Christians are suspicious of Grace. They believe, if left unrestricted, it promotes sin, and hate it because they can’t use it to one-up other Christians, point out their shortcomings, and thump their Bibles. For sure, Grace disarms and frustrates the religious, but frees and fortifies the broken. Yes, many Christians do value Grace to an extent because they know you can’t sell God without at least some of it, but also like to keep a lid on it, because in their minds too much would be too much and they could lose control.

The formula they hold to is… Grace + Law= Gospel.

That’s why they believe rules, guilt, fear, shame, to-do lists, steps, and formulas are what are needed to move the Christian train down the track. Appeal to a person’s sense of guilt and a perceived ability they can turn their lives around. Break them down and then show them how to build themselves back up, looking and acting just like “us.” This is the drum beat of the historical and modern day Pharisee.

However, what may work for a military boot camp, does not work for Jesus nor the Christian life. Punishment has never made anyone Holy.

The Gospel is Grace, or it isn’t the Gospel. God does the work, we believe, and thus receive. The formula is… Grace + Law = Law, Grace = Gospel

There is no mixture, and if there is, there is no Grace. It is not, “God does His part, we do our part.” Rather, it is, “God does His part, and our part is to realize we don’t have a part; only to believe.” Faith is the currency of heaven, not our efforts. Favor is unmerited or it’s not favor at all.

A person who truly receives the pure Gospel of God’s Grace does not sin more than sin less, because they know who they truly are in Christ and believe it. They are not sin conscious, they are Jesus conscious. It is their identity that defines their performance, not their performance that defines their identity.

This revelation of the new covenant Gospel of God’s Grace changes everything, rules and rule keeping never changed anything. It is all Grace, or it isn’t Grace at all.

The Pharisees hated Grace, at any level. They loved to condemn, push their rules, and display power point presentations of their religious standards and traditions. And though I hate to say it, I suspect they would be very comfortable in most churches and with most Christians today where this always enough of the Law around to make sure Grace is kept contained and quantified. The modern day, 21st Century Pharisee at most thinks Grace is the appetizer, it’s the bait that leads to the catch. It’s a nice thing that leads to the real thing. It’s part of an equation, but not the solution. For them, the solution is God + you, together saving and sanctifying.

However, the Gospel is Grace alone through faith. It IS the solution, not a part of it. It’s the main meal, the only meal, not an appetizer. There is not hook, there is no catch, there is only Grace. Grace needs no side kick, lead in, bate, appetizer or trailer, it is the whole deal, the real deal, and the only deal. Its host is faith, not performance. It is attracted to our weaknesses not our strengths. Everything else is a con, scam, and substitute. Grace is the only thing that works, changes, and transforms. Believe it to receive it.

o.o6 Consuming Crowd verse Complete Cooperatives- If one were to attend a church service in America, you would very likely experience a message that has a basic theme of “how to be a better person.” or “what you need to do more or less of in your life” and a worship experience that was bent towards appealing to a cultural desire to hear good music, be emotionally moved, and get motivated for Jesus.

Now I know I am walking on a thin line here because there is an important value in communicating the Gospel in culturally relevant ways with excellence. I am a firm believer in utilizing modern communication methods and technology to share the Gospel.

However, in most cases, it is not the Gospel that is being sold, but rather a spiritual experience that appeals to a desire to enhance our lives through our own habits and actions with a little help from Jesus along the way. To be sure, we have become a culture of Christian consumers looking for the best worship experiences, programs for our kids, and inspiring messages to utilize in improving our lives. Many-a-church have been happy to join the competitive race among pastors and leaders to be the latest and the greatest to serve the needs of consumer Christians. Nearly every conference on ministry you can attend centers on ministry and leadership performance in some way or another. Pastor and leaders spend big bucks looking for that latest program, principal, strategy or idea that is going to take them and their church to the “next level” of success; success being defined by numbers, baptisms, and overall growth.

We are a culture of consumer pastors leading consumer churches that breed consumer Christians. It is the American dream turned into the pastoral dream turned into the church dream turned into the Christian dream. This is nothing less than the traditional, Pharisee philosophy of ministry made modern. Finding the best Rabbi to follow who fits your needs and desires has simply turned into finding the best church to attend, conference to experience, or program to implement. Instead of being spiritual leaders and churches that have The Name as our identity and nature, we strive and strive to make a name for ourselves and our ministries.

Yet, what would happen if Christians saw themselves not as incomplete people who constantly need to consume more of the Jesus they already completely have, but as complete people in Christ who came together to express their love to Jesus and manifest the Gospel to others? There is truly something misguided with the Christian who sees themselves as desperate for more of Jesus in their life. How can you want or need more of what you already have fully? This desire for “more of Jesus” belittles the cross and suggests that the Gospel comes to a person in portions, as if God were withholding Himself from us. Indeed, we live under an open heaven. When Jesus said, “it is finished” He meant it, giving the everything of Himself to the nothingness of us.

The only thing that a believer needs to consume is that which strengthens their faith in Christ’s performance, not a plea to muster more energy for their performance to do more or do better. In fact, the job of the Holy Spirit in the non believers life is to convict them of their unbelief in Jesus, but the job of the Holy Spirit in the believers life is to convince them of their righteousness in Christ.

I would venture to say, most of what Christians consume spiritually is purposed or translated into striving to behave better and do more. This is religion and its religious cycle at it’s best, just in modern forms.

But Jesus through His Grace, breaks the cycle. He completes us completely, our performance does not. There is nothing we can consume other than Jesus and His Grace received through faith that will heal, change, or transform any and every aspect of our lives. Jesus is not in the business of making good people better, but giving dead people Life. He is not into life enhancement, but complete life remaking, all by His work, through our faith.

o.o7 Performance verses Rest- To rest is to believe, to perform is to doubt. The moment we look to our own performance for our worth, value, and standing, we have stepped away from trusting in the performance of Jesus and His finished work on the cross. Pharisees then and now are all about performance, all in the spiritual disguise of modern terms like “faithfulness,” “radical obedience,” “serving,” and the like.

Make no mistake, there is nothing wrong with acting in response to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and to be sure, we are not talking about working hard in life economically. Rather we are talking about our efforts to appease God, gain the gleam of His eye, legitimize our faith, prove our worthiness, give our lives value and worth, remove guilt and shame, and make a name for ourselves. So many Christians are turning to church activity and “serving” to right the wrongs, even the score, legitimize their faith, and heal the scars of guilt in their life. Most don’t even realize it, or would ever admit it. Yet, unfortunately, the church, like the performance-driven systems of the Pharisees are happy to oblige.

Rest is not the absence of activity, it is a foundation of faith in Christ’s performance over, above, and despite ours. When we rest, God works. When we work, God rests. Pharisees then and now, are repulsed by those whose lives are ruled by a foundation of rest. Rest disarms the power of fear, guilt, shame, failure, and success to define or persuade a person’s life, the very things that religious people and groups thrive on to motivate and legitimize their lives.

Performance is founded on self-righeousness. Rest is founded on righteousness in Christ.

Tag: bible (Page 4 of 4)

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Bottle One : Sodom and Gomorrah Summer Ale

Bottle Two : Leviticus Lager of 18:22

Bottle Three : Romans Imperial Stout

Bottle Four : Corinthians Chocolate Porter

Bottle Five : Saint Timothy IPA

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Fear 1: If we truly love homosexuals, we won’t be faithful in defending what the Bible says about homosexuality.

Fear 2: If we truly love homosexuals, we will be condoning homosexuality.

Fear 3: If we truly love homosexuals, we won’t be taking sin seriously.

Fear 4: If we truly love homosexuals, we might start attracting too many gays.

Fear 5: If we truly love homosexuals, we will be adapting to our culture.

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