I got an email last week that both surprised me and didn't surprise me.
An old acquaintance said he was going to a (brick & mortar) church to learn more about them. Here's the email:
"I plan to attend XXXXXXX Wednesday eve. since they are going to be discussing XXXXXX basic beliefs and theology and I wasn't raised in this denomination I thought it would be a good way to learn about it."
No, really, this was the email.
Blew me out of the fucking water.
Here's the response I drafted, but didn't send:
"I vote that EVERY Christian bookstore and EVERY brick & mortar church in the world be shut down forever. This would mean every follower of Jesus would have to (gasp) intercourse with God himself: about their life, about what the hell is going on, etc."
Receiving that email showed a lot.
It shows what an unstoppable death grip and entrancement of power churches hold over people.
Shows the extent of how sorely most people are lemmings.
Shows, unfortunately, how mind-numbingly dependent people are on the breasts of church.
"I'll let the church speak for me. Yeah, whatever he said, yeah me too."
Huh? Are we such Caspar Milquetoasts that we just brainlessly default to what other people think and say?
A friend and I discussed something relating to this recently, about talking conversationally with God.
He made the point that this scares the hell out of a lot of Followers.
"If God still speaks to people today, gosh, that would mean He may want to speak to me. What might He say?"
I don't get the reservation. At all.
And I also regretted the fact that if I were to send that draft in reply to the acquaintance's email it would sail over his head.
But I like the idea.
Have people stand on their own feet.
Strip the artificial coddling and chin-scratching and thumb-sucking going on all around.
I mean, seriously, what are we really and truly going to say to God one day?
"Yeah, Father, I know I was a bedwetter my entire life and never grew up...but You're this God of love who just forgives me and is full of grace and it's okay, right?"
Shut all these coddling institutions down, and kick people out of the nest.
Make them grown some hair on their chest, and stop this socialite bullshit stageplay.
4 comments:
ok I'm going to be like Abraham a sec and say, but what if 1000 people found the real Jesus by going to that place? Should you tear them down then? Well what if it was a hundred? what about ten? What about one? I understand what you mean, but take it up with God because he decides to work through those places, fraught with sin and yuck not withstanding. I found Christ through Joyce Meyer. Now that I not a "baby" I don't listen to that stuff anymore, and have some criticism for it too. But I have apprecaition for the fact that I learned things from there that I never would have. So, how then, should we regard it. Are they profitting from the gospel? probably. Are they wholly moral? Definately not. Who is? But they had what I needed to get from one place to another spiritually. Would you will that I had not stumbled through there into real faith at all?
This is exactly one of the big problems going on in the American body today.
I have been stirring for a long time to do a post called "Feminine Christianity".
Your post is exactly along those lines. The idea that the entire structure of Christianity is to be about coddling and breastfeeding and goochy-gooing each other.
The man who emailed that to me is in his 60's, and has been in church his whole life.
To see someone of that age and around Jesus that long to say something like that?
Yeah, let church remain as it is. That's why God has left brick & mortar church. It is largely a hollow social institution where God's presence is but a fast-fading echo.
I am not saying church needs to remain as it is. Have you read my blog? You have to know that I don't think that. But I beleive in lead by do. I don't think that church needs to be a coddling coochy coo "feminine" nothing. Absolutely not. If you spent five minutes with me you'd know that I have a very low bullshit tolerance and if I detect even the slightest trace I will attack it relentlessly. But there is a baby in that bathwater, JTT. That's what I am saying.
I agree with just about everything you said. But, my theory on how to effect reform is different than yours. I am there and I know I make some people a little uncomfortable to say the least with some of the shit I say. But people can tell me things and not have any judgement coming from me, I can love people through shit and
I am not going to be moved by foolishness. Not the bullshit, not the ritual, nothing. That is MY father's house. I can appreciate your reasons for walking away, but I have not been called to do that. I have no defense for what you have experienced. There is none. NONE! But in the face of that I have two choices: Walk away, or love as I wished to be loved. I can not bear the thought of someone going through what you went through entering those doors to be met with what you were. What else can I do but try to assure that does not happen again on my watch? I don't walk away from anything, ever. That is just not my way. I am stubborn to a fault. and God's presense doesn't fade from anywhere. The reception of his presense may not be recieved. But, he is ever present and I beleive in his power to clean house. Does that sound like GOOCHY GOO to you?
yes, there is a baby in the bathwater, and I (when I used to be in that environment), like you, would steam on the inside when I saw a hurting, bruised, crying-out person being met by the kool aid of Churchianity.
As an observer, I could see time and again that people were NOT showing compassion or love.
That's the bullshit we both see and hate.
The bible says to mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who rejoice. Funny that's put into practice so rarely today. It's all about positive, victory, overcoming, winning...regardless of the signs. And people ignore the signs.
I see seasons. I see winter followed by spring. I see death followed by rebirth. And this doesn't happen once, it happens over and over again.
And I see many in the Body living as though everything of God is supposed to be perpetually "spring".
They preach this. They curb their entire life (behaviors, words, actions, attitudes, advice, etc) to this end.
I don't see God keeping everything He's "in" alive forever. I see Him in them for their course, then moving on when we screw up what He's authored.
This doesn't pertain to everything of His, but I think it true for some of them.
And I don't think He just fluffs the pillows. I think He lets things die. Completely.
I'm with ya all the way on love as we wish to be loved. I used to be a Tin Man follower--followed Jesus but had no heart.
Now I HATE seeing the hurting exposed to shallow b.s., that's why I shout so loudly on these pages.
Mankind does stay in ruts, sometimes for centuries on end.
Man stays in cocoon shells which have long been abandoned and left behind. I grew up in one of those empty shells.
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