The Jesus nobody wants...

Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so...little ones to him belong they are weak and he is strong...ish....because he also is meek and mild....in fact we all know that this is what Jesus looks like...I mean lets face it....He's white, has long hair a well groomed beard and blue eyes, something

that always made me wonder because growing up in the church tradition I grew up in guys having long hair was considered some kind of major sin that would inevitably lead to promiscuity, drug use, drinking, smoking, swearing, and very likely devil worship complete with regular human or at least feline sacrifices.  This Jesus is safe, this Jesus is fun to follow, a mash up of Barney, the Wiggles, Mr. Rogers and David Copperfield (the magician).  Christians like this Jesus because this Jesus is above it all, this Jesus never did any of the gross things that humans do.  He never had doubts, never questioned authority, never had a crush or fell in love.  This Jesus turned water into Grape Juice, floated a few centimeters above the ground, and
shed tears on a regular basis.  This Jesus was led quietly away without a sound or complaint....This is the Jesus so many grew up knowing, and believing in and the reason is simple, this Jesus is manageable.  This is the gentleman Jesus that I wrote about the other day and people like this Jesus because this Jesus will never surprise them, never call them to care about more than what their church says to care about, never ask them to stand up for people no one else will stand up for.  This Jesus would be welcome in our churches because this Jesus wouldn't rock the boat. He would "find his ministry" and spend his days checking kids in, or taking offering, or parking cars, or singing on a praise team or in the choir, nodding, smiling, affirming what comes from the pulpit.  People like this Jesus.

Recently, due to life I've done a lot of re-evaluating of my faith.  There were always things that didn't sit well with me growing up.  Things that didn't make sense that caused me to push against the edges which is a good thing when we push against the edges of our faith authenticity develops but I've said that before, it's nothing new.

While we love that Jesus in the picture we are afraid of this Jesus, and the reason is actually pretty simple, this Jesus is not happy, he's not meek and mild, he isn't offering you and I our best life now.
On the contrary this Jesus is angry, this Jesus had doubts, this Jesus wondered if "the plan was worth it.  This Jesus is the one that did one of the most irrational things that a person can do, and in doing it should offer all of us a type of hope that the other Jesus, the meek and mild floats above the clouds Jesus could never give.

Mark 11:12-14 (NLT)
¹²  The next morning as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry.
¹³  He noticed a fig tree in full leaf a little way off, so he went over to see if he could find any figs. But there were only leaves because it was too early in the season for fruit.
¹⁴  Then Jesus said to the tree, “May no one ever eat your fruit again!” And the disciples heard him say it.¹³  He noticed a fig tree in full leaf a little way off, so he went over to see if he could find any figs. But there were only leaves because it was too early in the season for fruit.
¹⁴  Then Jesus said to the tree, “May no one ever eat your fruit again!” And the disciples heard him say it.

I love this scripture because it shows  Jesus really did get it, he really did live among us, he really did walk the earth, have feelings, got angry and lost his cool, but more than anything it showed he could be irrational and respond in a completely emotional way.  IT WAS TOO EARLY FOR FRUIT. Jesus knew this, and yet he was hungry, and tired, and frustrated and so he reacted he just said no fruit for you, never again.  I can see him walking away the disciples shaking their head thinking what did you expect it's not time yet.  Keep reading the story and you find that they saw the fig tree a few days later is didn't just have no fruit, it was dead.  In his frustration, in his anger, Jesus destroyed a tree that wasn't supposed to have fruit on it yet.  

Jesus begged his dad to not make him have to die, I know we love the idea that Jesus said not my will but yours and it was just this resigned shuffle off to death, but the Jesus the cursed a tree for not having fruit, when it wasn't even time for it to have fruit wouldn't have done that. I believe there was a lot of struggle, a lot of angst, a lot of begging, with the ultimate surrender not because he had to but because he chose too.  I believe the Jesus that cursed the tree to death, that threw out the people buying and selling, that got angry at the mourners at Lazarus tomb, that stood and cried because his friend was dead, even though he knew what he was about to do, had crushes, got in a fight or two joked around with his cousin, skipped out on chores, came in late, argued with his parents from time to time, made good choices and sometimes made bad ones (that tree again.)  

This Jesus is not the Jesus we want, but it is the Jesus we need, correction it may not be the Jesus you need but it's the Jesus I need, because this is that Jesus that offers humanity the hope that the end result of a walk of faith, and lets face it, his time on earth as a HUMAN was a walk of faith, can lead somewhere besides church on a Sunday morning.

One of my favorite stories from the life of Christ happens just after the resurrection.   Jesus is about to forgive Peter and lay some pretty heavy instructions on him.  The disciples are fishing, Jesus tells them to put their net on the right side of the boat they get a huge haul of fish peter rushes to shore even after he had denied Jesus...but the part of the story I love is that Jesus is already cooking breakfast.  Jesus built a fire, brought some fish, and was cooking for the disciples, he knew they would be there, he knew they would be hungry, and so he was meeting their need, not only that he invited them to bring some of what they had to round out the meal.

John 21:10 (NLT)
¹⁰  “Bring some of the fish you’ve just caught,” Jesus said.

Jesus has always viewed faith not as a blind trust, but a full on partnership. A partnership with people just like him.  People who walk the earth, who get angry, who love, who hate, who hurt and who help.  People that doubt and fear, and make good decisions and sometimes are irrational.  People who can become more like He is now, because he took time to be like we are now.

How it is.

As I sit here the day after Christmas I have come to the conclusion that Christmas and all it's trappings are better when you're a kid.  The best memories I have of Christmas have kids in them, either I'm the kid or it's my own kids, okay that's not totally accurate, one of the coolest Christmases I remember is our second Christmas.  We didn't have a regular tree in or apartment, instead Joyce taped a tree to the one wall made of paper, ribbon and ornaments. Simple times before life began it's inevitable trudge towards whatever this thing is now.

I want to say thanks to everyone who has been reading posts, and reaching out.  I know it may not seem like it but I do appreciate the effort.  I just want to make sure people understand a few things I guess. 

I grew up with a certain set of beliefs about God, Church, and Christianity.  Most people do so that's not really news to anyone.  We all come at the God question from whatever angle we are taught to view it.  If you come from an evangelical upbringing you answer the question, many times through very narrow windows of understanding.  You come to the Bible with a certain set of preconceived ideas as to what it really means and you are right and everyone else is wrong but that's not really exclusive to evangelical Christians, or any religion for that matter, we all take a we're right and you're wrong approach to religion.  What gets me is how we all are so positive that we are right and everyone else is wrong, usually based on our feelings, not based on anything more.  People read their faiths chosen texts and cherry pick what they like.  The gather together with other people just like them, that think and read said text the same way, they become a church and begin to make rules of inclusion and exclusion, usually based on their own ideas of what God meant when the holy book they read was written. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a pantheist, nor am I Unitarian.  I happen to believe that Christianity is the one that has it right, what I refuse to believe in any more is christianity (small c on purpose.)  I am so very tired of platitudes, of we're right and you're wrong simply because, for whatever reason, we don't like or agree with or understand you. I'm done with artificial sanctification, the kind that comes through a membership class,or getting baptized the right way, tired of christians in general, myself included itching for a fight about worship music, or service style, or eschatology, or LGBTQ issues, tired of the idea that scripture is to be viewed through the lens of personal conviction and current experience as opposed to through the lens of context, and historical accuracy.  Tired of evangelicals giving the president a pass as the one that will stay the hand of the apocalypse bound to start in America because I mean lets face it we are the center of the universe.  Tired of liberals claiming the moral high ground, or the real understanding of scripture knowing the real truth. 

Most of all though I'm tired of myself.  Tired of trying to straddle both of those worlds, not feeling like either is a complete fit for my faith in God.  I am not as far as I can tell an evangelical, or mainline, or liberal, I just am. I have said for years that I am a Christ Follower as opposed to a christian, but even that is a bit of a struggle at times.  It's hard to follow in the steps of the one that got it right because, well lets face it, he was God of course he got it right.  It's hard to accept that in this journey I am supposed to be on I'm not ever going to be like the one I am trying so desperately to be like, and worse yet, when I try and lead people to be like him they may or may not accept that I have it right.  If they do, then I run the risk of yet another group of intolerant people putting qualifiers on what it means to have a faith of consequence. 

I have asked that people not tell me what I already know, not tell me Jesus has me in the palm of his hand, or that God is preparing me for something.  I have asked not to be given the Jesus Loves Me answer, simply because I know those answers, have said them to  myself and others, and don't really need reminded of them, what is equally off-putting and makes me realize how far we have to go if we really do want to effect the world the way we were told to is the complete lack of respect for this request that I have seen evidenced...

Growing up one of the things that I was told on a regular basis was Jesus was a gentleman, that he would never force himself onto anyone, the idea that we were all given a free will to choose was drilled into us, but there was always a catch...Jesus was a gentleman as long as we realized that the way our church said was how Jesus worked, and we were given a free will to choose the Jesus that was the one our church or denomination liked to follow, the one that affirmed their understanding of Old Testament scripture etc.  That was the qualifier to Jesus being a Gentleman, he was as long as we understood that the only Jesus that mattered was the one taught by our church...our denomination and this Jesus may or may not have been the  Jesus that walked the earth with 12 guys and a few women over 2000 years or so ago give or take.  Why we think we can be the gatekeepers to a relationship with God is anathema to me but we all do it, and in doing so we turn away whosoevers by the bucket load.  Jesus consistently called religious leaders to task for making it impossible for people to know God and yet religious leaders today keep setting the bar higher and higher for what constitutes a true believer. 

Recently I have had people tell me that I'm not like any pastor they have ever seen, they have said I can talk to you, if you were my pastor or if you had been my pastor I think I would have stayed in church, with that in mind I posit this question....if you are in the Baltimore area...would you and yours be interested in being a part of Baltimore's un-Church.  The place that people who want to explore their faith, do what the Bible talks about.  Hanging out together, having all things in common, taking care of people who can't take care of themselves, doing good, talking not so much about the God we serve and the rules to get to him, but the struggle to become more like the one that God sent to show us how to live and move and have our being in him?

I am posting this to two different Facebook accounts...opening the Pastor Aaron Facebook back up, it's been rather dormant for the past 10 weeks but I think it may be time to explore what it looks like to do something that looks different and hopefully fresh, that reaches to all the rest of the Un's...

Struggle

...Funny how those three little dots can have so much meaning.  For me they evidence my thoughts on life, God, Church, fill in the blanks.

It's been a little over 8 weeks, I have been told I need to get over it, that I choose where I am, that depression is not of God.. that "the enemy" is attacking...bla bla bla, dot. dot. dot.

For the record. I used to say the same things, I used to think that God was intimately involved in the daily life of the people he created, the people that follow him, that when we read he orders our steps, it actually means there's a plan and path that is set out for us and all we have to do is "read the map" the map being the Bible.

More and more I am leaning more toward a deist view of God.  God exists, don't get me wrong, but I am increasingly coming to the conclusion, at least for me personally we are set down into this world and then he kinda walks away...things like the Big Bang theory shouldn't be seen as a lack of belief in God, rather as God creating through word, deed, volition, and then watching to see what happens. Feelings of being called may come from God or they may come from the fact that we are created in the image of God and as such find our worth in doing something beyond our own human capacity for survival and the pursuit of happiness.   The degree to which we "tap into" the image we were created in then determines the vocation we choose.

I am fully aware that the above paragraph is going to further alienate me from the people I grew up with.  I understand that for many of them as it was for me, this need to have God involved in an intimate level with their activities of daily living is life and breath and faith to them.  If at any moment they begin to doubt, to question, to wonder, they look for and find a space, usually their church or small group, or family members that will offer the encouragement that lets them quickly slip back into the Jesus Loves me this I know type of faith that is so much easier to live in, but for me at least has become hollow and meaningless.  We choose the call, we choose the work, we choose the fight, or we don't.  God watches, God sends the butterfly to flap it's wings at times, but ultimately it falls to us to do what it takes to fulfill the calling we FEEL is placed on our lives.

Which brings me to where I am now..

There's a much better song that fits where I am but sometimes we realize that it's better to edit...

As it stands now I have been gone from the Church for two and a half months, it has not gotten better, I have not gotten better.  People talk about being dead inside, and while there have been times in my life where I have understood this feeling to some extent, I am not sure I have ever lived in it as much as or as acutely as I am at this point. I am so angry at the people involved but no where near as angry as I am at myself. We gave a lot, and before you say but Jesus gave more please don't this is not news to me.

We are hurting, I am hurting, we are not going to see family because the leadership of both the church and conference decided that they didn't need to help though a very trying time financially.  Yes I am working but Joyce had to take 8 weeks off for surgery.  Oh well deal with it, seems to be the take away. I have never hated anyone in my life, yet that is where I find myself, hating others, hating myself, angry at God beyond imagining, and still so many people want to tell me that God cares, that God sees, that God knows that God is ordering our path and steps, to which I reply...then God can stop doing so.  God can go spend time with someone else for a while.

If anything this has not served as a push me to my knees time as much as it has to a push me away because of all the times I have fallen to my knees the Heavens have rung hollow.  People will point out when Joyce was ill...I would point out there was no reason for it, people will say but she survived cancer, to which I say she never should have had to deal with Cancer.  I know that's silly, I know all the answers but for me I yes I can't do it any more.  I can't listen to God cares platitudes, I can' hear you the evangelical right wing christian friend from my past tell me again that I must have done something or that the trying of my faith works patience, or that God has something on the other side that is huge and important and wait to see what he does.

I don't want God to do anything else...

Merry Christmas.

What are We Saying?

“But in a church meeting I would rather speak five understandable words to help others than ten thousand words in an unknown language.”
(1 Corinthians 14:19 NLT-SE)

Last night J and I were reading together.  We are finishing up a series on love in the church and I thought I would read the chapter after my text for Sunday.  That would be 1 Corinthians 13, nice chapter gets used quite often really for all sorts of things.  This Sunday it’s going to be coupled with a baptism.  Which reminds me I need to order a jar of marbles… anyway I digress.

Chapter 14 starts with a six word exclamatory sentence…( I did hear what school teachers were saying, even if it took 20 some odd years for me to listen to  what they said.) 

Let love be your highest goal! Already Paul is telling us that all the other things I’m about to talk about in this part of the letter are important, but they are not the MOST important, they aren’t the thing that has the most value.  He isn’t discounting anything that he is about to say, he is just saying that you all think that these things are the most important issues you are facing, I have news for you they aren’t.  Love is where I want you all to camp out.  I want you to get very good at Love.  Love should be the focus of your interactions with each other and with the world around you. 

Anyway as I read through this chapter I began to look at it with a different set of eyes.  Growing up the way I did you always look at verses that speak about tongues and get mystical about them.  Sure that’s a basic view, and it is more nuanced but the general assumption for many is that speaking in tongues shows you and everyone around you…in the club…that you’ve got something special.  You’ve got “it.” of course there are the times that people take umbrage at labeling the Holy Spirit an it so they tried to say you got Him,  Some say you got the power…there are all different explanations to the whole thing that tongues is to a large contingent of Christians.  My thoughts when it comes to gifts and God and all that is that all things equal God can do whatever he wants or needs.  It’s not my job to tell him what those things are, it’s to be available…. anyway enough of that.

What struck me this time around was this verse…

“It’s the same for you. If you speak to people in words they don’t understand, how will they know what you are saying? You might as well be talking into empty space.”
(1 Corinthians 14:9 NLT-SE)

Follow me here for a moment.  This has been used to talk about the charismatic practice of speaking in tongues.  But it holds true for so much more than that. 

Christianity like any religion has words that are used by people in the club.  Calling everyone brother or sister can be strange. Talking about communion and blood and all that could be off putting, but there’s more to it than that. Even when speaking full sentences in English they don’t necessarily mean what they sound like.  Churches have a language all there own.  Services, and Gatherings, and small groups, fellowship, Christian Education, Buy In, Outreach, Service.  These are concepts that have basic easily understood meanings to people in the church but if you asked people outside the church it’s highly possible likely probable that those same words would take on a different meaning.

Churches take way too much for granted.  Even when we as church leaders are told not to take things for granted there is a part of us that continues to do so.  When you are in a smaller church, or a church in a part of the country that is not as wide open as some of the fasted growing church areas things go from disappointing to depressing really fast. We work in most cases with people that remember when… shoot we remember when…and all the stuff from when, the words that we spoke and the language that was used through events and outreaches makes sense to us because it’s what we are used too, meanwhile the people we are supposed to be reaching aren’t getting the conversation, both verbal and non verbal from churches, but more importantly from Christians.  We use Bait and Switch tactics more than we should and many times we don’t even realize it consciously. 

Here’s the thing. If we started talking the language that people understand instead of the language we want them to understand we would be so much further down the road. 

Sharing our faith is more about living it in front of people in such a way that they become curious,  the trick is that once they are curious we need to stay away from the in club words and move toward authentic conversation, building a relationship, getting to know the person and letting them see what makes things in your life different, letting them see what makes my life different.  Sure there will come a point when they understand what a small group is, what a worship service is all about, and why we sing the songs we sing.  But in those first few weeks and months if they come to church they are going to be in a foreign land, they are going to see the worship time as a concert let them, and if you’re sitting with them treat it the same way.  They may wonder why someone gets up and talks for 20 to 40 minutes depending on the church, answer their questions if they have them but be sure to do so in an in-churchy way.  Don’t bring out scripture and verse that talks about how important it is for Christians to be together, bring out practical you based examples of how important it is for Christians to fellowship together. I can almost guarantee the deeper in they get the more they will begin to understand that worship isn’t a concert, teaching is a chance to look at the Bible and what it says and how it has meaning today even if it’s been around for a few thousand years, and that service is a way for us to be the hands and feet of Christ extended not just a way for us to get the warm fuzzies. 

Some people think that the approach I’m advocating means that I’m willing to toss out the Bible, etc.  Far from it.  I want what the Bible says to be the foundation on which these conversations and interactions grow.  I want people who claim to follow Christ to follow him so hard and so fully that they can have a conversation about the last movie they saw and not feel like they haven’t done enough to spread the gospel. 

See sometimes a movie can just be a movie, a song can just be a song, a meal can just be a meal.  It doesn’t always have to lead to the ABC’s of salvation.  What it does have to lead to or at least what it should lead to is authentic relationship that is nurtured and cared for and ready for that moment that will come when all hell has broken loose in a person’s life and they turn to their friend…not their pew mate…

We have to use words that people understand because that’s the only way we will get to use words that will bring the light and truth of Christ into a persons life in real lasting ways.

The Greatest of These

This Post also Appears on the Pastors Screen portion of Locust Point Community Churches Website.  I posted it here with a couple of edits because I know some do not read or visit that site but may read this blog.

It's February.  I am shocked that It's already February but there you go.  It is.

So much has happened in the past month.  The elephant in the room is of course the fact that there is a new president.  Regardless of your feelings on the new administration, it's safe to say that remembering the title of today's blog, or more importantly remembering where that title came from is important.

Let's look at it real quick.

Faith, Hope and Love Abide.  Abide is one of those words that people rarely use any more but it's meaning is not really all that hard to figure out.  Some translations use the word remain but the meaning is clear.  Other things will end.  Circumstances change, people change governments change.  Everything changes but these three things.

It's been a long few weeks for people in my house.  I am not a person who just sits quietly and agrees with things.  I have an opinion and I'm willing to share it.  If you are interested in that opinion dig around the blog a bit you can probably figure it out.  However I realized something last night when I was told to stop "trolling" Facebook.  I was forgetting a few things that are important.

No matter where we stand on the issues that are confronting us on a daily basis, no matter what our party affiliation, our stance on immigration, climate change, education, health care, fill in all the blanks that people are fighting about now and all the ones that are coming in the next months and years, if we claim to follow Christ.  If he is the one that we want to be like, to emulate and to share with the world, we must remember that all of these things, while important are temporary.  They are here for a moment and then gone when a new idea, or administration, or set of important issues comes up.  What matters what remains, what lasts are Faith, Hope and Love, and the one that is more important than any of the others is Love.  Love that is unconditional, unwavering, and constantly reaches to others weather we agree with them or not.

Don't get me wrong. I believe we have a mandate from Christ to reach to the least the lost and the lonely, to stand up for those that can't stand up for themselves.  Inaction is not an option if you and I follow Christ and are working at living and moving and having our being in Him.  However I have to remind myself that through all the actions that I am willing to and must take, no matter what side I'm on, the person across from me, needs to see a Faith a Hope and a Love that endures.  One that is firm, but that also is sure and full of compassion for whosoever it comes into contact with.

So stand for your convictions.  Say what you have on your heart and in your mind.  Be strong for those that are weak, but in doing so be sure that behind that stand is not a need to be right, but a need to show people the God you serve, in real, tangible, touchable ways.  A God ever faithful to the promises in His word, a God who offers humanity Hope for eternity, a God who's unfailing, unending, and unfathomable love is constantly extended to the people He created.  All of them those that you like, those that you don't, those that you agree with, and those that you don't, those that you understand and those that you don't.  It extends to whosoever, and we all need to step back and realize that we all can be whosoever s, if only we will allow the God Shaped hole in our lives to be filled by the one that made us.

How I saw it...

I'm confused.  I guess the best way to start this little conversation is to admit that from the get go.

Growing up in the church can do things to a person.  For some it scars them.  They get out of High School, head to college, and never look back.  I feel bad when I hear about that happening, I know it does, and there are real valid reasons for it.  Just feels sad that a place that is supposed to help you live the life that you were designed to ends up being a place that you run from.  I never really felt wounded by the church I grew up in, or the people that were there.  Pastor John was such an amazing influence in my life, such a man of God, when I started down this whole pastoral path, there was an example of care and concern and service that could be aspired too. But...

Things started to unravel.  I began to see things differently than the denomination I grew up in.  I began to have questions about why things were the way they were.  I started to wonder and poke and prod and in doing so I began to see cracks in the denomination.  Now don't get me wrong,  look hard enough and there are cracks in every denomination.  Every time you add humans to the mix when it comes to a relationship with God there are going to be cracks.  I stepped away because for me the cracks were hampering my relationship with God and others.  They had the potential to make me into someone that I didn't want to be, and while I never left a relationship with God, I did step away from the church that introduced me to God.  I love the memories that come from my time in church growing up. The time praying, the time at camp, and at youth group and conventions.  I am proud of the work that I did while still in the denomination.  I look at what was accomplished, at all of it and while there are things that I would change there are things that make me a better Christ follower today that have their roots in my upbringing...and yet things did unravel. I began to see past some of the things that "God Said" to find that in digging a little deeper it may not be as simple as the interpretation given.

I began to wonder at the disconnect I saw between serving others because it's what Jesus wants, and serving others because in doing so they owe you a listen.  I started to question why some people were welcome whole heartedly into the faith and some were "prayed for" in love that God would really prepare their hearts to receive His message.  That they would accept the correction that came from God into their lives...I watched as entire churches fell prey to the idea that our country was founded as a Christian Nation, as opposed to one that was founded on Biblical Principles.  There is a difference.  I stopped wanting prayer in schools, started to question capital punishment, and began to realize that context is everything when studying the Bible.  I started to understand that for me there is a difference between endorsing something and recognizing that the very rights that assure me the ability to worship and study, and question, and protest for "Christian" values, also afford those same rights to others.  I began to understand that it's possible to support a woman's right to choose and still feel that life is precious and should be cherished, nurtured and cared for, all life not just new life.

I disagree with people all the time when it comes to these and other issues, but disagreement does not mean I need to make them see it my way, to force them to accept Jesus on my terms because every time I stick my terms into the very real and amazing gospel that will change a persons life, I am watering it down.  Every time I try and qualify exactly what the word whosoever means, I am telling God that he messed up in His inspiration of John 3:16, that he should have done some "extreme vetting."

All this seems to be coming to a head here in 2017 and it's coming at the intersection of faith and politics.  I find myself getting more and more frustrated at old friends seemingly blind support of our president.  Lies are renamed alternative facts, the women's march is talked about as pointless, conspiracy theories are now accepted by many that I know and love as fact.  There is no ability to dialog because the moment you question what is going on the claws come out and instead of answering the question they attack, blame, and rip apart the previous administration.

Looking at what has happened in the first eight days of the new presidents administration is frightening to me an many people like me.  Instead of doing things to answer those concerns, instead of attempting some kind of reconciliation the vast majority of people from my past and many who support the administration say things like "buckle up."  or "We won get over it." Meanwhile the president is taking a sledgehammer not just to the previous administrations policies but to constitutional rights afforded in the very amendment that Christians use when they don't want the government telling them how to worship, when to worship, and what their faith means and looks like.  In case we need a refresher on that amendment here it is.



That's a bit hard to read but I wanted to put that in there to show how long this has been a foundation principle.  Here' is the text in a readable state...

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.^[1]

 If the past eight days are any indication this entire ideal, an ideal that our country was founded upon, the ideal that allows NOW, and GLADD and Westborro Baptist, and The Family Research Council, and Locust Point Community Church, and Liberty Assembly, and CAIR, and fill in the blank is a suggestion instead of a founding principle.  What we say matters, we all know this and yet for some reason our President gets a pass on these issues.

I feel such a disconnect from people I know and love from the past.  I read what they say on Facebook, I read comments to posts that I make and I get frustrated because what I see Jesus doing, and what I see them supporting don't add up.  What I see happening flies in the face of what we read in the Old and New Testaments.

I read this and I look at our country and many of the Christian leaders and people I know supporting it and this is what I see...

The thing is others don't, and while I can't imagine how these things aren't clear to anyone watching what is going on, to anyone taking the time to read the executive orders being signed on a regular basis, to anyone that is willing to dig a bit deeper, I do understand.  Which brings me back to the beginning of this particular post.

God's word tells us to work out our own salvation. It's important to attend Church, it's important to have fellowship with others, but it's also important to go beyond what your pastor says.  The moment we relegate our growth as a Christ follower to what we hear on Sunday and in modern worship songs, we stop growing.  We become a danger to Christianity because instead of living the word of God, we are living the word of the church and pastor we attend.  I spend a lot of time studying and praying for the sermons I preach on Sunday's, I step into the pulpit and I share what that study and prayer has pushed into my hear for the people I serve, but I also know that there are times that I get it wrong, that I misinterpret, that I misrepresent, not because I want to but because I am human and I don't see things clearly, or face to face but through a glass lens that is warped and smudged and dirty with my own thoughts, feelings, prejudices and leanings.  I always want my people to go home and dig in a bit more, to read the text and talk to God and learn for themselves what God is saying.

I could be wrong, I could be missing the boat when it comes to my fear and misgivings about our President, and yes I said our...I'm not about to suggest that President Trump isn't my president, he may not be my choice but he is my president...but isn't it also possible, just maybe that his most ardent supporters could be wrong too?   That's what is so off-putting to me in this whole thing.  The apparent blind support of a person who has had a past that would make all the dads in my audience with daughters, sit on the front steps cleaning their shotgun...

Celebrity Appresident...

It's not personal it's just business, while good in the corporate world is problematic when governing, be it sitting on the board of a church, being a member of city council, mayor, governor, senator, congressman or yes even president. It's no secret that I am not keen on our new president. I am amazed at the willingness of many to ignore, mansplain away (what is so frightening about the mansplaining is the women that are also engaged in it) comments that were made, by saying " but he didn't mean that," etc.

I am concerned for our country in the next four years. HOWEVER, that does not mean that I am rooting for his failure. That makes no sense. I will pray for him as I prayed for George W, and Bill Clinton, and George Senior. I suppose I prayed for Reagan but in an I was 8 when he took office and 16 when he left and yeah you get the point sort of way.

Governing is personal, things that work in the business world, the personality it takes to successfully grow, and run a company successfully are not the same.  As a government official you have to make difficult decisions, but as a business person you do so constantly looking at the ledger. The bottom line is growing the business, doing whats best for profit etc. While the best bosses have the ability to humanize the process, and can see the people they employ and serve as important, there is an over riding desire and look at the ledger, as it should be, it's business. However the bottom line in governing is not whats best for the bottom line, but what's best for the people you represent. Yes there are times that financial decisions will matter more, but there are also times that physical health will matter, or that housing and quality of life take a front seat. There are times that you can't throw money at the problem because it's not money you need.

 

When I look at some of the people being tapped for key positions in the current administration, I see someone assembling a team of elite 1%'s out of touch with the very people that got our president elected.

 

I want him to succeed but I also want us all to realize that we MUST stand up for those that are not just going to lose a voice, but those that think they now have one.

 

I find myself consistently frustrated by politicians in general. Too may are willing to re-write recent history to make themselves appear better than they are.

 

The thing is as a Christ follower my job has never changed and if you claim to be one neither has yours. It's summed up in these verses in Matthew...

As followers up Christ we are consistently supposed to do what is right, even when it may not line up with what we want to do, when it goes against what is considered the bare minimum, when the governing authority say's we don't really need to.

The apostles made it clear that there was a time to honor authority, but there was also a time to stand up, and many times in doing so, in standing up and living their lives for Christ they were not just persecuted by the governing authorities but in some cases executed.  Far from going meekly about their lives submitting to the authority they actively challenged it and stood against it when that authority was doing things that were contrary to what Jesus would do.

In many ways Right Wing Evangelicals have equated the republican party as a whole as the party of Christ.  To that end anyone they elect must be a Christian, and must by default be right.  I know that sounds simplistic, but the only answer I seem to get when bringing up my concerns about our president, and they are many, for our president's unflinching support from many who claim Christ, is that: "It's a big conspiracy," that the media is out to get Trump, that I didn't really hear or watch the the things that I heard and watched.  I have had my faith and profession called into question by a friend of a family in the church I grew up in simply because in that individuals mind, any true pastor would fall in line, vote Republican, push LGBT people out of the church, demand the de-funding of planned parenthood,  push for prayer in schools, and recognize that if America will just get back to God then suddenly it will be sunshine and unicorns.  The steel mills where I grew up will start up again, Detroit will start producing loads of gas guzzlers, and regulation of fossil fuels will disappear because face it climate change as we all know is bunk...I wish that is was just that person that thinks I'm past the point of what true faith is, but I know better.  As I read comments and see what people I grew up with are saying and how they are reacting to peoples very real concerns myself included I have realized something rather disturbing.  If that is what Christianity looks like, if those words, and those ideas, if this man is the person they want to anoint as the Christian choice for our country.  I don't want to be in the club...I'll turn in my card, and walk away from the entire system, because it doesn't fit...he doesn't fit.

Years ago Christians talked about the importance of the character of the people in office in our country.  They called the private lives of elected officials into the public, decrying past behavior and making it an important part of their ability to serve. All of that has gone out the window this time around.  Not only are the same people that called for impeachment, investigation, and imprisonment excusing the behavior, they actively stick their heads in the sand and ignore it.  Now the past should be left alone, who can really know what he was thinking, that's just locker room talk.  I get why people call so many christians in America out for their hypocrisy.  It's rampant.

I want a few things from President Trump.  I want him to succeed, but more than that, I want to see him come to a real, authentic, life altering faith in Christ.  Naive... of course it is but it's what I want.  It's what I have wanted for every President we have had since Reagan.   What I don't want is the de-funding of planned parenthood, the national endowment for the arts, the corporation for public broadcasting.  What I don't want is for my daughters and yours to have to worry that some idiot is going to act like this man has in his past, treating women disrespectfully  and talking down to them. What I don't want is for my black friends to be pushed and pushed and pushed into molds that they don't fit.  What I don't want is some big wall to our South and North, because remember not only do walls keep people out, they trap people in.  I don't want some vaccineaphobes kid to be in the same class as my daughters, exposing them and others to needless disease, but more important exposing people with compromised immune systems to danger.  I don't want my kids and grand kids to be the ones stuck with a world that has been used and used and used and used with no regard to what that use is doing to God's creation.  I don't want to be told how and who I can worship, which means I don't want us telling others how and who they can worship. I don't want to ostracize people who look, sound, believe, and love differently than I do, I don't want to put myself in a place to make decisions for a woman that I don't know, will never meet, and have no idea the situation she is in, because the moment I make rules or strike down rules that effect their freedom, I am removing my own freedom as well.

I will be praying every day not just for our President but for every leader that sits in Washington.  This I can and will do.  But I will also bee looking for ways to be Jesus with skin to those that are afraid, disenfranchised, and ignored.  I will take the opportunities that are afforded to stand with them, to be a voice that advocates for them. To call out our leaders if need be.

Being a Christ Follower has never been easy...if you find it so then you're doing it wrong.