Whirled Views with Dan Burrell

“I’m so glad that it was Jesus who met the Samaritan woman at the well and not the stereotypical Christian.” — Louie Giglio 

This is what greeted me when I checked into Facebook this morning. 

It’s been a while, but it’s time for a rant.

Give me a break from the hyper-sensitive, hipster evangelicals whose self-loathing and insane desire for some sense of superiority combines with an apparent high need to “connect” to the popular culture and gives us a constant stream of this kind of pathetic drivel.  (Oh yeah, I’m back and I’m just getting started.)

Perry Noble wants to lecture us on the damage we do for standing up for traditional marriage and having a Chick-fil-A sandwich.  I have to drive by a billboard constantly that touts a new “kewl” church that is designed as a place “for people who don’t like church”.  I read a lecture by some blogger on how “Christians are the worst tippers in the whole world” (something that is patently not true — there is not one whit of empirical evidence to support this, I have tons of anecdotal evidence to counter this and its just a lovely Christian-bashing urban legend that has been circulating for 40 years or more.)  Now we’ve got Louie (whom I don’t dislike and enjoy reading on occasion) looking down his nose at the ill-bred and dysfunctional Body of Christ and calling them to task as if it could be universally assumed that Christians would treat the woman at the well unkindly.  Well, I just got pushed over the edge.

I’m sorry, did someone make “Bashing the Brethren” a new Olympic sport and I somehow missed it?  What is it with this constant assumption of the worst in our spiritual family and then pontificating about it as if that makes us somehow morally superior and not “one of them”?  When do we give the Body of Christ some benefit of the doubt and with the athiests, secularists, most of the media, higher academia, the scientific community, bloggers, the entertainment industry and myriad other facets of society and culture keeping Christian humble by constantly pointing out our foils, hypocrisy and general lack of any signficant social virtue, must we really add all of the evangelical spokesmen from the Millennial and X Generations?

Maybe what I’m suggesting is that some of our folks “cease fire” for a minute and consider the facts.

Self-described Christians give more per capita to non-profits than their non-confessing neighbors however you want to divide the demographics — by locale, by age, religion, by political affiliation, by sexual orientation and so on.

Compare for me the number of hospitals, schools, relief organizations, missions, homeless shelters, food pantries and other social organizations that are operated by, funded by and/or operated by “Christians” to the number of ANY other demographic.  Again, choose your religion, your political affiliation, your socio-economic strata, your generation….name your group.

Apart from Fred Phelps (who is as legitimate a Christian as I am a Mormon), a couple of tiny Southern churches so far back in the woods that they have to pipe sunshine to them and the occasional “fascist extremist” who adds the term “Christian” to his self-described moniker (along with patriot, white, posse, revolutionary, independent, constitutional, etc…) who all seem to garner headlines from the “super-pro-Christian-pro-Biblical-worldview-mainstream” media [exit sarcasm mode…again] about a bazillion times bolder than their numbers or IQ’s, can you really name me significant examples of “Christians” who are beating down gays, being rude to prostitutes, ostracizing divorcees, holding book and cross burnings, abandoning puppies and kicking grandmas? 

I’m not deaf, blind or mute — I know some seriously whack-job people who call themselves Christians.  But I also know some seriously disturbed _____________’s as well (you go ahead and fill in that blank for me — Muslims, Democrats, Republicans, 50-somthings, entertainers — you choose.)  Are Churches often populated with some hypocrites.  Duh…YES.  But might I ask you where a better place for a hypocrite to go for treament of his/her character disorder?  Would they be more likely to be cured at the local bar?  Club? Political rally? Sporting Event?  Mall? (Cuz’ we all know there aren’t any hypocrites THERE, right?)  That tired and cliche old argument is like going to a hospital and griping about all the sick people that are there.  Of course there are hypocrites in church…that’s where they NEED to go….and by the way, come on down, we’ve got plenty of room for you.  From my experience, the biggest hypocrite at all is the person who delights in pointing at others and yelling “hypocrite!” 

We’ve got plenty of people all across the landscape who are just waiting for the opportunity to tweet about some crazy driver cutting people off and cursing who has a “In case of Rapture this Car will be Unmanned” bumper sticker on their car.  (Been there, tweeted that myself.)  We love to opine on Facebook about how some Christian business person did us dirty during some business transaction.  And yep, there are some people that came from the WalMart end of the gene pool who stuff their massive selves into too-tight T-Shirts and do some pretty stupid things in public claiming to do so in the “name of Jesus”.  But they are not the majority — they are not even a tiny part of the minority, they are just the occasional freckle on the hind-end of a body of believers who by-and-large are just doing their best to earn a living, worship the Lord, raise their kids, help their neighbors and stay a few steps ahead of the tax man. 

Yep, they like Chick-fil-A with their freshly scrubbed teen counter help that were obviously there on a break from their home-schooling.  Sure enough, we tend to be so conservative that we only order the “right wings” of the chickens when we go through the drive thru at KFC.  Obviously, many of them do have a problem with homosexuality because — no matter how you try to twist Scripture — God doesn’t approve of it and so neither should we.  (And the fact that Christians sometimes cheat on their spouses, have premarital sex and look at porn doesn’t in any way mitigate the Truthfulness of Romans 1 into a non-sequitor.)  You name the sin and I’ll guaran-doggone-tee ya’ I’ve known a professing Christian that has commited it.  But isn’t that what growing in grace is all about?  Identifying sins and weaknesses and trying to love Jesus so much more that we stop doing the dumb and self-destructive stuff?  The argument that speaking of a “better way to live” and that some personal choices are both wicked and destructive is not an act of hate — it’s an act of compassion, of concern and in this day and age — often an act of courage.  Speaking out for virtue and morality and aspiring to wholesomeness and integrity is not “hate speech” no matter how many times you want to call it that.  So stop it.  And if someone accuses you of it — just roll your eyes at them and keep on speaking the Truth in love.  Don’t be intimidated. 

I struggle with sin.  That will come as no surprise to those who know me.  I need my brothers and sisters in Christ to love me where I am and help me to get to where I need to be.  The people I know who are earnestly living out their faith – those in my church family, those that I meet in the community, those that I “fellowship” with on Facebook, those that have sat in my classes — they aren’t mean.  They aren’t hateful.  They are quite the opposite.  They routinely give to the needy.  They bring meals over when someone has a tragedy or a serious illness.  They take collections for people with bills or who have lost their jobs.  They go to Bolivia on missions trip and not Disney on vacation.  They cry tears of joy when someone gets good news and tears of grief when someone gets bad news.  They hug me — sometimes for no reason except to say “I care”.  Sometimes I see them do kind deeds anonymously for others who will never know who blessed them.  I’ve never known them to speak hatefully about gays or minorities or addicts or single moms or the homeless or the media or anyone else.

Louie — I don’t know what kind of people you’ve been hanging around, but I can ASSURE you — the people with whom I worship, with whom I pray, with whom I fellowship within the Body of Christ would have gone right up to the Samaritan woman at the Well of Sychar and would have helped her draw her water. They would have accepted her where she was and loved her to where she needed to be. They would not have been shocked at her immorality because they see that every day and more.  Indeed, many of them carry their own scars that have now become trophies of God’s grace in their life.  They would have talked about the difference that Jesus had made in their lives and then they would have invited her over to their house for coffee. 

Maybe some of the quick-to-condemn-the-brethren folks with their megaphones of influence might reconsider and remember that we’re talking “family” here.  At some point, shouldn’t we give family the benefit of the doubt and not assume that they will constantly live up to your worst expectations.  We are a messy lot on occasion — there’s no denying that.  But not only are we neighbors today…..we’ll be neighbors in a million years as well.  So….how about eliminating the “cheap shots” and “broad brushes” and notice the positive?  At the very least, don’t reinforce a stereotype that is as negative as it is inaccurate.