I just saw a page on Facebook. the title was "I'm Proud To Be A Christian". 4 of my Facebook friends have become fans of the page.
yet my first reaction was, hmm, difficult to describe....revulsion perhaps? yet not quite that strong...
I had to think for a minute or two why that was my gut-level reaction. shouldn't pride in that fact that you've been saved from sin be a good thing? can't you be proud that you have religious freedom?
after reflection, it hit me like a ton of bricks.
pride has absolutely no place in the kingdom of God. pride is the antithesis of a Jesus-follower. pride is the fault of Satan, the reason there is a Hell, the root of any sin conceivable. and yet....and yet it's attached to an individuals "chosen path/religion/status". even if the title of the page had been "I'm proud Christ saved me from myself, my sin, and hell" I'd still feel revulsion, because it is only by the extreme act of grace by God that any person "escapes" his true judgment and is saved from a self-destructive life of sin and bondage.
really, this post reminds me of a slogan: "I'm proud to be an American". they wrote a song about it. you could take pride in your country because you had freedoms and so on and so forth. our highschool cheerleaders had a whole routine to this song that was really powerful and involved an enormous American flag. the point of the slogan? take pride in what you are, because it makes you better than everyone else in the world. (that may be an oversimplification, but it really isn't that far off).
and the page on Facebook, well, it reminds me of that slogan. take pride in what you are (a Christian) because that makes you better than the rest of the world (pagans). yet, it is this world we are trying to reach. and elitism is a form of ostracization, and ostracization from the rest of the world is the opposite of spreading the light of the saving gospel of Jesus.
what would the title of my page be? if I'd ever thought that creating a Facebook page for my faith was a worthy goal, and I had to follow that form of a title....humm....I think "I'm Proud of Jesus and His Cross" is closer to Paul's boasting. because then the focus is no longer any "status" I've attained but rather the focus is on Jesus and what He has accomplished on my behalf.
Showing posts with label freedom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label freedom. Show all posts
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Monday, July 6, 2009
freedom
I wish I could have written this yesterday while the thoughts were still fresh. it stems from a video shown at church. a couple lines caught my attention.
the video starts out describing aspects of freedom, mostly aspects of our "possessing" freedom, and ends by saying essentially freedom can only be found in Christ (which, of course, is absolutely true). it didn't use the word freedom until the very end, pasted across a background of the cross. the first half of the video, in describing all these aspects of freedom, use pictures of people holding flags and whatnot, people at rallies and so forth.
what caught my attention was a couple particular lines: "we were born with it" and "it is our right".
apparently the makers of this video were talking about Americans and not about Christians. Americans were born with all kinds of freedoms, freedom of speech, freedom of religion (the first few lines of the video talked about this freedom), and so on. it is indeed a right, written into the American constitution, that all Americans can and will be free (the definition of said freedom is open to interpretation, of course).
Christians were born into bondage, namely the bondage of sin. the foundational doctrine of Christianity is that we are slaves to our sin, slaves to this world, and we cannot "do right" or be righteous until Christ saves us out of our sin. we weren't born with freedom, we were born a slave to death. also, and more importantly in my opinion, once a slave to death becomes a Christian, he becomes a slave to righteousness (to use the words of a famous Christian author). our life is no longer our own (which isn't truly "our own" anyway given the sin nature) but instead is dedicated to the cause of Christ. or at least it should be.
many people in America seem to think that freedom in Christ is equivalent with religious freedom, freedom of speech, and the bill of rights. too many well-meaning Christians place a higher value on American values than on Christian values. too many people want to live their own lives in "freedom" without having to answer to anybody.
too many people forget the slave-nature of Christianity. we are called to be bondservants of Christ, not autonomous do-gooders. one will be told "well done good and faithful servant", another will be told "get away from Me, I never knew you".
the video starts out describing aspects of freedom, mostly aspects of our "possessing" freedom, and ends by saying essentially freedom can only be found in Christ (which, of course, is absolutely true). it didn't use the word freedom until the very end, pasted across a background of the cross. the first half of the video, in describing all these aspects of freedom, use pictures of people holding flags and whatnot, people at rallies and so forth.
what caught my attention was a couple particular lines: "we were born with it" and "it is our right".
apparently the makers of this video were talking about Americans and not about Christians. Americans were born with all kinds of freedoms, freedom of speech, freedom of religion (the first few lines of the video talked about this freedom), and so on. it is indeed a right, written into the American constitution, that all Americans can and will be free (the definition of said freedom is open to interpretation, of course).
Christians were born into bondage, namely the bondage of sin. the foundational doctrine of Christianity is that we are slaves to our sin, slaves to this world, and we cannot "do right" or be righteous until Christ saves us out of our sin. we weren't born with freedom, we were born a slave to death. also, and more importantly in my opinion, once a slave to death becomes a Christian, he becomes a slave to righteousness (to use the words of a famous Christian author). our life is no longer our own (which isn't truly "our own" anyway given the sin nature) but instead is dedicated to the cause of Christ. or at least it should be.
many people in America seem to think that freedom in Christ is equivalent with religious freedom, freedom of speech, and the bill of rights. too many well-meaning Christians place a higher value on American values than on Christian values. too many people want to live their own lives in "freedom" without having to answer to anybody.
too many people forget the slave-nature of Christianity. we are called to be bondservants of Christ, not autonomous do-gooders. one will be told "well done good and faithful servant", another will be told "get away from Me, I never knew you".
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