Some truths about Christians

Four truths

I caught this the other day. My wife put it out on Twitter – “I find it incredible that Christ would die for the sinner in all their mess yet we're the ones who look at them and scorn.” It reminded me of one of the reasons for our ministry together to the hurt, wounded, and disadvantaged. Jesus told us to love our neighbours. Who are our neighbours if not the man in the street, especially those less fortunate than we are?

It also reminded me of something else I picked up in the last few days. Four truths about Christians and the practice of their faith. These were observations from comments made on Facebook.

1 People very seldom, if ever, practice what they preach. For Christians this must be one of the great sins; one that must grieve the Lord so very much; that Christians say one thing and do entirely a different thing. Things like loving our neighbours, and the quotation that ends, “By their love you will know them.” So many seem to try to buy their way into God’s good books by their giving to “good causes”. This is good but their motives aren’t quite matching their reasoning. Many would shudder at the thought of even talking to a down and out on the street, let alone providing a meal. The first thing to admit is that it is not everyone’s calling to minister like this but the giving is done out of duty and appearances rather than out of love for anyone. Christians are also frequently hypocritical in their whole life-style. If we are no different from the world, what is there to attract the unsaved to Christ?

2 The non-religious believe they know more about religion than those who practice it. This is perfectly obvious from all the news where we read and hear all about those who make laws against Christians based on gross misunderstandings of what Christianity is all about; based on gross ignorance of what Christians values are; based on a total ignorance of the constitution of their country and the Christian values upon which it was founded; and based on dreadfully misguided thinking that the new law will in some way appease those who demanded it so loudly in the first place.

3 Many who call themselves Christian nowadays have so compromised their values that you cannot tell them apart from non-Christians. Where do we begin? How long have you got? As Christians we are told to be in the world but not of the world but we have espoused so much jealousy, greed, sanctimony, unfaithfulness, worldly practices and approval, possessiveness, covetousness, and so on, that there is no longer any visible dividing line between us and the world. We are sexist, ageist, xenophobic, homophobic, and probably worst of all – we are judgemental of those who stand where we should be standing – just as accused, just as guilty, and just as unrepentant.

4 Those who say they despise intolerance are often much more intolerant than those they tend to criticize. Oh Lord, forgive our intolerance of others views, rights, and actions. Yes we do have to tolerate some activities, so often totally against Christ’s teaching, because the law says that the activity is acceptable to our society – but we do not approve nor condone. Also forgive us Lord for our intolerance of those who hold very slightly different Christian views to ours. This is perhaps Satan’s greatest dividing weapon – denominationalism and elitism. When Jesus sent the 72 out they returned saying that they had stopped others not of their group acting in Jesus Name. Jesus said, “Do not stop them. If they are not against us then they are for us.” I think it is around 95% of all Christian views and credos are virtually identical. It is that last 5% that keeps our denominations separate and disunited. How the Holy Spirit must grieve over this.

Oh Lord, bring us back to Your values as given to us in Your Word. Take from us our worldly value system – it has brought you nothing but heartache and caused us nothing but sin. Make us more Christ-like and cause us to walk in His ways to your everlasting Glory. Amen.