I’ve just finished Larry Crabb’s Real Church (Thomas Nelson, 2009). When I found it in the bookstore, I thought, “This sounds like it will encourage my thinking about the Church, modern Christianity, and what it means to be the Body of Christ.” Six weeks later, I realize how right I was, though the book took a far different path than I expected.
Author: Chris
My belief is that God has created each of us for a holy destiny. Through biblical teaching and writing I hope to lead souls to find God, learn to apply His Word to their lives, and find opportunities to join in the work of His Body, the Church.
Infamous Christianity
I hinted at this post at the end of “famous” Christianity, but haven’t had a chance to get to it because of some changes around here. Another reason is that I’ve had so many other thoughts floating around my head that these were lost in the shuffle.
So far we’ve talked about three other pitfalls of Western Christianity: Mindless, Lonely, and Famous Christianity. You could say that the previous posts primarily affect those of us who are part of the Church, participating in Christian circles. For example, “mindlessness” hurts the individual. The desire to be famous impacts an individual church. Infamous Christianity starts within us, but its impact is felt more outside of the Church.
Famous Christianity
In this stage of life and ministry, I find myself pondering nuts and bolts Christianity, as well as the purpose and mission of the local church. Many talk about the approaching demise of what is often called “institutional” or “formal” church, being for the most part that gathering on Sunday mornings or through the week where Christians come together for corporate worship, prayer and teaching.
These ponderings have launched us into this series of posts. They have taken shape as pitfalls of our Western, post-modern understanding and practice of Christianity.
Thanks to a combination of the Declaration of Independence (the right to life, liberty and happiness ~ misquoted on purpose) and the spread of democratic ideals, the American Dream has reached the four corners of the earth. It has also infiltrated our understanding of spirituality and church life.
Lonely Christianity
According to Adherents.com, Christianity is the largest world religion with two billion adherents (defined as “all members, including full members, their children and the estimated number of other regular participants who are not considered as communicant, confirmed or full members”). According to ReligiousTolerance.org, about 75% of American adults identify themselves under the title Christian.
It’s safe to say there is no shortage of “Christians” in our lives. In many towns and cities, to open the Yellow Pages and look under churches, you’ll find not just a small handful, but pages of listings. And yet, when things happen in our lives, where do we turn?
In most cases, we pull away from everyone. We try to figure things out, working with all our might to fight through some of the most difficult times in our lives. But is that the answer God prescribed for us?
Mindless Christianity
The stuff that makes us up as human beings boils down to three parts: spirit, soul/mind, and body. In the Christian world, you don’t have to go very far to find some rules about how we use our body. Don’t go here, don’t eat or drink this, don’t listen to that, don’t say this. . . There is also a lot of talk about what it means to be have our spirit in tune with God. There are teachings (and debate) about what it means to be Spirit-filled, to be lead by the Spirit, to move in the Spirit.
But what about the mind? What role does it play in the Christian life? Are we living a mindless Christianity?
Searching for One’s Self – 4
This should be my last post on the topic of searching for one’s self. Of course, in relation to all of the self-help books, recordings, and seminars, and what seems to me as the obvious struggle to discover who we are and what we’re supposed to be doing, these posts are really just a drop in the bucket. (And you never know when it’ll resurface here.)
Think back to the post 2, where we talked about three traps that we fall into when it comes discovering and becoming who we are meant to be. We talked about how we get stuck by, (1) what we think we should be on account of the input we are constantly receiving, (3) what others think we should be, and (3) what we want others to think about us, true or not.
There’s one other perspective that we haven’t talked about yet that may have come to mind when you read this list. It’s the topic of this post, and you might be surprised by what gets unpacked here.
Chris MacKinnon 