the friend test: wot kind of a friend are you?

so i’ve devised this friend test that goes like this:

brett and bob are friends. brett hurts bob (says something out of line, scratches his car, steals his girlfriend, whateva).
bob stops being brett’s friend.

question 1: was bob really brett’s friend? or was he just hanging around while thing were easy and it made him feel good about himself? if the moment something goes wrong, bob disappears, starts ignoring brett, starts bad-mouthing brett, whateva, were they ever really friends, or was it something else… something convenient?

if i think of my three best guy friends, at least two of them i have done enuff stuff to (always unintentionally, you never set out to hurt your best friend) give them ample reason to walk away, or give up on me, or move on… yet they haven’t… that’s one of the reasons that tells me they are really good friends…

what about me? am i a good friend? how much stuff do i put up with before simply disowning or disregarding or moving on to the next friend? do i fight for my friendships? do i refuse to simply let the other person walk away? or do i continue to make it more about me and less about them?

what about you? have you finished sulking yet and gotten over yourself and chosen against the pride (and self-preservation and ego and needing to be right and and and) and gone out to restore that friendship?

or are you a bob?

the point: reasons to not hate Christ-ianity

so i recently wrote a 5 part ‘reasons to hate Christianity’ blog series which was (for those who read it) intended to be a tongue-in-cheek statement on some of the basic things Christianity is actually meant to be about – things like love and forgiveness and looking after people in need which are all things that actually no-one in their right mind would hate…

but yet people hate christianity and have issues with the church… therefore there must be a problem somewhere…

james writes this, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says!”

and i think that’s it. we don’t. well maybe not all of us, but enuff of us to give people outside of the church the idea that it is not the predominant thing we are about

in fact Jesus said this, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this SHALL ALL MEN KNOW THAT YOU ARE MY DISCIPLES, if you love one another.” [John 13.34-35]

so why is it that the church is more often known for being judgmental, or anti-gay, or greedy and wanting all of your money, or hypocritical and so on… cos i think that is why people hate christians and fear or despise the church…

as my friend kleinfrans once said ‘the God i believe in is not the God you don’t believe in’ and i think that’s really true and the krux of it – people are against Christianity and the Christian God only because the witness and example they have had (from God representatives) have been so bad

Jesus Christ issued this hardcore challenge to those who would be part of His team – “If anyone wants to follow Me, He must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” [Luke 9.23]

when Christ is at the centre of Christianity then it works – then it attracts – then it heals – then it brings together – then it uplifts – then it unites

and so as Christians, or my more favoured term Christ-followers (which implies that we do) cos there are so many different people calling themselves christian who are so badly not-representative of who the name is meant to be all about, we need to be the love and the grace and the forgiveness and the uplifting that it as all about

then maybe we can start introducing people to a God they are in fact desperate to believe in.

[to see the start of the series ‘Reasons to Hate Christianity’ click here]

reasons to hate Christianity – part II

let’s face it – Christians are not among the most loved and respected people when it comes to those outside of the church and i have often wondered why this is and so i started thinking about some of the core basics of this religion and suddenly it makes a lot of sense. when you look at what Christians intrinsically fundamentally believe (i’m not talking how some of them act or those who claim to be Christians but are living contrary to what being a Christian is meant to be but those who are actively living out what the bible teaches) then it becomes pretty obvious why we are despised and hated and regarded with suspicion

so let me take a couple of notes – purely by looking at the basics of what Christianity is about or meant to be about – to show why it is valid to hate Christianity…

part II – we forgive

‘For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.’ [Matthew 6.13-14]

wow – how heinous are we? people who forgive people who hurt or disappoint them. and if you read this you can see that God’s forgiveness is conditional on us forgiving other people. not as an option. not as a ‘if i feel like it.’ not even ‘if you’re a good Christian you’ll do this’

it’s a command. it is a fundamental entrance exam requirement. if you follow Jesus Christ and His teachings and want to be called a Christian then you will forgive everyone

Jesus demonstrated this perfectly as He was hanging on the cross, dying one of the cruellest deaths known to mankind:

‘When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified Him, along with the criminals – one on His right, the other on His left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” [Luke 23.33-34]

in fact when peter, one of Jesus’ followers and closest friends, comes to Jesus and asks Him how many times he should forgive someone, Jesus replies, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” [Matthew 18.22]

this doesn’t mean we keep count and when we get to time 78 we can withhold forgiveness. it means that we keep doing it without record. the kingdom of God calls for crazy revolutionary love demonstrated in forgiveness demonstrated by Jesus on the cross

so yes, people who are commanded to forgive people around them, regardless of whether they deserve it or not – no wonder people hate us!

for another ‘reason to hate Christianity’ click here…

poem: twice prodigal

Twice Prodigal

Have I walked this path?

I can not remember having come this way before;

Yet… strange feeling of familiarity haunts me

As each step I take brings me closer to home…

I still taste the pods I fed those wretched swine

A plague reminder of my sin and shame upon my tongue

Hazy images of the land I’m walking:

Imagination..

…or memory?

Something is not quite right

Can’t put my finger on it

Inheritance grasped…

Relationship squandered.

…and now returning to beg mercy and forgiveness

A Father’s compassion…

A butchered calf celebrating a life once lost

Now returned from the grave

…could it be?

Is it even possible?

NO!

That could never happen!

It wouldn’t!

It mustn’t…

Must…not…

But yet…

I find myself walking a path somewhat recognisable to me

A robe hangs across my shoulders – faded, torn.

Ring on my finger with shiny glint, long lost…

Forgotten?

Dirt-stained sandals worn beneath my tired feet…

Surely this is my first journey home…

Yes! – my mind is just playing tricks

That’s it… no one would return home to such love and acceptance

Only to turn his back and set out once more?

Nobody cured of blindness deliberately erases their sight

Pushes away the embrace of unconditional forgiveness

Heads back towards the shadowy abyss…

NO!

This is it.

It is me…

And I am walking home

Back to a place I knew

To a father who hasn’t stopped loving

Looking out…

Awaiting my return.

why God doesn’t suffer from amnesia

i was chatting to my buddy rob today about a talk he heard where the guy said ‘when God forgives your sin, He forgets about it completely and it’s like it never happened’

and i don’t think that’s precisely true. i think the point is that despite not forgetting about your sin (if God is all knowing then surely He still remembers that you did sin) He chooses to treat you and regard you as if you had not sinned (if you have repented and received forgiveness) and i think that is a more exciting and overwhelming thing

if i hurt my wife – the beautiful Val – by dropping a scaffolding on her car for example (almost a true story) then if she was to develop amnesia and forget that the whole incident happened she would treat me as if i hadn’t done anything wrong (and to her i wouldn’t have) BUT, if she, knowing and remembering that i dropped a scaffolding on her car, still chooses to love me and forgive me and not hold it against me (not continually bringing it up and whining about it and using it against me) then that is a much bigger thing of greater significance and promises far greater relationship.

so i don’t want a God who is amnesious (it’s a word!) [now.] but a God who, despite knowing all the horrible things i have done and do – and all the amazing incredible things i fail to do – still chooses to love me and call me His son and treat me as if i hadn’t and never hold that sin against me (again, assuming i have confessed and repented and accepted the free gift of Jesus dealing with the sin in my place) then that is just a mind-blowing thing

and that has to compel me to go and do likewise…

I wish you were dead (part II)

it is important for us to realise just how insulting and offensive the son’s attitude towards his father is, because otherwise we will never fully ‘get’ just how incredibly over-the-top ludicrously insane the father’s response is.

the father hands over to his son the inheritance (and if it is half of everything he owns then it must be at cost to him and to his lifestyle and comfort/luxury) and the sons heads off and wastes it on ‘wild living.’

eventually the son has spent all his money and his ‘friends’ have all disappeared now that he is no longer providing the party and he ends up working as a man who feeds pigs. it gets so bad he starts looking at the food the pigs are eating and being tempted to dig in. realising that his father’s servants eat better than that, he decides to head home and throw himself at his mercy and ask if he cannot return as a servant in his dad’s house.

now if we ‘get’ how completely rude and disrespectful the son had been to his father, then the father’s response is even more insane. in the jewish culture of the day a man of wealth and position would never run. he was dignified and would walk at his own leisure to demonstrate that position.

but in the story Jesus is telling, the moment the father spots the son (which shows that he was looking out for the son and probably spent a lot of time doing so) he runs out of the house and sets off down the road, screaming to his servants to bring the good robe and the ring and sandals and start killing the fattened calf for the party we are going to have tonight.

not just undignified for a father of his stature to act that way – but remember he is acting in response to the hugest possible insult and betrayal from his son – and the response is absolute unconditional undefiled love.

the kind of love the world does not largely ‘get’ today, except in extreme cases. the kind of love the church is meant to be known for and by, altho too often is sadly known for the opposite (especially when it comes to treatment of people we view as horrible sinners – rather them than us).

the God i love and serve is the father in that story. even while we were turning our backs on Him and rejecting Him and screaming (with our mouths or our lifestyles) ‘i wish You were dead!” He was watching us with love and compassion and secretly storing up party supplies and simply waiting for the second we came to our senses and started the journey home…

And then there He is, once again, running undignifiedly full of compassion and love and forgiveness and mercy and hope and invitation and declaration (my son was once dead but is alive) straight towards you…

free, free, i’m free…

arr, so last nite of crew before baptist summer camp 1 (1000ish young people) arrive and my friend Craig Fincham leads a devotion/crew-building moment and confesses some stuff to the team and God who has been loudly whispering (well i have been incessantly converting His calls to a whisper so as not to pay too much attention to them) to me decides this is a moment of truth (MOT) moment to SCREAM at me – okay buddy, choose this day whom you will serve… i knew i had to and it sucked a lot (cos of the impending disappointment and hurtment that i knew tbv would experience and of course – once again – the embarrassment of not being big or strong or real enuff with this thing i’ve been struggling with for most of this last year, or maybe more accurately not ‘struggling with’…

and so i had to (take 2) confess that once again i got caught up in online pokering and while last time i confessed i left a back door which enabled me to fairly easily slide back into it, i knew this time it had to be kill kill kill (which is not easy cos i really enjoyed playing online and it gave me both an escape and an outlet for my competitive vibes) and so i have come home and deleted the software, this time with the knowledge that i cannot start again if… it is gone, finished, and i know that it won’t be a problem again in that regard cos the only reason it was able to become a problem again was cos i left a backdoor…

and so it was tough and it sucked to have to admit to her i’d been caught up in it again, but at the same time it was amazing and incredible and much needed and it really was (again, you’d think i would have learned last time) like getting a huge chunk of my life back again (and time which i need for book-writing so super stoked and excited for everything the time will free me up to be and do) and it was SO INCREDIBLY TIMED cos i knew deep within that as much as i was ready for summer camp and the workshops i had prepared and to serve and so on, that i wasn’t and i absolutely needed that moment to happen so i could stand in front of 1500 young people absolutely compromise free and not hiding my secret sins while admonishing them to be free of theirs.

burden lifted. thank you God. thank you lovely wife for your grace and forgiveness and lack of judgement.

thank you God for 15th chances… help me not to need a 16th… free me from my addictive personality that quickly gets my feet wrapped up and entangled with sin or distractful things which masquerade as not sin.

hebrews 12.1-3 starts with ‘therefore since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw of everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles…’