A Parable on Holiness

On the wall at the local coffee shop bulletin board was a poster, among about a hundred others, which read:
Jesus: Myth or Man
Come to a discussion at Kells
7:30 pm Wednesday nights.
Franklin was in awe that someone, whoever it was, decided to host a discussion about Jesus. For him, it felt like there was hope and that maybe there was a Christian influence in the city. He was warned before he left home by everyone, it seemed, to stay away from sin and find a good local church and get involved. But finding a faith community was becoming harder and harder to do. For him, he felt like the area was full of stuffy churches that were either traditional or else seemed to be a “haven” away from the culture. He didn’t like either option. This was San Francisco and by moving here he knew this would be different than anything he knew from growing up in the Southeast.
Franklin decided to go and he asked his two roommates to attend with him. All three left the house about 7:00 and by 7:20 were completely lost. “Have you ever been to Kell’s, Franklin?” Rob asked.
“No but I pulled directions from online so I didn’t think it would be this hard to find.”
“Wait there it is! Kell’s Pub? I thought we were going to a coffee shop, Frank.” Mike said from the backseat.
Franklin got a lump in his throat and just acted like he didn’t hear him.
“This will be interesting I guess.” Rob said.
The three walked in to the bar and searched for the group that was to meet. They asked the bartender if there was a group that was meeting and he pointed to the back of the room where there was a few couches and said, “The Jesus Group meets back there.” There was one guy sitting reading a book with a long beard circle glasses and long thin blonde hair. Franklin thought he looked like a cross between a hippie and Harry Potter. The man closed his book and looked up.
“My name is William. Are you here for the conversation?”
“If by conversation you mean The Jesus Group then yes.” Franklin said. They all laughed and exchanged names with William. William talked with them and it turned out that they had a lot in common. William grew up in the South and moved to San Francisco to be a youth pastor. After several years of working in the ministry, William had enough. He retold his feelings about how he lost sight of Jesus while he was busying himself with ministry. William said that he started a discussion group about Jesus to save his faith from reckless abandonment. 7:45 rolled around and another group of people came into the bar and joined the conversation. By 8:00 William spoke up and asked the question, “Who is Jesus?” The group that was all talking before in sub-groups was suddenly joining with each other to participate in sharing their point of views and discus the things that they have learned. For the most part Franklin, Rob, and Mike were silent. They sat back and watched as people discussed what they thought of Jesus. For each person, their seemed like a different view. It was 10:00 when people started to leave. By about 11:00 pm the three roommates walked out of the bar drenched in the smell of cigarettes. The three guys walked silently to the car and started to leave Kell’s Pub. Franklin was the first to speak.
“I really like William. It is so refreshing to know there are Christians out there that are engaging the culture.”
Mike sighed and said,”It was interesting. I guess I don’t understand why they meet at a bar.”
By that Rob spoke up and chimed in,” Yeah! I really was uncomfortable with how many people claimed to be Christian but smoked and drank that way. Some of those views seemed really far off.”
Franklin drove in silence as the two roomates talked about how aweful the evening was critisizing everything that was said.
Franklin, Rob, and Mike never returned to Kell’s Pub to meet with the Jesus Group, as was known by the bar’s patrons. In fact, after several more failed attempts to find a good church, Franklin decided that organized religion was a waste of time. Rob went on to become a pastor of Evangelism back South at his home church and no one ever heard from Mike again.
What does holiness look like?

Test

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Living vs Believing

So where to begin after such a long time of absense from blogging? I am not sure. The last several months have brought many interesting things. Lessons to be learned, people who have inspired me, despair, joy, abundance, brokeness etc. I can’t really retell all the stories that I have. So coming from a long hietus of writing, I begin with this.
A very basic question, and yet very profound is what does it look like to be a Christ follower? A couple of weeks ago I read Dan Kimball’s “They Like Jesus but Not the Church”. In case it isn’t obvious from the title, the book is generally about those who are on the outside of the church and their views on Christianity. Like it or not, from most people’s perspective the church sucks. For me, it is pretty easy to judge the church and to be cynical towards her after spending most of my life within her walls. So you can imagine that throughout most of the quotations written or spoken by these outsiders, I was giving a hearty “Amen” like the old Baptist roots from whince I came. Perhaps you have heard the old saying spoken by St Augustine that states, “The church is a whore and I am her child.” I understand that Christians do a pretty bad job at representing Christ. In fact, I think that most people would say that. Take a look at the social networking sites like Facebook or Myspace and look at the religion section. I dare say that even those who are regular attenders of churches all around the US would have something like, “Christ follower” or “I love Jesus” and they would probably try to stay away from the term, “Christian”. I think we as postmoderns are finding out that our faith is less about a statement and more about a man. I am not sure if that is recognized by all who stay away from using this term, but I do think that there is some type of universal understanding by these people that they would rather identify with Jesus the man. Brian Mclaren expounds upon this in his book, “Finding Our Way Again”. The question that was posed to him by Dr Peter Senge was, “Why are books on Budhism more popular than books on Christianity?” Mclaren said that he had no idea how to answer him so he said that he just asked, “How would you answer that question?” Dr Senge went on to explain that Budhism offers a way of life rather than a system of belief.
There is a tension however within me. Although the church is not being the kind of bride she sould be, Jesus is still jealous for her love. It really doesn’t work when we are continually slandering and remaining cynical towards the church and try to pursue Jesus. The two intersect with one another. As much as we would like to start from scratch and move on beyond the Crusades, Racism, homophobia, and Christian consumerism we confess our sins and remain the church. Afterall, the church at its very definition is people.
So church, don’t despair. It is now more than ever that we apologize and life a disciplined life that honors Christ. We repent for all the injustices rendered and in that repentence we turn away from our sin and turn towards righteous living. Justin writes in the first century “Those who are not found living as Christ tought should know that they are really not Christians, even if his teachings are on their lips.” Are you more comfortable with living a life that is filled with a “System of belief” or a “Lifestyle of Worship”? How are we living?