It feels rather odd to be starting a new chapter on a Thursday, but things tend to work out best for those who make the best of the way things turn out. So here we are, smack in the middle of the week and entering into our second adventure in the Divine Conspiracy. I must warn you, in terms of adventures, this chapter depresses the imagination rather than exciting it. But it does bring forth deserving points that are seldom addressed in our church or society.
The first chapter of the book sets the tone for an exciting new life available to all which we have taken the liberty of labeling "The Eternal Life". It speaks of kingdoms and queendoms and governments and rules and destinies and dreams and wisdoms and fools. In many respects it is eye opening and uplifting. While this chapter possesses the former, it tends towards the opposite direction of the latter.
How does the grand invitation to life sound today?
A bumper sticker gently imposes its little message:
Christians Aren't Perfect, Just Forgiven.
What the slogan really conveys
is that forgiveness alone
is what Christianity is all about,
what is genuinely essential to it.
Such a simple little statement. Such deep theological roots. If there was one message I heard consistently throughout the Evangelical church of my childhood, it was the message to get everyone on earth to the point of being "forgiven." Now granted, that is a very admirable goal. We cannot approach the Father until our sin problem has been removed allowing us access. The sad news about the simplicity of this message, is that in many cases, the buck stops here. Inside this simple statement, along side its sweet and savory salute, seldom we find... substance. What does it mean when it says "just forgiven"?
It says that you can have a faith in Christ that brings forgiveness, while in every other respect your life is no different from that of others who have no faith in Christ at all. This view is by now worked out in many sober tomes of theology, lived out by multitudes of those who sincerely self-identify as Christians.
Does that not ring true? Is that not a major deblitating factor in presenting the modern Christian message? Do we offer nothing more than a statement of forgiveness, a get-out-of-jail-free card, worthy of a bumper sticker and a pat on the back, but without any life-changing mind-blowing eternal and lasting consequences to speak of?
I submit that we do not. But that is how it's heard.
A friend once asked me why they should be a Christian instead of just a better person. I offered "grace" as a desirable outcome, but they said they had no need of it at the time. How sad it is that I could not think upon any other reason to which they might cling. How sad it is that none was ever given me.
As it happens, that conversation I reference above happens to be one of the relative few that I've engaged in over the years. Perhaps if I'd known more of the life I could have been living, I would have been all the more eager to share it with others. Perhaps I would have been all the more giving, had I felt I had something to give. Intellectually I could never wrap my head around it. Don't get me wrong, I naturally want ever person I know to reach heaven in the afterlife. I've just never been fond of selling "fire insurance", which is what this type of "faith" has been called.
They contemptuously refer to it as "cheap grace." Some people actually reject Christianity because of it. But, to be quite frank, grace is cheap from the point of view of those who need it. And if a fire is likely, it would not be a mark of wisdom to forgo insurance that really is available.
So in terms of this diminished invitation to a Christian faith, it is not a matter of going in the wrong direction. I consider it more a matter of giving a homeless man a sandwich when you could offer him a house. The first act is certainly praiseworthy, while the second should clearly be the goal.
Can we seriously believe that God would establish a plan for us that essentially bypasses the awesome needs of present human life and leaves human character untouched? Would he leaves us even temporarily marooned with no help in our kind of world? Can we believe that the essence of Christian faith and salvation covers nothing but death and after? Can we believe that being saved really has nothing whatever to do with the kind of persons we are?
More importantly, do we ever find Christ preaching this message? Or had he something else in mind.
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