Elitist Christianity

I am quite tired of the elitist "Christians" who claim to have the corner on truth. We all know who I am talking about. These are the Christian's who accuse every one else of not having it right. Everyone but THEY are compromising.

What leads to this elitist Christianity you might ask? This attitude comes from having the need to have everything figured out. Somehow having everything figured out leads to a sense of security. I dare say that it is a feigned sense of security yet they offer it to others titled with the word "Gospel." While this isn't necessarily a false Gospel, what happens after salvation is what makes them elitist.

After salvation these elitist Christians come up with lists of do's and don'ts and then gauge other peoples relationship with God based on their own personal standards that have been elevated to an unGodly position. For some reason they think that their personal standards gain favor with God, and encourage others to participate with them by guilting people into a false sense of security.

Why would people join up with these elitists? Two things; Power and a need for security. These folks fall in two categories. I've talked about this in a previous post but it is well worth rehashing it here. Power drives people to do radical(bad radical) things in the name of Christianity. These people in their leadership positions, rule with an iron fist, claiming Scripture is backing their perspective. Scripture does support their perspectives, as long as you don't read the context of the passages they quote.

The second reason is a need for security. They get this list of do's and don'ts, and they gauge their spirituality based on their emotional response to this list. For example, if you do not like this list of rules, you are rebellious. If you do the rules but don't let on that you don't like them, you are a hypocrite. If you do them and have a good heart while you do them, your heart is right with God.

When I hear this diatribe, my head just want to explode! at there is no DO and DON'T do list in scripture. Paul actually addresses this faulty idea (don't worry; I did check the context) in Colossians. Verse 23 is SO important I have to share it here. It says, "²³ Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence."

Rules do NOT keep us from sinning. We always emphasize that when there is a will there is a way. Regardless of there being rules and appearing all perfect and "avoiding all appearance of evil"(totally just miscontexted that one) you can't set up rules that prevent others from sinning. Let alone that you can't raise these requirements up to the level of scripture as we talked about in another blog post.

The irony is that they believe they they are correct in all of their applications of these requirements. What really matters is the heart. Lets focus on allowing God to work on hearts rather than us trying to sculpt the outside. If all we do is mould people the way we envision God to want them, all we have done is created people who appear the way the god we have created in our mind wants them.

I read on another blog this week a phrase a church posted on their marquis. It said, "How many people have you led to Christ?" The obvious goal of the sign is to ultimately guilt people into witnessing. Good goal, bad method, but that's not the point. "How many people have you led to Christ?" None. I have led no one to Christ. The Holy Spirit through the work has wrought in my life has in turn shown people the light of Christ. I didn't do anything. When I bring people to Christ, I am bringing them to a god that I have developed in my own mind, and have explained to them not the true God only the Holy Spirit can bring them to.

When we allow our standards(hems down to the ankles, no "rock" beat) and our goals(bring 50 people to Christ this year) to cloud the true God, we are doing the world a disservice. We have ruined Christianity.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know it all. I know so little in the big scheme of things, but my desire is to allow the Spirit to move me into better service for the God of this universe. If that means the Holy Spirit will lead me to talk to 50 people about the Gospel this year sobeit. If that means that God will convince me of sin in my life that needs to be corrected, I humbly will bow and correct my ways.

I know right now as I sit here in front of this computer monitor, I am not a compromised Christian. Yes I have varied my ways and my standard systems since growing up and attending BJU, but I am completely and unequivocally sold out to Christ. That will never change. What will change are things that the Holy Spirit wants me to change to better serve the One and Only True God. I am uncompromised in my faith, and I am uncompromised in my belief that Elitist Christian's are more of a hindrance than a help.

 Jesus himself said in Matthew that his "yoke is easy" and his "burden is light." This can't happen if guilt and rules take the place of true grace. Scripture also says that there is no condemnation for those of us who have accepted Christ.

It is not up to us to judge other Christians based on their apparent spirituality. I for one never judge someone for an ambiguous rule in scripture. I've said it before in another post, that Peter determined that there were two rules that the gentile believers had to follow to show their salvation. Do not practice idolatry and do not participate in sexual immorality. If a particular "sin" does not fall in these categories, I will not judge. I cannot judge based on what Peter said.

We have to remember that after salvation all of us have been given the Holy Spirit after salvation to guide us and direct us. The irony is how many of us want to be the Holy Spirit for other people. If we truly want to make a difference for Christ, we must follow what scripture says rather than putting our own twists on it. We must share the gospel, without adding to it. We must remember grace. Only then is it possible to live the Radical Life!

Sanctification: Is just doing it enough?

Over the last few years I've been traveling a journey in my faith. This journey has modified my views on sanctification from what I had previously thought and what I had previously been taught.

Sanctification is first of all NOT salvation. Salvation is what Christ did for us through his death on the cross, if we accept him as savior. Sanctification is the process that we travel through after salvation, as our lives are transformed to become more and more like Christ. Sanctification can be summed up in two categories: works based sanctification and Holy Spirit Based Sanctification.

Works based sanctification is the idea that the things that we do or the things that we do not do will lead us closer to becoming more like Christ. These things can range from you have to tithe to be close to Christ, or you can't go to movies or you will be farther away Christ.

I was once told by a teacher that even if I didn't like something taught at the school, I should still make it a practice in order to glorify God, and eventually I would come to like it. While I agree with the intent of that statement, I believe that is also what causes so many issues in modern Christianity. In Churches all around our nation we have Christians who are posers. They put on a good act, and we tend to think they are sold out for Christ, but the reality is that they are still acting. We have lost the heart by approaching things from this perspective. People who are taught this perspective often end up thinking all they have are a list of rules and lose respect for the leaders and mentors who give them a list of things they cannot do.

I tend to lean toward the perspective of Holy Spirit based sanctification. Scripture gives us clear principles of how to live and it is up to the Holy Spirit's influence to transform our lives to become more and more like Christ. Before I lose some of you, this is in no way a permission slip to sin. In fact it is quite the contrary. This view is a call for Christians to be more diligent as there is no oversight by another person but rather Christ alone. This principle applies to things like how involved in culture we should be, what music to listen to, how liturgical we should make our services, whether we should raise our hands in worship, and so on.

In Acts we are taught that the only "things" gentile believers are required to do, is to abstain from idolatry and abstain from sexual sins. This is the only list in scripture we are given. Everything else we do must conform to the expectations of an holy God as we see in the lists that Paul specifically addresses to churches who were straying.

As believers attend church and read the Bible they will naturally learn more and more about living the Christian life. This is when the Holy Spirit convicts and leads the believer away from the act that is leading them farther from Christ, and back to Him.

It comes down to a heart attitude. Are you allowing the Spirit to lead you? If you are leading others, are you leading them or allowing the Holy Spirit to transform them. As Mark Hall said, maybe we need to let God change the heart, before changing the shirt.