Easy Targets? I Don’t Think So.

I am woefully behind in my reading, and have come to terms that I’ll not be caught up anytime soon, especially since most of the writers I follow write every single day, and sometimes several times a day; but,  after reading a relatively high

number of posts last night and this morning, I got the idea to write this post. 

I’m not going to call out the writers and comments that gave me this idea. Each person is entitled to call it the way they see it. Instead, I thought I’d just jump on the bandwagon of Un-Requested Opinions myself, and say something in the defense of Christians in general. This is my opinion, for what it is worth.

Ask anyone who knows me, you’ll probably find out that I am not a huge fan of organized religion, churches, or most high-profile televised pastors/preachers/teachers. I am very much a Christian, but after belonging to some churches that started on the correct path, only to end up somewhere bizarre, cultish, or just completely wrong, I finally gave up finding a church home. I’ve read the books and watched the sermons of people like Marilyn Hickey, Benny Hinn, Joyce Meyer, Paul Crouch, and laundry list of other famous teachers, and all I have to say is that you have to be very, very careful to study the words that are preached in the light of what the Word of God really says. I’m not saying they aren’t saved. I’m saying that I find some problems in some of the stuff taught, the number one lesson being the Prosperity Gospel….”Name It, and Claim It” sermons and the “Mini-gods” teachings make my butt absolutely pucker. No where in the bible are we taught to just accept whatever is taught to us without checking it against God’s Word, so be like the Bereans:

“Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.” Acts 17:11

That being said, it seems to me that Christians take a lot of heat from people who aren’t Christians themselves, but also we have quite of bit of in-fighting as well.  There tends to be something of a civil war among ourselves over the logistics and interpretations. One thing I think we should remember about each other is that this walk with God is neither easy nor is it ever perfected here on earth. Each relationship in your life is going to look and feel different to you, and the same goes with your relationship with Jesus.

But one thing I think we can all agree on is that being a real, day-by-day Christian makes us the target of satan’s many attacks, makes us the enemies of the atheist/agnostic agendas, the butt of tasteless jokes, and puts us in the unwelcome spotlight of people who use our weaknesses and failings to justify their own refusal to embrace our God.

We tend to be judged by a world that hasn’t first judged itself.

Sometimes, we just need to encourage each other that this life is so temporary, and we are truly aliens in an unfriendly land. And I just want to point out that we should respect each other no matter what differences we have in interpretations and doctrines because it takes a lot of guts to keep on keeping on when so much in this life has set its hand against us.

To me, it would be easier to just throw up my hands in defeat, stop denying my flesh what it wants, and live according to what I want to do, instead of what I know to be right. But, instead, each moment of my life is a tug-of-war between my spiritual self and my fleshly self. And the only time that war will truly be over is when I die, and am finally separated from my fleshly desires. So, to me, a person who has decided to take a leap of faith and follow God through His Son, Jesus, is a person that shows an incredible strength, not a person who is deluded, weak, or fanciful.

Soldier on, my fellow Christian sisters and brothers, but not against each other. Let’s opt out of this spiritual Civil War we tend to be distracted by. Satan is only helped by in-fighting, and we should do nothing that enables him to sully the hope of God’s message to a dying world.

We may all differ on specifics, but the message of Jesus’s salvation for us remains the same, and we are more effective as a unit when we bond together, than when we fight amongst ourselves.

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. Be of the same mind toward one another; do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly. Do not be wise in your own estimation. Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,” says the Lord. “BUT IF YOUR ENEMY IS HUNGRY, FEED HIM, AND IF HE IS THIRSTY, GIVE HIM A DRINK; FOR IN SO DOING YOU WILL HEAP BURNING COALS ON HIS HEAD.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Romans 12: 14-21

 

— Bird