so, once we get past the mindless comments of people responding to the blog title and not actually reading it, what am i on about?
if you haven’t read my other blog about the christians choosing to become atheist (http://brettfish.wordpress.com/2010/09/13/a-theist-walks-into-an-atheist-bigbang-its-a-steel-atheist) i would suggest you begin there, cos this is a (s)equal of sorts…
so in the context of finding out that one of my church peoples had turned atheist over the varsity holidays, i have been giving this a lot of thort and i came up with this:
both of my friends who became atheist were christian and so they know the deal – they understand what the Christian-perceived Bible-teaching consequences of not being a Christ-follower are. they both know that if they have got this one wrong – and continue to stay in it – that they are in a LOT of trouble.
so, knowing the consequences of not being a Christ-follower, they are actively choosing against that and embracing another belief, and everything that goes with it
therefore, there are no surprises for them – they get that if they’ve got it wrong, it’s death. damnation to be more precise.
so it is an active step made, considering the facts or understanding or belief or perception or whatever, away from that
there are many ‘christians’ on the other hand (and i use a small ‘c’ as i always do to depict people calling themselves ‘christian’ but not necessarily following Christ at all) who think they are ‘in’ and ‘making it’ and ‘on their way to heaven’ and ‘damnation-free’ and so on, but who are one day going to stand before God and be completely surprised when He says, “Depart from Me, I never knew you!” [Matthew 7, towards the end, bible downstairs, me upstairs]
they are doing the stuff, going through the rituals, hanging out at church, maybe listening to the music and watching the (awful) movies, walking what they suppose is the walk, but completely missing the point
and as i have been thinking about this whole situation, i think that i would rather have you actively choose to walk away from Christianity and become an atheist (or something else) than be lulled into a false sense of security, thinking you are a Christ-follower when you clearly (at least to God who sees all) are not
“I never knew you” speaks of relationship, not religious hoops – it’s not about you didn’t do enuff stuff or you didn’t get enough people saved or you didn’t attend enough religious meetings or you didn’t try harder – it’s that you missed the primary number 1 key aspect of being a follower of Jesus which is loving God with all your heart and soul and mind (closely followed by ‘and loving your neighbour as yourself’ – matthew 22)
i would, obviously, rather have you follow Jesus with me. after all He claimed to be “the Way and the Truth and the Life” and said that “No-one comes to the Father except through Me” [john 14.6] and that is what i believe and am chasing (and being challenged a lot lately that i need to be more focused on the remaining in Him and building relationship with Him than all the other stuff i get caught up in, so that all the other stuff can flow out of being in a strong place with Him) and would love for you to be a part of
but if you’re not. if you choose to walk away. and pursue something else (because please don’t walk away from Christ-following and just sit around apathetically and believe nothing!) then i would much rather have you do that, than call yourself a ‘christian’ while completely not believing in any of it, or living any of it, but just miserably continuing to live out some kind of sick meaningless pointless waste-of-time facade.
what’s it gonna be?
Does God agree with that sentiment? Revelation 3:16 (isn’t it cool how most 3:16 verses are pretty important?) says God would rather have us hot or cold, but lukewarmness gets puked out! Pretty graphic, but thats what it says. Hmmmmmm…
@Duncan: good verse, if that is what Jesus meant by being ‘cold’. See http://www.thefaithfulword.org/briefinterpretations.html; or this note from another site:
“Strikingly visible from Laodicea are the cliffs of Hierapolis, 100 metres high and over a kilometer long, glaring white from the overflow of the medicinal waters of the hot springs. A score of kilometers away was also Colossae, famed for its crystal cold waters. Yet Laodicea itself suffered from a mediocre, lukewarm and emetic water-supply – neither hot nor cold, and suitable only to be spat out (3.15-16).”
Maybe ‘cold’ still means useful, rather than anti-God?
Anyways, we can throw in 2 Tim 2.11-13 which compares God’s response to those who disown him versus those who are faithless. If someone has made a genuine decision for God and become faithless, is that still not better than someone who has disowned him? (In terms of end of the line stuff?)
The more i read about Atheists who have rejected Christianity, the more i see the similarity between them being a mindless, religious, jumping through hoops type Christianity that i attempt to stay ‘barge pole’ length away from. These guys reject their own notion of what it means to be Christian. They don’t understand what Christianity is actually about. The problem is: Anyone would reject the type of Christianity that they’ve been exposed to, and in a very strange way their own churches have inoculated them against true brand Christianity.
So firstly, as leaders we need to make sure that we aren’t offering them the ‘religious-do-the-same-thing-without-thinking-until-my-mind-turns-to-scrambled egg’ Christianity. But offer them what its truly about. Lets offer them the real deal
And secondly, i feel very strongly about this but don’t know how to make it happen. It is to confront those who are performing weekly anti Christian inoculations. I have loads of guys who I’m working with who have been baptized, catechized but definitely not Jesus-ized. The leaders of these guys churches boast in numbers, but they don’t realise that they are what’s making our job in introducing guys to the real Jesus, difficult. Most of the non Christians are missing out on what Jesus is really about, because they have rejected what other people have gotten wrong about who Jesus really is.
Lets get it right, and let Jesus radically mess the ‘World’ up for his sake. Let’s properly introduce Jesus to our guys.
I am so over our King being misrepresented!
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