the Intersect community

Pastor Bill Shuler recently wrote an article titles “Ten Ways America Can Become Post-Christian.” I think we’re already there, and this was the road that got us there.

1. Reduce your prayer life to blessing your meals.

2. Embrace a form of religion over Jesus.

3. Win arguments but lose people.

4. Choose which parts of the Bible you want to believe — and discard the rest.

5. Don’t share your faith so as not to offend.

6. Dilute the message to gain a wider audience.

7. Embrace success and forget the poor.

8. Get uncomfortable around the unchurched.

9. Keep the Bible on the shelf.

10. Keep Jesus in stained glass.

Through the generations Jesus’ followers have established schools, hospitals and orphanages. They have reminded the world that man is not an end unto himself.

The call now goes out to a new generation. The Scriptures declare, “You are the salt of the earth…the light of the world…Let your light so shine before men that they will see your good deeds and praise your Father in Heaven.”

You know, there are some things that really matter to me, and a lot that really doesn’t. This is true for just about every part of life for me. I love planting veggies and different types of fruit in the garden – there’s the weeding that has to happen that I’m not a huge fan of, but it helps the veggies and fruit to really thrive.

If I concentrate on the planting and that’s it, it doesn’t matter how great my planting was, if I don’t weed, the plants will be choked by the weeds and I have no harvest. I love the harvest, therefore I weed.

Probably a bad analogy, but I sort of think of this principle when I think about theology sometimes. People can really get wrapped around some doctrinal things and can’t seem to get away from them. Some of it is important to be sure – but some of it just isn’t.

I think there is some theology that just isn’t that important, and some of it is just bad theology anyway. I like to look at the fruit of different types of theology. People who have certain belief systems tend to exhibit certain behaviors.

People who have an escapist view of theology (pre-trib, pre-mill) tend to not care as much about social issues, and certainly not environmental issues. Why??? Because the earth is just going to burn up anyway, and Jesus is probably going to come back tomorrow (as a friend of mine likes to say) so why care?? I mean we’re commanded to take care of this place which for all of the ways we’ve tried to destroy it, it is STILL God’s creation. (I’m just using this particular eschatological viewpoint as an example, and understand that I’m painting with a broad brush, not all are like this).

I guess I’m saying that theology has consequences, and beyond just a blind faith that what you believe is “right”, I would say it might not hurt to judge theology by the fruit that you see exhibited in the lives of the people holding a particular viewpoint.

All in all, there are many things I have been taught theologically that I don’t particularly hold to now, partly because maybe I have studied further and have been corrected, and partly because I don’t see Godly fruit on the theological tree. Some of the most “theologically correct” people I know, have also been some of the most uncaring, unloving, judging and isolating people, along with being the most unlike Jesus I know.

There’s probably more questions than answers in this post, and maybe that’s good. I’m still searching for truth and will until I am with Christ.

Until I become “theologically correct” I will be working on living out Matthew 25 – doesn’t seem like it would hurt =)