I’ve become
a comfortable Christian and I’m uncomfortable with that.
About a
week ago, I went to a teen women’s Bible study. I remember we got off topic and
started talking about the call we have as Christians to spread the gospel, no
matter what opposition we may face.
One girl pointed out how so many of us fear
offending anyone with our beliefs that we keep Jesus to ourselves instead of
sharing His love. We don’t want to step out of our comfortable, Christian
bubble to reach someone out of fear of being offensive.
I started
to wonder: Have I become so comfortable as a Christian that I’m afraid of being
offensive?
A specific
example came to mind. In my English class, we read a spiritual autobiography. We
were doing group work and I found myself on the opposite spectrum of a debate. The
first part of the debate was about whether the voices the narrator heard were
demons or a side effect of her depression. The second part was about whether religion
saved her or was religion a defense mechanism to deal with her depression.
There was a
guy in my group who had a depressed parent and he argued that what his parent
went through was similar to the narrator. He disagreed with all of the
“religious nonsense,” as he called it, and made his case. I could tell he felt
strongly about the topic, so I mainly stayed quiet, as if I was neutral on the
matter.
But I
wasn’t.
Having gone
through depression myself, I felt my own connection to the narrator and came up
with my own ideas. My idea was that the devil used the depression to his
advantage. I also believed that though religion might have been a defense
mechanism, in the end, God was what truly saved the main character, just as He
saved me. Out of fear, though, that I would be offensive to the guy with the
depressed parent, I didn’t say much.
But I
should have.
Why was I
so afraid of being offensive? Isn’t that what happens when we disagree with
societal mainstream ideas, as Christianity seems to always do nowadays?
Or has it always
been like that?
As these
thoughts ran through my mind during Bible study, the same girl pointed out
something else that struck me. She said, “Jesus must have been the most
offensive person on Earth.”
I
completely agree.
Jesus was
so different from what everyone was expecting, that He constantly offended
people. He worked on the Sabbath. He sat with all kinds of people society
looked down on. He had “radical” ideas, so to speak.
Jesus was so bothersome to society
that He still offends people today!
But here’s
the thing. It wasn’t Jesus’ motive to offend people. It was the message He was giving. And that’s what I
think Christians, including myself, don’t understand sometimes. If we
respectfully spread Jesus’ message and people are offended as a result, that’s
their problem.
What matters is whether or not
we’re trying to be offensive.
I should’ve
realized that when I was in class. Obviously if I was trying to be offensive
and said something like, “Well, I think you’re wrong and your parent is wrong.
I’m right in believing this, so screw you,” then I’m sure even God would be
upset with me. But if I respectfully disagreed and simply pointed out my views,
even if no one agreed with me, I’m sure no one would have been offended.
And even if
someone were to be offended, it wasn’t like that would’ve been my intention.
God would’ve understood.
I’ve become too comfortable as a Christian. It’s
like I’ve accepted Jesus as my Savior and left it at that, but there’s so much
more to being a Christian. Spreading God’s message is part of Christianity,
even if it means stepping out of my comfort zone and risking being accidentally
offensive.
C.S. Lewis
put it best when he said, “If you want a religion to make you feel really
comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity” (“Quotes”).
I’ll keep that in mind next time God calls me
to step out of my Christian comfort zone again.
Sources:
“Quotes by C.S. Lewis.” Goodreads.com.
Goodreads, n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2014.
