Saturday, August 13, 2005

Do we preach the "Jesus of Suburbia"?

At Odyssey Chris writes about the worship among North American Christians of the "Jesus of Suburbia":

... their Jesus has been fashionably refashioned to be the god of safety. "Jesus died to get me to heaven." "Jesus wants me to get others to heaven." "Jesus blesses the guns and bombs and planes and policies that keep me safe and happy until I get there." So much of this non-Christian Christianity is really about creating a safe world where I'll never have to love my enemy, deny myself my creature comforts, or die as a witness to Jesus Christ. This is a gospel but it is not the Gospel.

Week after week, year after year we break open the Text among our people, disentangling a worldly Christianity from the tales, fables, myths of a broader culture that is too often the real text we all hear and obey. And while we preach, we preachers are disentangled too--for none of us can hope to live safe from the entanglements of so many alluring counterfeits that masquerade as the real thing.
Preachers, are we up to the challenge?

2 Comments:

Blogger Keith Brenton said...

Somehow this reminds me of the exchange between Mr. Beaver and the children about Aslan the lion in the Chronicles of Narnia ... "Safe? 'Course he's not safe. But he's good."

10:49 AM, August 15, 2005  
Blogger Milton Stanley said...

Amen!

2:19 PM, August 15, 2005  

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