Random Thoughts from Lit. Class

A quote by David James Duncan:
When I was thirteen and my brother was dying, a clergyman told me that if I prayed hard enough and with a pure enough heart, I could save my brother’s life. And then my brother died. This left me with serious questions about the pastor who told me those things, and about the purity of my own heart. So to the extent that I had bought the old time religion, I was guilt-ridden—I felt like I had been given an ideal that was impossible to live up to. But the older I grew, the more the ideal seemed like Swiss cheese religion—full of some serious holes. I couldn’t figure out, for instance, how to make God compassionate when all the people on the earth are only given one life and everyone is supposed to accept Jesus… It seemed to me that any God that I would believe in would have to be merciful. I felt that the God of my childhood was not merciful, and became an atheist, at least in terms of that God. I mean, I believe in God devoutly, but if Pat Robertson’s God is God, then I’m an atheist. I make a distinction between God and ‘God’.

David James Duncan wrote a book called the “River Why”. I had to read it for my English lit. class last week. The book takes place in Oregon and is basically about this young man’s spiritual journey as he finds God (or something like God). In general, I liked the book. It preached the normal Pacific Northwest Christianity, obsessed with nature and the natural world, focusing on a loving God without any judgment, a God that can basically become whatever anyone needs him/her to be. I didn’t agree with a lot of the spiritual aspects of the book. But that is really neither here nor there.

On Wednesday, when my professor brought in this interview with Duncan (quoted above) I started to think. In fact, I got so lost in thought that I didn’t bother paying attention for the rest of the class. The quote above made me, once again, wish that there was something else I could call myself besides a “Christian”. Because, very simply, I don’t want to be associated with the clergyman that told Duncan if he prayed hard enough his brother would live, or with Pat Robertson who proclaims that the earthquake in Haiti happened because the Haitian people had sold their souls to the devil.

How often does the Church drive people away by casting judgment, making snap decisions about people, or by petty arguing? And please don’t think that I am not guilty of this as well. I have messed up plenty in the Church, especially while in leadership positions. The thought that I might have driven someone from the Church is a constant in my life.

I have been a part of a church that went through a church-split. I know how devastating it can be. What would a visitor to the church have thought the Sunday when three pastors read resignation letters at my former church? I pray that they would have found somewhere else to worship, a church that was healthy. But what if they didn’t? What if that one event was enough to drive them to leave the Church for good?

Is the Body of Christ really a welcoming place? It should be. Everyone should be welcome regardless of race, political opinions, theology, past mistakes, or sexual orientation. Now, before anyone freaks out… There is a difference between welcoming someone into the Body of Christ as Jesus would, and being tolerant of blatantly unbiblical behavior.* Jesus came to sinners; there is no prerequisite for becoming a Christian. So why do we sometimes act as if people must first clean up their lives and THEN become Christians? We as a body of Christ certainly still have a lot of cleaning-up to do in our lives. Why should we expect others to uphold standards that we ourselves can’t maintain?

The 2nd greatest commandment is to “love your neighbor as yourself”. Is the Church really doing this? The way we treat each other matters to God. And it matters to people outside the Church. If people on the outside look into the Church and see only a squabbling, hypocritical, and judgmental group, then why would they want anything to do with our God?


~Laura

*I’m not in anyway saying that within the church we should accept certain behaviors. However, there is a difference between being judgmental and correcting in a loving manner. This is a difficult thing to do, and I personally think that if we aren’t completely sure (and by that I mean, you need to be able to point to a specific verse) then we have no right to tell someone their actions are wrong. God is the ONLY judge. And once again, I am not trying to say that I am above reproach on any of these matters. Just by writing this I am in some ways being hypocritical. I am a sinner, that is saved by undeserved Grace.