rapid-fire conversion and making a fool of God ..

recently a preacher spoke to conversion, making the point that it is a process ..

well. many in my old circle would have lost it right there

she did go on to say that there is a place of conversion, where the person recognizes Jesus, so if they had stayed through the sermon they would have gotten there, and their anger might have been assuaged somewhat ..

(and yes, i said 'she')

..

i think of all the good people running around with a date in their mind, that particular moment they 'went forward' and 'got saved' ..

God bless 'em all

i think of the reductionism of conversion-into-disciple that took the place of serious inquiry and struggle with the spirit of God, a palliative for the rapid-fire mentality of the developed world, and the un-understandable desire of preachers and churches to count coup, to add to the membership role, the baptism brag, the tithe pool

and .. hang on a minute .. i'm getting sick .. .

..

somehow Jesus' 3 years of presence here was shrunk to a piece of paper the size of a dollar bill sporting verses, with the promise of salvation for the reader

i don't for a minute think that people can;t be saved by reading a tract .. God will use whatever's available in God's pursuit of the human soul

but to reduce the gospel to a blip is to seriously threaten God's wisdom and the mystery hidden for ages, but now revealed to us by the prophets ..

we've traded the bread of life for fast food

and the result is people who are fooled by what the tele preacher said was escape from hell .. he lied ..

the romans road became a quick fix for both the chuch's membership role and the unmistakable ache in the soul for the missing link between God and human

quick fixes might do the deed in the short-run, but what about next year, what about the change that represents the fruit, the maturity that flows out of fellowship and prayer and meditation on the scriptures .. 

you can't 'tract' those .. they require passion and effort and discipline and communication and chasing-after and response to the Spirit tugging at the corners of the soul ..

..

we had a discussion over dinner about the reduction of reading to shortened sentences, simplified by periods and commas, many in the wrong places. no-one wants to read a 'long sentence anymore, so we chop them-up into bites.. even the bibles are like that now

it's not that the older writings were complicated - think of all these people reading college-level texts on biology and philosophy and law and .. wait .. how come they can't understand the scriptures in well-structured sentences ..

it's flippant, is what it is

we flip from facebook to internet searches to blips and bites on this and that and .. it's like we can't sit still

we have national ants-in-the-pants syndrome

..

question is, how much does a person really care about the call of Jesus to be a disciple

if you want to know what that involves then, for goodness' sake, read the gospels !

but, if christianity is something to be displayed on bumper stickers and tattoos, something that we cover sunday at 11:00, something we do when we 'say grace' at a restaurant to let everyome know we are christian .. 

then why bother with the cost of following Jesus, the cost he counselled us to count before we step into the street to follow him

ahmmm ... don't bother if that's not in your vocabulary - waste of time

really, it is

just forget it, and go get on with your life

'cause conversion absolutely is a process, a life-long process of following, maturing into the image of Jesus

absolutely

listen, my friend, there is such a thing as falling from grace, as insulting the spirit of God, as counting the blood by which you were redeemed as a light thing, trampling on the son of God ..

God is not a fool ..

God is love

God is merciful

God is longsuffering

but God is not a fool, so we need to stop treating the things of God as if they are really inconsequential and don't require much of us 

like a gym membership, or monday night football

if we are really concerned about the things of God and who God is and who Jesus is and what christian is, then we need to serious-up and behave like it ..

we need to commit to it

to struggle with it

take the time to consult God, communicate with the divine

the preacher was right

conversion IS a process

and it calls for commitment and passionate pursuit of this man Jesus we claim is our saviour ..

or we better be checking whether we're fooling ourself

'cause we sure aren't fooling God

peace to you