Church? April 5, 2008
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left a very interesting post on her blog last week, which resulted in my leaving of a rather lengthy response, which I’ve posted here for your reading pleasure! (Does that violate blogging etiquette?) This is a discussion that my husband and I have been having for years, so please feel free to join in! I promise to not call you a religious-zelot of I disagree. 
Salud! H
I’ve grown up in church, and I’ve attended neat ones, and not so neat ones. I remember once as a teenager, I had on blue-toe-nail polish (back when that was cool), and this woman decided it was her duty to say something about it… I guess she thought blue toes were not pleasing to God.
I could get off on a tangent here, but I will resist the urge, and say that one of the best quotes I have heard recently is something John Piper said. It was something like, “To many people try to look at God through a microscope instead of a telescope; a microscope takes tiny things and makes them more clear, a telescope takes things that are huge, and reveals their details more clearly.”
I have a feeling that if we were all going to church on Sunday with a Telescope mentality, we wouldn’t be so concerned with the tempo of the music, or the fact that we thought someone’s skirt really should be two inches longer. We’d be to busy worshiping the creator of the Universe, to diligently combing the scriptures as we listened to the pastor, weighing his words against what God has written, eagerly anticipating being able to see more of our Savior.
Personally, I have to say that I love Christians. Mostly because we are commanded to love one another. But in my many, many years of being in church, I have certainly met my share of people who meet the world’s stereotype of judgmental, self-righteous busy-bodies.
It makes me really sad to see that church is very often the place we are most on-guard. It should be the one place where ANYONE can run, to grasp hold of love and hope and support in times of trouble and pain. And the place we most desire to be when we have rejoicing to do.
Please keep questioning! Maybe our generation will be able to right some of the wrongs we’ve noticed since we were tiny. Maybe we will trade microscopes for telescopes, and maybe we will get better at understanding love.
I’m writing a (pathetic) novel in which one of the main characters is a seriously tattooed, body-pierced Christian (she falls for a straight-laced evangelical type, or rather he falls for her…his mother is NOT pleased). At any rate it explores the church’s lack of acceptance of those with a different appearance. It’s a sad fact, but no reason for gloom. Christians have not been living up to Christ’s standards since the days of…well, of Christ. All the more reason to point people to Christ and to humbly acknowledge our own (and I am talking of myself here) failure to live up to his standards, which makes me really happy for Christ’s grace which is poured out upon me (pharisee and appearance lover that I wish I wasn’t, but if I’m honest, am!).
its what happens when preferences become more important than the main reason….well said….