Rant #1,000,004

I haven't ranted in a long time.
It's definitely time.
We've been going through the Nooma Videos in our life-group.
It has brought up a lot of thoughts lately.
We watched "Sunday" last week and somehow got talking about how Jesus tells us to "come as we are" to the Gospel.

How have so many churches and so many Christians lost this??
We want the unsaved in our church, but we want the "moral unsaved".
They're safe.
We don't want someone in ragged clothes, withdrawing from drugs, and knocked up walking in.
And we certainly don't want to be seen talking to them.
How did we get this way?
Jesus said "COME AS YOU ARE".
Not as you will be after your saved and your whole life is changed.
But as you are now.
Bring all your crap.
Bring all your sins.
Bring all your failures.
Don't be afraid of what all the self-righteous bigoted people around you are thinking- Just come.
It breaks my heart when people expect non Christ followers to clean up before they can come to Jesus.
Isn't it supposed to be the other way?
Aren't we supposed to bring all of our baggage to lay at Jesus' feet?

I know I'm ranting.

It just annoys me to no end to see Christians take such "conservative" stands on things just because they're scared to step out and open their minds that maybe Jesus wasn't as conservative as they deem him be. He was friends with the whores and the crooks. Did he condone this? Absolutely not. But he had the balance figured out to love them, show his disapproval to their current actions, and by His grace help them change. I know that we're finite and it is a whole lot more difficult for us to do that than it was for Jesus- but should we hide away from these people with false superiority just because they're not who we think they should be? Maybe we're not who we're supposed to be- and we know Jesus.

How are the unsaved supposed to walk in the light when they have never seen the light?

It would be like giving someone in the dark a candle and not giving them anything to light it with.

We become utterly useless to a lost and dark world when we're too self-righteous to humble ourselves and go into the dark a little bit to help them see the light that Jesus gave us...

I'm done.

"I am a whore...I do confess..
I put you on just like a wedding dress
and run down the aisle..."
-Derek Webb