I slightly regret the post before this one. I lost sight of where I was going and let my angry view of people take over. I have waited a while to post to see if I could even bring the focus back to where I was originally going. I don't I remember it, but after reading what I put I have a good thing to say. Well a couple of good things to say.
1st. My apology.
I did want to be brutally honest about how I feel about churches today but I think there is a major difference between honesty and angry honesty (if that works). I do not know why I have always had this negative attitude towards larger churches. I have never even been a member of one. I have only gone once in a blue moon with people but every time I go I cannot look past all of the materialistic things. I will stop right here before I start it up again. Let us all be honest really fast.
Church is a business...and business is freaking booming. BUT....
These corporations do service a lot of good into our communities. They raise money, spend it on others(sometimes), they hire a staff to work and make money who may not have had a job...there is a huge list of the good and the bad...
I am sorry for assuming that everyone who attends a larger church is not gaining something out of it. I do not know them or how they feel inside. I know that some people go to a larger church for status and others because they genuinely enjoy it. Who am I to condemn them for not seeing or viewing things how I see them? So there is my apology. Every church is great and terrible.
2 more things.
I do hate it when someone uses a sports analogy to analyze their relationship with God. Or even better...some analogy about exercising and God. So I am going to go above and beyond those people and use music (cause that is my sports, exercise, and all other dumb analogies).
"Look Closer"
I have posted some of these lyrics before. I will just take a couple out because they always make me think.
"Cause we are all born into a control mindset,
God/money makes a death threat on ethics,
Governed by greed and a stale routine.
Can we just justify the means if we're plugged in?
We all need to wake up cause we've been detached for too long.
We need to deprogram from shifting with the public eye.
We have a right to question why, re-sensitize and look closer."
Just pretty much sums up "Christian culture". You are born into this mindset that sets you apart from non-believers (of course this is not everyone). Greed and stale routine...we have all experienced. Detached for too long from the basic principle. The easiest thing to understand out of the Bible. Jesus. And yes we do have a right to question why.
"Get schooled, get married, get it on. Start a family. Hurry. Move along.
They want to benign complacency. This is where we start to look closer."
Yep. Just...yep.
The last thing I want to tell you I have forgotten for a while. That is the simple concept of "God is everywhere...and he will use anyone and anything to present himself. Sure "christians" represent "followers of Christ". But God will and does use everyone whether they know it or even want it or not. I have had more meaningful relationships with nonbelievers and it felt right. I know God has used me for them, but I feel like he has used them for me more.
And no matter how I feel about a person or a church, he uses them for good as well.
Random side note. My friends are amazing. I would never pick and choose over them. I feel like we were all connected for some reason. Good times.
Love you.
-CAW
