I posted a few days ago that my father-in-law (Allen) had passed away. It has been a very hard time for my family. It has also been very interesting to me. Allen was a unique man. He was one of the very few people I ever met who was completely devoted to his church, yet his life was not centered around it.

Allen battled cancer for 10 years. In that time he took every available opportunity to let God use the cancer in him as a witness to others. His devotion to his church meant we didn’t always see eye to eye. He thought he was the person he was because of his church and I thought he was the man he was in spite of his church. Either way I respected him a great deal.

It is the opposing ideas that Allen and I had of what made him the man he was that I found to be so interesting during his visitation. Allen was very well known and loved by people both in his church and outside it. For that reason there were lots and lots of visitors. I watched them. I listened to them. I can’t say that I was amazed by the things that I heard, but I was disappointed.

Look first at some of the quotes from the people he went to church with:

He was at church every Sunday.
He never missed Sunday School.
He was always at the Men’s Prayer Breakfast.
He sure loved his church.
He always gave his tithes.

Now look at some of the quotes I heard from those who don’t go to church:

I have never met a more loving person.
I became a Christian because of Allen.
Allen always loved me no matter what.

There were many more on both sides. That gives you an idea though.

Let’s try to look at these statements as dispassionately as we possibly can. Maybe it would help to get the mindset that you are an alien with no knowledge of the human race, Christianity, or anything. What would the statements you heard say to you about Christians and non Christians?

Looking at that way is actually very scary. It says that Christians care only about their special little club with all it’s rules, rituals and activities centered around a building. It says that nothing is more important than supporting your club with your time and money. In other words, everything is all about the building and the things that happen inside it and very little about about anything outside it.

On the flip side what does this say about non Christians? It seems they are more concerned with the type of life you live. They are concerned with the example you set in front of others.

Is this really the image that Christians want others to see? It seems this is just the mindset and religious junk that caused Jesus to so despise the religious leaders of his day. Yet it permeates today’s Christianity.

I hope someday the culture of Christianity will wake-up and realize what arrogant narcissists we look like to the rest of the world. I hope that someday Christians will realize that we should be the ones leading the charge on issues involving love, compassion, and social justice instead of hiding in our churches away from the big, bad, scary world. If that day ever comes I pray Christians also find the courage and desire to make real changes.

This world could use many more Christians like Allen. Whether because of or in spite of church he was one of the finest examples of Jesus a person could ever meet.