But They're Not Like Us

There has always been an attitude within certain sectors of Society, both Globally, Nationally and Locally, that if someone is different to, 'me', there must be something wrong with, 'them'.

Down through human history this has led to conflicts, sometimes terrible conflicts, resulting in massive loss of life.

These differences can arise for a number of reasons: place of birth, colour of skin, the language spoken, different beliefs, different philosophies, etc.  The list is almost endless.  The saddest incidents of these 'differences' arises within the very arena where they should be rarest:  the arena of Christian belief.  Let me explain.  

Christianity, as a faith-based system, is rooted in the Holy Bible, a Book of books:  actually 66 books in all, telling the story of creation, the stories of God's and Creation's interaction through Millennia which lead to the Ultimate interaction, that of God sending his Son, Jesus Christ, to die for the redemption of a broken creation having turned bad as personified in the Human Race.

From the moment that the first humans disobeyed God, and Sin entered the world, it has infected our Humanity, our very DNA, and there has been conflict.  Even, sadly, where the two Sons of those first humans had a conflict, and one Son killed the other.

That first act of, free-will rooted disobedience, resulted in the whole of creation being broken, from that moment.  And it is this broken creation, in which we all live, which causes all the conflict we see every day.  And it is this broken creation which seems to be constantly over-looked when we come to consider all our conflict initiating differences, and none more tragic than how we treat each other.

OK, so now we come to the core of this article.  How we Christians, view, respond to, and treat those we find are different to ourselves.  How the, 'Me' is different to the, 'Them’, particularly, in the 21st Century, how we view certain groups of, 'Them', the ‘Others’.

One of the favourite targets, and there are others, of certain Christian groups are members of the LGBT+ community.  An example being the Westboro Baptist church in America, one of whose favourite placards proclaims, 'God Hates Fags'. This church also targets many other groups, as well as other churches.  It really is a hate group.  Sadly though, their hate-filled rhetoric and messages towards the LGBT+ community, in particular, seems to have influenced many churches, and many  Christians groups.  But of course, this hatred towards, ‘Others’, this ‘otherness’ is not new.

So lets start with the question: Does God Hate People?

Being part of a broken creation, we are all born into a sinful world.  Sin lives in us all, and it is who we are.  And it is this Sin, this terrible disease if you like, that fills us and leads us to do sinful things.  And that is what God hates.  And the only way to deal with this disease of Sin that consumes us was to offer his Son as a sacrifice, which is what happened when Christ was hung on a cross to die more then 2000 years ago.  And all this happened because God Loves us and wants us to be free of the disease of the Sin he hates.  He did it not because he hates us, but because he hates what has become of us because of Sin and because he loves us and wants to rescue us from that which he hates.  God does not hate us. God loves us.

But we are still part of a broken creation, and we still do things that are wrong.  But because God loves us, and Jesus died for us on that cross, we have a pathway to be washed clean of all the horrible things that Sin can still do to us. 

You may have come across the argument used by many people to condemn people who are Trans-sexual (or Trans), Homosexual (Gays) etc. and you may often hear the argument, 'God made them Male and Female - END OF!’  But what those people forget, or have failed to understand is that, the moment Sin came in, ALL of creation,  I repeat, ALL of creation became broken.

From that point onwards everything we did, thought, said, wished for etc., became tainted.  Nothing was, or is, how it should have been, nor how it should be.

And this leads us to another very important consideration.  Not only is the whole of creation broken Spiritually, it is also broken Physically and Biologically and some of that is down to us.

In 1996, some 30 years after Rachel Carson's book, 'The Silent Spring' was published, another book was published, called, 'Our Stolen Future'. One of the outstanding things in the book was the discovery that Man-made chemical hormone changing molecules have now permeated every living person on the planet.  Even isolated and remote Northern Inuit peoples are contaminated.  This had led to, in some people, deep psychological, physiological and Biological changes.  So people may be born with bodily defects that are a direct result of these human made chemical contaminations.

So it is really no surprise that a person may be born 'Male' and yet feel they're  'Female', or vice versa.  Or they may be born with two sets of genitalia, or none.  And the list goes on.

Because we are all part of a broken creation, we should not be judging, criticising, ostracising or condemning anyone.  As Christians, or as I prefer to say, Christ Followers, we need to heed Jesus' words in the Bible: Matthew chapter 7 verses 1-3 'Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?

It is humbling to acknowledge that we are all broken people, and in no position to set ourselves as judges of others.

Remember, as Christ Followers, Love Others. 

The Conflict of Light and Dark

Ever since the first episode of Star Wars lit up the cinema screens (that would be Star Wars iv), and audiences almost universally had a sharp intake of breath, theological controversy has dogged the heels of the saga.

I clearly recall learned Christian articles, and a few books, that were written around the time, as dismissing the concept of a ‘Force’ being made up of the ‘Light’ and the ‘Darkness’, in a constant struggle to bring a ‘Balance’, as dodgy Eastern, Yin & Yang philosophy.  Pretty much all of orthodox Christian thought dismissed Star Wars’  theological universe as un-Christian, un-biblical and, well let’s say, spiritually unhealthy.

But, as a Christian, of some 50 years at time of writing, the debate has long intrigued me.  From an early age, I have always enjoyed Sci-Fi: Asimov, Arthur C. Clark, Van Vogt, John Wyndham, Star Trek, etc., the list is long and glorious, but when I became a Christian in 1966 at one of the Billy Graham meetings in London, Sci-Fi was laid aside as the Bible became my main reading. 

Later (1980) my wife and I went to Bible College, and the irony is that the intense Bible studies led me to places in the Bible along paths less trod; places rarely ventured, and verses rarely, if ever, preached upon.  And it was here, in the somewhat dusty corners of the book of Isaiah (45^th Chapter, 7^th verse) that I was effectively smacked in the face by this: 

I form the light and create darkness,

I bring prosperity and create disaster;

I, the Lord (aka God), do all these things.

I underlined the words in my Bible, knowing there was something contained within them, something extraordinary, which I couldn’t get my head round at the time, and even now, all these years later, still rocks me to the core of my faith. I tried to shut them out, but they kept coming back to challenge me, and I kept trying to ignore them.

The reason I desperately tried to ignore these words in Isaiah was because of this date, some three years earlier: Tuesday 27th December 1977, the day Star Wars was released in the UK.  Naturally, when it came to our local cinema in Essex, some time later, early 1978 I think, we (my wife and I) went to see it, and, yes, we had a sharp intake of - w0w - at the opening scene. 

Of course, the film was amazing.  Loved every moment of it.  Acknowledged the Yin & Yang philosophy, ignored it, as it went against the last 11 years of Christian teaching I had received, and got on with life, hoping the next film wouldn’t be too long in coming.

This Christian teaching (I am no theologian by the way) can loosely be summed up as follows:  the Lord God is high over all, God is good and God created everything and is in control of everything.  Evil (aka Sin, Darkness) entered the world because an Angel, Lucifer, aka The Devil, rebelled against God and he and his followers were banished to Earth from Heaven.  To sort out the resulting mess, God sent his Son, Jesus, to die for all our Sin.  All those who follow Jesus will be saved and live forever.  Yes, I know we could discuss this for a century or two, and many have and do, but let’s move on.

Indeed let’s move on, and go back to the future (another great film!), and those words in Isaiah’s book.  ‘I form the light and create darkness,  I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord (aka God), do all these things.’

Brain freeze, red alert, DEFCON 5........

As a child grows, and as they eventually make their own way in the world, they will discover for themselves what they believe to be true about everything; the world, the universe, body, mind spirit and soul. Sometimes they will naturally rebel against the core beliefs of those who raised them.  I found that, being faced with something which is in the Bible, but fundamentally shakes that core belief, leads to conflicting possibilities:  If the Bible is true, then it conflicts with everything I had been taught about everything.  So I choose to ignore that which caused this fundamental conflict.

But, as I have said, it kept on coming back over the years, and still does. 

Here then is the tough bit.  If, as Star Wars’ philosophy, which is basically rooted in Eastern Philosophy, contends, there is a ‘Force’ and that there is a ‘Darkness’ and there is a ‘Light’, and these two ‘sides’, Light and Darkness, are in constant conflict, do not those words begin to look very much like those words from the Bible’s book of Isaiah?  Are they not, indeed, saying the same thing, just under different names?

This view, if we go with it for a moment, makes a lot more sense of what we see and experience of the world around us:  the goodness balanced against the badness, The Light balanced against the Dark.  It also starts to put a different perspective on why doesn’t God simply stop all the bad things from happening?  Why?  If there is the need for a world both of Light and Darkness, in the same way that there is Day and Night, if this need is fundamentally part of the whole thing, then the significance might just blow all our home-brewed Christian theologies and philosophies clear out of the waters of our fundamental Christian belief.

There is an interesting moment in the first Matrix film.  Morpheus is confronted by Agent  Smith.

Agent Smith: “Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery.”

Maybe we are, at a deep and fundamentally level, only able to function within  a world of conflict between Light and Dark.  Is this what those shocking words in Isaiah mean?

Where then is Christian faith?  I still, in the face of this, deeply believe in Jesus as my Saviour.  I still believe there is a God, who made the Universe, and who loves me at a level I have no hope of truly understanding.  

Everything I have experienced in the last 50 years proves, deeply in my very being and soul, that God loves me.  Do I understand it all, how it all fits together and what are the deeper implications? No, and I would venture to suggest that after some 2000 years of debate and learned theological discourse, of myriad writings, of a million songs and of untold questioning, that no-one else does either. 

In the Bible, The Book of Hebrews, 11^th Chapter 1^st verse are these words - Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.  

The whole chapter is about what can be done, and was done, because of faith, even when people didn’t understand what was going on and could only see darkness rather than light.

And that is what faith is really about, isn’t it?

  

Faith Journey

A piece I wrote on the Faith Journeys website.

It's the early 60s. The Beatles were the new kids on the Merseysound block, I had just started an engineering apprenticeship and had met my first Christian. Of course, I didn't know he was a Christian. As far as I was concerned he was a religious nut who blathered on and on about God and Jesus. However, although I didn't realise it at the time, meeting him put my feet firmly on the faith path, and my first destination was just over the horizon.

Two years later he had nagged me into submission and I went along with him, and a whole coachload of young people, to hear Billy Graham at Earls Court, London. It is 1966, and reluctantly I find myself standing in front of the charismatic American saying the sinner's prayer. The Holy Spirit had fished another one from the waves.

Going to the small Brethren hall for the first time was a cultural shock. I managed a few weeks, but I didn't own a suit, and I felt uncomfortable in this weird environment. I left and joined the young conservatives (not such a cultural shock!) learned guitar, formed a folk duo and managed to avoid God stuff for a year. But the Holy Spirit still had his fish-hook in me and began reeling me in. The folk duo split and the attraction of the Young Conservatives faded. So after a year of invites to a young people Bible study, I RSVP'd a, yes, and got back on the faith-track.

It was at that Bible study I began to learn what being a Christian was about. It was also the place where I met my future wife,Jan. At the time of writing (2010) we have been married 38 years! Nice one God!

The next few years saw me involved in a coffee-bar evangelistic team, a couple of local churches, getting engaged, an outreach rock band, getting married, buying a house and then.....

..... all our furniture is stacked around us. We're sleeping on the floor of an old house in Birmingham. Our house is sold, the bridge is burnt and we're at Bible College. How did we get here? Another destination along the path, and this path is straight up a really steep learning curve. The journey along this bit of the path was, and remains, 30 years later, a priceless spiritual experience at the feet of men and women of God who led us to places we would never have visited in a local church situation.

Faith in God is easier when things are going well. Real faith grows when you have nowhere to turn, except toward God. Many times at College we find ourselves praying that our Father will meet our different needs. Money to buy food; we never go hungry, healings, guidance, spiritual insight, courage.

The water of a number of different jobs and different churches flows under the bridges over the next few years. We now have a Son, Joel. We work together at a Christian outdoor centre and then we move to the North-West, to the Wirral, and I work for a few different Christian charities. In the local church we belong to, we are involved in home-group leadership, diaconate, worship group, worship leading, preaching, teaching, sunday school. The steep learning curve in Birmingham pays dividends.

Then the local church falls on hard times. There are three huge leadership splits and traumas. We wonder should we stay. God says stay. We stay, but often find ourselves caught in the middle as people take sides. But from the middle, sometimes, the view is clearer. We are able to see things others don't, but it doesn't prevent the traumas, but God does reveal some of the spiritual truth behind what is happening. At the end of it all God says it is time to go. We join with the ex-Pastor building a new fellowship; a fellowship which will do things differently. The difference lasts a few months. It isn't working. We leave.

But now our pathway starts to lead in a strange direction. For the first time in decades we realise our path is leading away from the institutionalised church we have been used to, have been an integral part of, and could never imagine being outside of. And this is where we find ourselves now, still continuing along the path of faith, still following Jesus, still fellowshipping with other Christians, but not aligned to a building, denomination or institution. We are openly involved with the body of Christ - which is what 'Church' really is - but not behind brick walls, not under some man-made idea of 'church'.

The journey continues. Already there have been new and interesting destinations, but the ultimate destination is still over the horizon. But in the dark sky of this fallen world, its glow is now brighter as each day passes, and we keep our eyes fixed in that one direction. End of the path? The New Jerusalem!