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Grimly Christian
04.14.2007 by Tim Reed
Last week at church one of my congregants made the comment that he was listening to Larry King and agreed with him that one of the major errors Christians have made is allowing things like the Easter bunny to creep into Easter.
I disagree.
First, just let me say that I understand that things like the Easter bunny and Santa Claus, if taken as the reason to celebrate can turn a celebration of Jesus into a celebration of chocolate and gifts. But, I also don’t think that’s anywhere close to as huge an error as being Grimly Christian.
We probably all know someone who is Grimly Christian. Generally its someone who seems to take things like the Easter bunny, wearing proper clothing and Sunday School Attendance as salvation issues. To give you an example there used to be a minister in the area who would yell at people to sit down from the pulpit when they would get up to use the restroom, even if they were older, or younger, or he was rolling up on an hours worth or sermonizing. Want to know if someone is Grimly Christian? Well that’s pretty easy. On Sunday morning look around and try to spot someone who isn’t laughing or smiling (of course the lack of smiling and laughing doesn’t automatically make them Grimly Christian, after all it is early and the coffee and donuts may not have hit their blood stream yet) and tell them a joke, or even better, tell them a joke involving Jesus, or one that is self-effacing. For example:
A rather pompous deacon was teaching a children’s Sunday school class, and asked the kids, “Why would people look at me and think I’m a Christian?” One small child looked up and answered, “Because they don’t know you?”
Its even better if you can take a shot at the denomination you’re a part of, this is a great one for our Baptist readers.
What is the difference between a Baptist and a terrorist? You can negotiate with a terrorist!
If the person in question laughs he’s not Grimly Christian. If he says “that’s not funny” he’s also not Grimly Christian as he’s clearly indicated he knows what a joke is. If all you get is a cold glare, then you’ve got a live one.
Now lets be clear, the Grim Christian is a Christian (he’s just Grim), and he’s going to be at church every Sunday morning, and Wednesday evening, and will speak up in Sunday School, and may even be leading Sunday school class (God forbid!) and will be volunteering for VBS, and whatever else his church does (or at least whatever else his church has done since he was a child).
So why in the world would I say that Grim Christianity would be a bigger problem than secular practices creeping into Christian holidays? Well, first, take a gander at this:
That’s what Christianity does, makes you hate yourself. To be a Christian, one must believe that their self, their essential self is bad. Christianity takes away the natural exuberance from life. That’s what happened to me as a child, and I spent the next 20 years trying to make peace with the angry sky-god I was told about as a young child. Finally something in me snapped, and I said “ENOUGH!”. The last 10 years have been a search for self and truth. I will not go back to the mental slavery and self-hate that has so colored my life.
I am now trying to get back what was stolen from me years ago.
This is why Grim Christianity is a threat. This is what stone faced, humorless, grimacing, Grim Christians do to people, especially when they end up in leadership. Grim Christians understand salvation, and they understand sin, oh do they understand sin, but they miss completely the results of salvation. Take that last quote and compare it to these verses:
The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.
- John 10:10After this interview the wise men went their way. And the star they had seen in the east guided them to Bethlehem. It went ahead of them and stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were filled with joy!
- Matthew 2:9-11I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!
- John 15:11
The results of salvation is not Grimness, it is joy and life.
Or take the central idea of the writer that the essential self is a terrible thing. This is not the message of scripture (although the message of scripture is that the essential self has been twisted by sin, but more on that in a moment).
So God created human beings in his own image… Then God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was very good!
- Genesis 1:27, 31For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.
- Ephesians 2:10You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body
and knit me together in my mother’s womb.
Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!
Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.
- Psalm 139:13-14
Do these scriptures indicate that God has created humans in a way that is so awful that each of us should be hating ourselves? In fact, as we take a look at scripture we see that only through Christ can the essential self truly be revealed, because its only through Christ that the destructive effects of sin can be rolled back to reveal who we really are, and it is only through Christ the self has the freedom to be exactly what God intended it to be.
Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God’s grace.
- Romans 6:14For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
- 2 Corinthians 3:17
A church full of Grim Christians can never, ever communicate these things. Grim Christians exchange the freedom and life that Christ died to give them here, on earth, right now for soul crushing guilt and obligation that has to be endured for the sake of eternity. That’s not what Christ came to do, that’s not what the scriptures teach, and that’s not how God created us or meant for us, so when someone writes earlier about leaving Christianity because it has caused him to hate himself we shouldn’t be surprised because the very nature that God has created us with, and the Spirit that He’s sent to us don’t agree at all.
Hattip: Jolly Blogger
Grim Christian bait
April 14th, 2007 at 3:45 pm
Well put.