Christianity Should Not Be Comfortable

I'm uncomfortable with Christianity.
There's so much brokenness in this world, and how do you deal with that as a Christian?

Not as a “go to church, memorize the bible verses” Christian, but as a true Christian, as a follower of Christ, as a disciple.

Are we supposed to be hiding from the pain? Pretending it doesn't exist? Pretending that the sex trade market is a scam? That rape is just something we only hear about on the news? That mothers aren't weeping over the senseless violence in their community that has robbed them of their children? That children aren't starving to death as orphans while we pick out the onions in our sandwiches purchased in a store dedicated only to selling food?

And to be clear, I'm desensitized to the brokenness and I ignore it. Sometimes because I can't deal with the pain, sometimes because I don't want to face the reality that brokenness that vast exists.

But that doesn't give us, including myself, a reason to ignore it. Never.

We can't blame the news for showing us so many pictures of people being shot at that gun violence doesn't bother us. We can't blame all the UNICEF adds about starving children for the lack of care we feel in our hearts for suffering people we don't know.

It's uncomfortable to think about, it's uncomfortable to realize and it's important to realize that this makes you uncomfortable.

Christianity should make you feel uncomfortable.

You should feel uncomfortable in a world where the best and brightest country is ranked based on the size of its army and the amount of weapons it possesses.

You should feel uncomfortable that Jesus said “blessed are the peacemakers” and asked us to “love our enemies as ourselves” while we send men and women out to foreign places to murder enemies we don't even know the names of.

And I feel like it should be so simple, so easy to figure out what to do as a Christian, but it's not.
I try to put my faith in God, and I try to put my faith in his words.
And I listen to other Christians who try do the same, but teachings get lost, or labeled as unimportant. We make up reasons why Christ would want Americans to go to Iraq and Iran to start a war. But, let's not kid ourselves here.

Would the man who said “turn the other cheek” and asked a known murderer of Christians to follow him, to be his disciple, really be running around with a gun strapped to his back?

I mean, that annoying slogan is everywhere, “What Would Jesus Do?”

It's annoying, because sometimes you can't know exactly what Jesus would do, but then again, sometimes it applies very well to real life.

So, would Jesus:
-Blow up a community?

-Pretend pain doesn't exist?

-Keep all the food and money to himself?
-Not let people into his life?

-Build barriers and walls around his country to keep the vagrants out?
Are these really things Christ would do?
It's hard to not conform to the patterns of the world when the Church of your faith so often conforms to the pattern of the world.

I get it, we're lost.

I'm lost.

I'm not going to hide anything here.

I sin constantly. I'm greedy, I don't share everything I could, I keep my head down when I walk past the homeless downtown and I mostly look at for myself and the occasional close friend.

I like to pretend that there aren't people suffering right now, that my life is the most important and that God would want me to have that shirt made in a sweat shop in China so I can look the part of a good, Christian girl, but who am I kidding here?

I'm a mess.

I am so unbelievably broken and terrible.
It amazes me that God even has a plan for my life because my heart is so hardened and wretched, that it doesn't seem possible.

And I think more Christians need to realize this.
That we as a whole, as a community, in our Churches, need to realize that it isn't all about me. It's not all about us, it's about the world, and Christ's love is for the world, not for a chosen few in a building following the same denomination.

We need to step away from the patterns of this world,

be inviting, hospitable.

Put down our weapons of mass destruction, stop hiring people to murder others in a country for our benefit and personal gain.

Stop believing that violence is ever the answer.

We need to stop turning a blind eye to the poor.

Stop focusing on hating homosexuals because one verse in the Bible in certain translations possibly alludes to it a sin.

Stop focusing on why people won't join our Church while we preach love with hatred in our hearts.

It's uncomfortable, but,

Christianity should not be comfortable.
Stop the screaming hatred and bring forth a quiet love.

We need to love.

If we don't have love, we have nothing.

If our faith is not built on love, it is nothing.

If the Church we attend does not have an outpouring of love for the community around it, the community of Christians and atheists, poor and rich, greedy and selfless, children and adults, than the Church is nothing more than 4 walls and wooden beams. It becomes as empty and desolate as the hardened hearts we carry in our chests.

I'm uncomfortable being apart of something that could be so real and beautiful, but is often twisted by the followers of it to be something so upsettingly fake and plastic in order to seem like we all have our lives in perfect order and know exactly what's going on and exactly what to do when

no one has a clue.

I'm really not surprised in the least when people don't give Christianity a second thought.

I'm more uncomfortable at church than I am in a room full of people who have just discussed the stupidity behind religion, specifically Christianity, and then find out that I follow Christ.

I'm sick and tired of a fake religion.

We need to realize we are broken, accept that we are broken and love the world.

And until we realize that we are no better than anyone we come in contact with, until we realize that Christ wants a relationship with us as much as he does with the rapist in a prison cell, until we realize that we have to outpour all the love we have into the world until it hurts, until we're raw, until our hearts are shattered from the pain we feel, until we can love, nothing within the church, within Christianity as it is today will even get close to what God intended it to be.

Uncomfortable? Yes.

But that's exactly where we should be.

Lord, make me uncomfortable, soften my heart, open my eyes to the brokenness and allow me to love the world as you love me.

Amen.