Christian Zombies: A Conversation

I knew I could count on you, P Corcs, to spark some conversation on this topic. You make an excellent devil’s advocate and bring up some very good counterpoints. Some I agree with, and some I’ll do my best to counter-counterpoint.

Many of the ideas you bring up, in my mind, are issues of perspective on sin. Like I said in yesterday’s post, I’m not saying that Christians are free to sin as they please knowing those sins will be forgiven. I’m not saying we shouldn’t hold ourselves to a high moral standard. The Bible tells us that God sees all sin as an equally ugly abomination, and we should strive towards a pure, righteous life.

My argument is that the church has misled us in the method of living a righteous life. It has taught us to dwell upon our sins. It has taught us to define our faith by our sins. It has separated individuals, people that we should be embracing, into groups according to their sins (homosexuals are the most prominent example that come to mind). So while we should be striving to be Christ-like, living a life of servitude and humility, we are focused inward, obsessed with our impurities.

Many Christians have gone through the experience of accepting Christ as the cleanser of sin, acknowledging Him as our salvation, yet continuing in their sinful ways and finding themselves consumed by guilt. I know I have. I would argue it’s because we aren’t really getting it. I think to truly accept Christ as the source of salvation requires a profound realization of what he stood for and what he endured for us. It also requires us to accept something wholeheartedly which is completely outside of our frame of reference. No human has ever experience the powerful, fierce, eternal love that God has for us, so how could we possibly understand what that means? I think true acceptance of Christ as our salvation means growing nearer to such an understanding. Once we can do that we will truly strive to be like Christ. Then it will be possible to truly rid ourselves of sin. Is such an understanding even possible? I’m working on it. I’ll let you know if I figure anything out. Feel free to do the same.

Faith is personal, but never private. It’s a communal activity. The Bible calls us to serve our fellow man (or woman), but the church has made us selfish, convincing us that if we merely focus on not committing sin we will be righteous in the eyes of God. I believe this is a lie.

I realize I’m opening a can of worms. There is a huge debate surrounding the relationship between acts and salvation. We have been promised salvation if we acknowledge Christ as the source, nothing more is required. It’s Biblical. But in my mind there is a big difference between salvation and righteousness. I genuinely believe that the man who spends his days serving the poor and his nights drinking with the prostitutes is more righteous in God’s eyes than the man who spends his days denouncing sin and his nights asleep in his mansion (take note James Dobson). I realize that’s awfully bold of me, and ascribing an opinion such as this to God is a potentially blasphemous endeavor, but I said it and I mean it.

I think that when Christ calls upon people to “go forth and sin no more,” as in the examples you have given, it’s more an invitation to live like Christ than it is a command to spend life running from sin. I realize this is up to interpretation, but if we truly strive to live as Christ lived we will be incapable of sin. We will have devoted our lives to servitude and justice and we will have no room for sin, which is by definition a harmful force.

Our Father, who art in Heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
On Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who’ve trespassed against us.
Lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil,
For thine is the kingdom,
The power, and the glory,
Forever and ever,
Amen.

As you say, sin is brought up in the Lord’s Prayer, but I don’t think this calls for our lives to be consumed by thoughts of avoiding sin. The first mention of sin is a plea for forgiveness and the strength to forgive others. It is a call to cleanse us so that we can let go of sin. We need to move past our sin if we are to have a meaningful relationship with God or with others. The second reference to sin is asking God to guard us from its presence in our lives. Maybe so we won’t become consumed by it?

The first section of the Lord’s Prayer has always been my favorite. “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.” It is dangerous to guess what God’s will is, but from the Bible we can draw a picture of what His Kingdom looks like. It is a world of beauty, righteousness, love and harmony. Every soul has a servant’s heart, is intimately connected to God, and is completely pure. To see even a reflection of that image on Earth I believe we must begin focusing our faith outwards instead of inwards.

Thanks for reading.