Christian Castles

"the only other group of people who worship the LIVING GOD."

ONE SERMON askew on a Sunday isn’t enough to focus the church’s eyes on Jesus and us see the full spectrum of colors in His hands. A few hours of personal study beneath Grandma’s old lamp aren’t enough to open the depth of the Good Book and display the heart of the Word. We color what we read with our self-drawn visions. We’re in the perfect outfit, in our favorite pew, just left of the air-conditioning vent. Two claps and a hallelujah later, we’re out the door, the springform door of our wallet nailed shut. Or left open. I know some really, really generously giving people in the church. Money’s not their God at all. For some, the church is.

When did the church stop being the hands and feet of God and become an art market? A place of common interests in fancy buildings that circle around us like a wagon train. On the outside are the marauders, who don’t see the way our fires burn. We’re looking for the Second Coming from our self-inflated raft in a tiny pond in the middle of a well-mown field. We’re all about end times and fulfilled prophecy instead of those we walk past who, once we’re outta here, we won’t care are left behind. We’re into forming clusters with interests like golf and grilling or genderific games, social stuff, and that’s okay. But being honest, if that’s what I went to church for, over these last 5 years, then I wouldn’t be here.

I knew the story of Jesus, was taught swordliness. I copied and postage-stamped it and heard laughter. It’s true what God says in His Word about the devil as a roaring lion, and that bit about him running in terror, except there’s a dump-truck load of qualifiers around it. And good people involved. Good people prayed. Good people encouraged me. But it was that God took the reins. Hell as we’ve crafted it is plastic. Styrofoam spiders and fat ghost costumes. When hell on earth is more shadows and distortion. Hell as it really is we have no idea.

Men’s visions are filled with fear and knowledge misunderstandings. Beginning with what we ought to know, that it’s God’s doing and not the work of darkness. Darkness is where God isn’t. It’s the absence of Him and not some solo power. Its torture is regret and useless self-defense mechanisms, permanent blindness to sin. We, in the church, are too quick to banish people there, including those beautiful ancestors and descendants of our Savior, the only other group of people who worship the LIVING GOD.

“Well, yeah,” some say. “He’s living …”

And what? He’s deaf? He’s been remodeled in His Resurrection? He was meek and lowly but now He’s arrogant? He’s forgetful. That one.

Or there’s others: “Wait a minute, who are these guys in the strange suits ….”

Why are we so dumb? We prefer to model Christianity after ourselves, something every fallen kingdom did on steroids, and now they don’t exist. Rome is gone. Egyptian pharaohs are no more. Alexander the Great died, age 32. This, strangely, reminds me of the mark of the beast. 6 repeated a gazillion times still isn’t 7. And 32 isn’t 33. Did I mention Jesus is alive? And He’s still Jew. We’re supposed to know this. We’re not required to act Jewish. We should see them and love everything about them, though. And assume in our cheers, GO TEAM, that we’re shortsighted and should be humble, preferring God’s heart over the excitement in our own.

Because joy colors the moment in whatever shade we’re screaming when it ought to lay down its cross and take up God’s. Jesus will return, and it will be soon. We’ll be in unity. That’s how He made us. We’ll also be surrounded by a lot of people we’re overlooking because Jesus had to send someone else to them.

And also, many Jews. Many. Like the sand at the seashore. The stars in the sky.

Illustration by Thomas Park on Unsplash


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Suzanne D. Williams, Author
www.suzannedwilliams.com
www.feelgoodromance.com