I watched the movie “Religulous” the other day.
It is an overtly anti-Christian / anti-religious documentary that seeks to point out the ridiculous nature of religion and religious people.
The hard part for me — I agreed with 90% of it.
Why do Christians have to be so weird? If Bill Maher was making a documentary in Jesus’ day he would have interviewed many of the religious leaders and Pharisees and come to some of the same conclusions that Jesus himself held.
The most difficult part of my job as a church planter hasn’t been working with non-religious, non-Christian or flat out pagan people… it has been interacting and working with Christians themselves.
Many of the non-religious people that I know and talk to are actually more interested in real answers and authentic faith than a lot of Christians who are either legalistic or self absorbed.
Don’t get me wrong… not all Christians are weird, legalistic or self absorbed.
The problem is that none of them should be.
The problem is that those who are are usually blind to it.
The problem is that those who are are usually the most vocal, time consuming and undiplomatic in the crowd.
The problem is that there is too much truth in Bill Maher’s documentary.
I thought his film was intense, mean and for some reason (as you stated) on point with a lot of things.
So yeah, pretty much my response to a lot of it. haha
I saw it and had the same feeling. Matter of fact, Ken, it made me think of a message you gave a looong time ago, about wanted Christians to be educated and to be able to intelligently discuss their beliefs instead of just building up a straw man to knock down. I watched that film and thought “perfect example of a WHOLE LOT of folks who cannot handle it when confronted with anything more than a straw man”. I found myself wishing Maher had come knocking on your door. :)
Although I’m guessing the weirdness you’re referring to in the Christians portrayed in the film was partially tied to their self-absorbtion and legalistic / judgmental outlooks, I think there can be a real danger in the church attempting to be cool (not weird). I did not see the film but it seems that if we are truly following Christ we will appear weird no matter what we do. Scripture seems to back this: “the wisdom of God is foolishness…”. Jesus promised the we would be hated just like He was. Jesus must have looked weird himself and he did not attract the “cool” people of his day – the ones with power, health, money. Those attracted to Him were the sick, lame, poor – outcasts, not the in-crowd. At the end of his life he was almost entirely deserted. Truly dying to self is the opposite of what the culture stands for and it must look completely weird. Maybe the church is in decline because it is trying to be attractive to the world and looks very similar to the culture. Why be a part of the church if it endorses being fulfilled by the same things as the culture, just on a lesser degree? It makes more sense just to jump in with both feet.