In the World, but not of the World

While attending a big youth conference last year, something became apparent to me about the Christian faith. It seems to me that somewhere along the way we have become confused. From what I understand from Scripture and Jesus' life, we're supposed to live in 'the world', but not like 'the world'. But it seems we have done the opposite. We live like 'the world', but not in 'the world'.

Here we were, all listening to a rock concert and calling it worship. Now, I don't mean to cheapen it and say God wasn't there, but it's weird to experience the same emotional response at a 'secular' concert and a 'Christian' concert, yet call one worship and say the other is not. The other thing that bothered me was the band was signing autographs and selling cds after "worship". It just seemed like they were mimicking 'the world', but in a seperate sub-culture.

Christians now have a sub-culture that we can easily hide ourselves in and never be exposed to the 'ugliness' of 'the world'... we have Christian music, Christian clothes, Christian schools, Christian dating services, Christian coffee shops, Christian t.v., ...and the list goes on and on. What ever happened to living in 'the world' as Jesus did? He didn't deny the so-called 'ugliness', he embraced it. In a world where everyone despised prostitutes and tax collectors, he loved them.

One of the causes of this Christian sub-culture is we want to keep Christianity cool, so kids will stay and carry on the tradition. Another reason is that it's way easier to be a Christian if it's marketable (no need for relationship). Another reason is that we don't want 'good' Christians to become tainted by 'the world' (This is the one that bothers me the most).

The problem with using this sub-culture of Christianity to 'protect' us is that we are ignoring the problem instead of fixing it. If we would be confident in our faith and learn to defend the faith, we wouldn't have to turtle everytime we're faced with opposition. Somehow we have come to believe that the Truth won't stand up to scrutiny, so we've created this protective sub-culture.

Well, my challenge to you (and myself) is to be like Jesus and live in 'the world'. Learn what it is you believe and why you belive it and don't be afraid of people who challenge your belief. We're called to be 'light' and 'salt' to 'the world'... you don't dump all the salt you'll ever need onto one piece of meat, nor do you put all your lights in one room... so why have we created this sub-culture? One day, I hope we'll learn to be 'Human-beings' inspired by God, rather than 'Christians' inspired by 'the world'.