stereotyping, part 2

Okay…eight hours of sleep later and I’m still thinking about the idea of stereotypes and the church and Christianity.

Here’s something to chew on. Jesus warns against being “ashamed of Him,” (Mark 8:38), but no such warning is ever given about being ashamed of the church. Apparently, if I say I’m embarrassed by being associated with Jesus that’s one thing; if I say I’m embarrassed by being associated with Christians, that’s another.

However, Paul repeated uses the analogy of the church as the body of Christ. Using this analogy, Jesus is the head and His people, the church, are necessarily and inseparably connected with Him. This kind of makes Jesus and the church a box set, a combo that cannot separated. I can no more say that I love Jesus but not His church than I can say I love my wife’s head but none of the rest of her. John makes the same argument: “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar,” (1 John 4:20).

On a side note, I’m not advocating hating anyone, even people calling themselves Christians who display nothing of the character of Christ. That’s pretty offensive to me, going around using Jesus name and making Him look bad and all, but I think Jesus would want me to love those people, too. I’m talking about be embarrassed by such people and being vocal about the fact that I’m not like them and I don’t really want to be associated with them.

But is being embarrassed by the church, even the Christian posers, while different from being embarrassed by Jesus, wrong?

To make the matter more complicated, there are several warnings in the New Testament directed at the church stating that many who claim association with Jesus are really claiming a lie, (Matthew 25:31-46 is my favorite). In other words, the body of Christ (made up of those who have true connection with Him) and the establishment of the church as a political, structural entity are not necessarily the same thing.

I suppose, then, that my initial conclusion holds. It’s perfectly acceptable, at least in as much as I can understand, to say that there are a lot of so-called Christians and a lot of so-called churches that I claim no association with whatsoever. Jesus' criteria for association with Him (in Mathew 25:31-46) is simple: if you serve others and love all (both those who believe what you believe and those who don’t), then you know Him. If you don’t, you don’t.

So any person or church out there who loves all and serves everyone they encounter, I’m cool with. Those who judge, criticize, condemn and love only on the condition that you agree with them, I’m not.

Make sense?