Real Christianity: Clothing, Buildings, Money, & Extravagance

There is a lot of stuff out there claiming to be Christian, when it's not really Christian. It's a difficult situation for any real Christ follower. On one side you have a culture and society growing progressively more hostile toward Christian values. On the other side you've got a religious establishment entrenched in wealth and worldliness. The real Christian must face down hostility from a depraved culture. And within the church, the real Christian must face down the rejection and hostility from luke-warm Christians, self righteous false followers, and health and wealth types. It's very difficult. Especially once within the church. One hopes to find respite, but instead finds hostility and many who feel threatened by the sincere Christian's real devotion to a real savior. Have you ever encountered that? I have. 80% of Americans claim to be Christian. But are they really? Of course not.

Now before I go any further, I know that it is very easy to attack the church. Everyone attacks the church, believers and non-believers a like. She's an easy target given all the trouble. So it's worth mentioning that the church, the body of Christ, was never said to be perfect. In fact from the very outset, evidenced by the letters of the New Testament to the early churches, from the very start there were serious problems. The NT letters tell of sexual immorality (1 Corinthians), men sleeping with their own mothers (1 Cor 5:1), false teachers (Galatians), Jews attempting to force Christians to be circumcised (Romans, Galatians), falling away, shipwrecked faith (1 Timothy), attacks from Gentiles (Acts), attacks from Jews (Acts), and many other problems. The church is not perfect. Yet it's also important to realize that when Paul and others wrote the developing churches, he didn't ignore the problems or sugar coat them. He addressed those problems directly. He then lovingly encouraged the believers to do better. So if we do the same today, we are right and correct to do so.

So what does it mean to be a real Christian? To be a true follower of Jesus Christ?

Does it mean that I never sin? Of course not. Does it mean that I never make a mistake? Nope, true followers make plenty (ask Peter). Does it mean we never fall away? No, true followers have fallen away (but they are always free to come back).

Jesus Christ taught that the wheat and the weeds are being allowed to grow together (Matthew 13:24-30). The church is full of non-believers, agnostics, hypocrites, liars, fakes, and abusive men looking for submissive wives. And that's not even the half of it. Some churches are dead, some churches are half death, other churches teach false doctrines, and still other churches are nothing more than CEO business style money making machines flamboyantly portraying a false belief system stamped with the word "Christian."

I don't want to be cruel or anything, but it's true. I don't want to be a debbie-downer either, but we real Christians need to watch out for this kind of thing. I've encountered people threatened by me in virtually every church I've ever visited. Why? There is no need for it, but it happens. I've been deeply hurt by people in the church professing to be Christians. It doesn't necessarily mean they aren't followers of Jesus. But that could be a possibility.

What I'm trying to say here is: Expect difficulties, especially if you're sincere about this Jesus following thing. I'm not always as great as I want to be. I fall short. I screw up. I don't always feel as sincere as I should. But I cry out to God about it. I beg God to change my heart. As I write this, I yearn for God to receive these written words as yet another desperate prayer from a troubled young man like myself, to please, please, please Holy Father, change me into the man you want me to be! I need it so badly. That's all it takes. Keep asking, keeping talking to the Father, if you don't think you're sincere enough, if you think your faith might be fraud, cry out to God the Father! Beg the Spirit and Jesus to intercede for you. It ain't hard, just ask.

Given that we believe and love the Savior, how then shall we live? That's the pertinent question. How shall we live in response to a world in such desperate need? We really can't live as Christians of the United States and Europe anymore. We need to live as Christians of the world. We're in that time in history, when we receive news and information from all over the world. If I want to, I can send a package to the Philippines and it will arrive in a few weeks. We are global Christians. Via the internet I can speak to people anywhere. I can access information on virtually any topic.