What is it about our American Christianity that wants to believe what it wants to believe, as opposed to Biblical, Theologically pure Christianity?
It's very easy in our American Christianity to go with the current, and flow of thought. Whatever sermon series the preacher of the day on television may (or in our own pulpits) be touting about how to live the best version of yourself, or your best life now. Or how we need to be in "revival" or speaking to our felt needs, by tugging on our emotions. A Christianity that has been correctly named "Moralistic, Therapeutic, Deism". We see how different our Christianity today is from Biblical Christianity, in what it means to be a Christian.
When one delves into the whole of Scripture, and see's Christ throughout, we see God's work throughout. In response to Christian moralism, rationalism, and mystical Christian experience, Gene Edward Veith's book entitled "The Spirituality of the Cross" answers with this...
"The Spirituality of the Cross negates all moralism, but it inspires selfless service. The Cross swallows up rationalistic speculation, while it affirms the truth of revelation in all of its ineffable mysteries. The Cross counters the mere quest for mystical experience by lifting up what is inglorious, ordinary, even painful, yet, through the Word and Sacraments, offers a true union with Christ."
When our preachers, and our 'Christian teachings' are trying to pull us away from the true, pure, Gospel of our Lord, and tell us that we need to seek God, who is present in the world ...but in a way that requires us to "hunt for God" as if he's out there, or in there somewhere, and we just need to find Him, and in a way trap Him so that we can have some of Him, and so he can then bless us. This thinking although well-intended, is simply wrong. Let's imagine, you're in a crowded amusement park with your Dad, and you split up and he says to you, meet me back here at the car in one hour, where we've parked, at the north east corner of parking lot B. And in one hour you start looking for your Dad by the pony rides. And then you look for him by the tilt-a-whirl. And then by the Ferris-Wheel. It's the same with Christ. Suffice it to say, that Christ is right where he said He would be. Waiting for us as planned. In His Word, In our Baptism, in the bread and wine, the Holy Sacrament, and in the preaching of His Word, and in the loving of our neighbor, as we live out our vocations, as husbands, wives, children, uncles, aunts, employees, friends, grandparents etc. etc.
Just recently in my daily reading of Scripture, I read Isaiah 51. Which speaks to this notion of God with us. And not "somewhere out there..." The Lord works in and through us, and those around us. Luther called them "the mask's of God".
“Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness,
you who seek the Lord:
look to the rock from which you were hewn,
and to the quarry from which you were dug.
2 Look to Abraham your father
and to Sarah who bore you;
for he was but one when I called him,
that I might bless him and multiply him." - Isaiah 51:1-2
While the Holy Scripture rightly tells us that "no one can see God and Live." Christ comes, and puts Himself, in a box. So that we can behold Him. Not only that, He gives Himself for us, His life, for ours. And the universe is (and always has been) in subjection to Him, under His feet. He has revealed Himself, in, and through His Word. Thanks be to God!
Veith's book concludes that the Spirituality (which is a word that has been dissolved of it's meaning in recent times) of the Cross is simply this.
"Though it's not easy to struggle with ones own nature, to be broken by the Law of God, fighting through trials and suffering. But on another level it is indeed easy. Simply a matter of receiving Christ's gifts. And the Gospel of Forgiveness and grace in the Cross, is, as the catechism says "most certainly true." This truth is no mere intellectual assertion but a faith lived out in worship, in the inmost depths of the heart, in love of others, in work, and in the day-to-day routines of ordinary life."
Now there are those who would say... "Why the Cross? Why must I accept that 'version' of the truth?" And to that, our good Doctor Martin Luther is very useful in understanding that mind when he writes...
"God seems as though he had dealt inconsiderately in commanding the world to be governed by the Word of Truth, especially since he has clothed and hooded it with a poor, weak, and condemned Word of the Cross. For the world will not have the truth, but lies; neither willingly do they aught that is upright and good, unless compelled to by main force. The world has a loathing of the Cross, and would rather follow the pleasures, of the devil, and have pleasant days, than carry the cross of our blessed Savior Christ Jesus."
So why does our "home-grown" Christianity believe, and teach what it wants? This may in-fact be one of the greatest questions of our age. It is the most human of natures, that we not take God at His Word. To pursue our own self justification, and not the justification that comes from another who is greater than us.
The beloved Psalm 52 that poses the question most excellently. I encourage everyone to read the entire text of the Psalm and see how the Lord comes to us with His gifts, simply because the righteous are those who trust in His name. Thanks be to God!
"Why do you boast of evil, oh mighty man? The steadfast love of God endures all the day..."
