I am amazed by the number of people who reject Christianity because of the behavior of Christians. They can’t see the face of Christ beyond the Christian façade. Rarely do they criticize Jesus, but they are quick to criticize His followers. When I spoke with men in the recovery program at the Union Gospel Mission I was struck by the number that had been hurt by the church. Thankfully, they were able to see past the “Christians” and have their lives transformed by a personal encounter with the living Christ. When did we become a stumbling block to the true cornerstone? Are we Christians such great guardians of the deposit of faith that we prevent others from taking out a Jesus withdrawal?

We circle Jesus with our denominational covered wagons thinking that we are protecting the Lamb of God when in reality the Lion of Judah is perfectly capable of defending Himself. We have greeters inviting seekers on board promising them a glimpse of the Jesus within, but then make sure they view Him from a distance with dogmatic binoculars. We warn them that stepping off the bandwagon with nothing but a broken and contrite heart is just too messy and may leave emotional stains on the new sanctuary carpet. Thirsty they want to run to the fountain of living water, but are instead handed bottles of doctrinally filtered Perrier.

Not only do we make it difficult for the seeker but we also create problems when cultural bandits attack our Christian wagon train. We foolishly try and repel them with a war of words instead of making an opening in our circle and letting Jesus out to wrestle with them until they are blessed.

It is easy to dismiss Christians, but impossible to dismiss Christ. If we denominationally Photoshop Jesus, people will never see the beatific vision. Since we are broken jars of clay incapable of perfectly carrying the living water to those dying of thirst, we need to rethink our global rehydration strategy, and instead, personally lead them to the spring of water welling up to eternal life where they can drink and never thirst again.

Photo by Mitch Lensink on Unsplash