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Another of their characteristics is that they do not feel they are missing out on something good by not sinning. They are not disappointed and do not feel deprived.
PEOPLE IN “HOLLYWOOD” WHO are sometimes criticized as pushing immorality do not, in general, see themselves in that way. Rather, they regard themselves as pushing a “higher” and “better” morality.
IN FACT, STANDING ON these things as essential is what produces mean and angry Christians. This is an inevitable result of failing to center everything on becoming people who have the character of Christ.
Christians are routinely taught by example and word that it is more important to be right (always in terms of their beloved vessel, or tradition) than it is to be Christlike. In fact, being right licenses you to be mean, and, indeed, requires you to be mean—righteously mean, of course.
A fundamental mistake of the conservative side of the American church today, and much of the Western church, is that it takes as its basic goal to get as many people as possible ready to die and go to heaven. It aims to get people into heaven rather than to get heaven into people.
When we are counting up results we also need to keep in mind the multitudes of people (surrounded by churches) who will not be in heaven because they have never, to their knowledge, seen the reality of Christ in a living human being.
Charles Finney used to say that the Christian minister is frequently in the position of a lawyer who states to the court the case he intends to prove (that would be the biblical picture of life from above), and then calls his witnesses (professing Christians), who contradict in their testimony (their life) every point he said he would prove.
Anyone who thinks God only blesses what is “right” has had a very narrow experience and probably does not really understand what God has done for them.
The New Testament does not recognize a category of Christians who are not apprentices of Jesus Christ in kingdom living now, though it clearly does recognize “baby” apprentices who are still predominantly preoccupied with and dependent upon natural human abilities (are “carnal”).
It is, I gently suggest, a serious error to make “outreach” a primary goal of the local congregation, and especially so when those who are already “with us” have not become clear-headed and devoted apprentices of Jesus, and are not, for the most part, solidly progressing along the path.
My father was a two-pack-a-day smoker until he was in his seventies. Then one day, in the Veterans’ Hospital where he went for health care, he saw a man smoking with the aid of a special machine that enabled him to smoke even though his lips had been eaten away by cancer caused by smoking. He saw the foolishness of smoking, and he believed it. He never smoked another cigarette. That is what belief does, though merely professed belief does not. Belief is when your whole being is set to act as if something is so.
A serious problem is created today by the identification of the good and the desired.
