There are a lot of things I see wrong with the church. And the more I talk to people here at Liberty, the more people I discover agree with me. I've also met some people who don't agree with me and think I'm a little too liberal in my ideas. But hear me out. I think Christians have set up this "fight or flight" mindset in that if the world around them doesn't agree with them or outright rejects them and their beliefs that they must either set up a wall of defense and stay safe within the church building, or they push their faith on nonbelievers even more and it turns into them setting out on what is essentially a Holy War against them. This seems ridiculous and completely unnecessary. So, here are some things I think the modern Christian needs to stop ignoring or making taboo and start talking about.
Your body is Not Dirty or Evil.
The human body was made exactly how it was meant to be made. God made your body, and no part of that is bad. It's your God given body, and God's Creation was made inherently good. Now, what people decide to do with that body may be wrong, and may be deviant from God's law, but your body is not wrong. Your body is a work of art, and I can only imagine how sad it makes the Artist when you think that it is not good or beautiful or wonderful.
This pertains to a lot of different aspects. Mostly it's this sex-negative mindset that so many Christians teach their children, not telling them the proper names of the parts of their bodies, and telling them lies about their bodies and other people's bodies. I don't know why this is even a problem or an issue. How can your child be comfortable with themselves if they don't even know the real name of the body in their pants? Sex-positive thinking does not say, "Yes, you can have sex whenever you want with whoever you want as long as you keep it safe." It says, "This is your body, these are the parts of your body, and this is how you take care of it. Your body is beautiful and there is nothing wrong with you. You need to make wise, educated choices and make sure you keep yourself healthy and out of danger." Sex-positive thinking is not about liberation, it's about education. You're going to spend your entire life living in your body, and that body is going to do the best it can to keep you alive and protected and give you the chance to live an awesome, wonderful life. But how can you live within something that you know so little about? If your kid has questions, answer them honestly, if you don't know, research. Then tell them in an age-appropriate manner.
Another aspect is in body image. Not only has secular society determined what we think is beautiful and acceptable for both men and women, but the church has followed this adamantly. Not so much in telling people what they should look like, but what they shouldn't look like. Because in some ways, formulating a list of "Do Not" rules, is a lot easier than sitting down and understanding what the Bible says is good for your body and for the Christian idea of body image. So we have so many people, especially women of all ages, who struggle with accepting their bodies natural structure, and who don't understand that everyone has a genetic tendency to a certain weight, and that there is no one healthy weight or shape or size or height. And it isn't just women, I see so many men at church and overhear so many conversations about how they are struggling to keep up with some new diet or work out regime that they have set up for themselves, and it is so disheartening to think that people are trying to push their bodies to be something they aren't. I am not saying it is wrong to want to be healthy or to make active choices in staying healthy. But when we get to a point where we end up worshiping a certain body type instead of worshiping the God who made those bodies, we end up with a power struggle for what has more of our attention.
The Rest of the World Does Not Have to be Held to Our Biblical Standards and Rules.
What???? This is preposterous! Of course, the world has to be held to our standards because our's are right and everyone else is wrong!!
Just...hush. Be quiet, you sound like a child when you say these things. Yes, they may be wrong, and they may not believe the same basic things you do, but guess what? Many Christians say that about other Christians!! In some cases, you have Christians who just inherently believe they are better than every other person in the world, and they think every one else who doesn't believe exactly like they believe is wrong and evil and going to be damned to hell for eternity. And that's an awful, toxic mindset. But it is there, and many of us seem to have a diluted version of this mindset in some way or another. We think that at the end of the day, everyone is still to be held responsible to the Biblical mandates and laws that we are held to. Quite simply, this is not the case. God gives us those laws and such that we may look different than the rest of the world and to shine a light in the darkness. No one but Christians are to be held by other Christians to these standards. No one. Not American society, not Muslims, not Atheists, not any one whom you do not specifically know is a Christian. If you know for a fact that they are a Christian, yes you can hold them accountable to biblical law. But if you aren't certain, then don't shame or condemn another person because they live a different life than you.
It is not our job to change the world's outlook on life as a whole. It is our job to focus on the one, the close, those who are already around us. It is not the job of the Christian or the church to target a specific part of our culture. We should not be trying to change Hollywood, or the LGBTQIA+ community, or the government, or any other group as a whole. One at a time, get close to people, make relationships, invest in individual lives. It's not about the most change you can make in the entire world, it's about the singular lives who are shown the beauty and grace of God's love.
Please Stop Oppressing People.
I know there are people out there that will say that the Christian church across the world is the one being oppressed, and worldwide, yes. But here in the West, we have literally no oppression. We are not being systematically murdered, we are not being discriminated against on a daily and widespread basis. We are not being denied basic human rights for our beliefs. As hard as it is to believe, over the course of history, the Western Church has been the cause of most of the oppression in the world, including the Crusades, slavery, and other minority struggles have been caused by the church and their desire to eradicate all other religions and cultures in the world. (White Man's Burden anybody?) We are not supposed to destroy other people's right to a pleasant and fulfilling life. We are supposed to show them the only true way to fulfillment and Salvation. The only way to do that in our world today seems to be to show love. More specifically, the love of Christ. Why is Christianity not characterized by the Love of Christ anymore? Why are we not known for our outreached arms and outgoing feet? Love is what everyone is desiring for, whether they realize it not, and the ultimate source of love is the Cross. We need to stop pushing shame, and start pushing Love and grace. That is what gets people's attention. Love and caring, not oppression.
Politics are Completely Different than Church Ordinances.
I am not going to bring up an argument about church and state, because I honestly don't know exactly what it is and I have had it explained to me to be several different things, and none of them make a lot of sense. But I do want to remind you, that the pastor can preach about the Bible's moral absolutes, of course, but when they try to get up and say that those moral absolutes should be forced upon the rest of the country or area in which you live through laws with a religious background, that's when we have a problem. A pastor's job is not to tell you how to think politically. It is the job of the pastor to shepherd the church and to guide them to the path of spiritual righteousness. How a person applies that to their political views is completely up to the individual, not the pastor. Please don't abuse the power of the pulpit.
The Country was not Founded Upon the Idea of Freedom of Religion Alone, and it was not Written Into our Constitution Sspecifically and Only for Christianity.
This country was not founded solely for the reason of Freedom of Religion. If anything, we must remember that our country did not fight for nor gain independence until 167 years after Jamestown was founded. This means that there was no correlation between the Pilgrims' reason for leaving England and the Founding Fathers reason for fighting for independence. Everyone who came over on the boats were long dead, and the biggest reason for the War of Independence was taxation. There are not connecting factors there. So please, stop misquoting history, it makes us all seem ignorant when we aren't. Some of us actually paid attention in high school history class, and a lot more of us know how to look up the real facts on the internet. Our country was not even founded by what most of us would consider Christians. Many of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were Deists, who do not believe in divine providence, nor in divine sovereignty. So, that being said, many most likely did not think to ask God to bless our country, or asked God for anything, because Deism says that God made everything in Creation, then stepped away and has left it alone since then and has no direct involvement with the world.
The World Sucks, Stop Making it Seem Happy.
Look, the world, because it has been enveloped by sin (which is an embodiment of evil, which is the perversion of good), and because of that, the world is an awful horrid place. There is death, there is violence, there is sickness, poverty, greed, abuse. The world, not even our own specific version of our own personal world, is going to be better, or get happier, by becoming a Christian or donating to a church or a Christian organization. Pastors, do not lead the people, who have trusted you to tell them Biblical truth, to believe that which is not true. Show them the heartache and the pain they will feel having to leave family behind because they do not believe. Show them what happens when they decide to accept a gift of holiness and salvation. Show them what other Christians suffer through all over the world, and teach them the selflessness of Jesus to try to help them. Teach them prayer and supplication, teach them mercy. The world sucks, please don't sugarcoat that.
The World is Beautiful, Stop Making it Seem Awful.
The world, while full of evil, is still a part of the Creation of God, who made it in perfection and beauty. IF we look, the world is still full of that beauty. The mountains, the oceans, the fields. The cities, the countries, the villages, all of them are still full of happiness, whether we see it or not. In every place, weddings, births, birthdays are full of joy. Holidays are taken as days of rest and celebration. Throughout every day, there are people blessing other people, spreading happiness, spreading joy, spreading love. Even places where the joy and love of Jesus have never been told of, people have these things, because they set out to have these things. The flowers still bloom, the sun still rises, the forests still stand. The oceans still house an entirely different world, the entirety of the universe is still expanding, still growing, and still burning bright. There is so much we overlook sometimes, because we get so caught up in the bad news, the suffering. We need to remember that all around us, there are children learning to walk, babies learning to laugh, and couples celebrating 50 years of marriage.
I feel like American churches and pastors forget this all so often, and I pray that we don't continue this trend.
Emily E.
