Silly saints

What does it take to immunize people to the extent that they become fully resistant to the Goods News about Jesus Christ? The answer is simple: just a few silly saints.

People have had enough of empty, dead religion. They have had enough of double-standard, Bible-thumping holier-than-thou hypocrites with too many skeletons of their own tucked away in a closet somewhere. And they have just about had it with the superspirituals, the ones who are totally out of touch with this world, ignoring or despising the good things of life, simply because they view them as not godly enough.

And then you have got the occasional lunatic who blows up the abortion clinic claiming that God drove him to it. Great. Any more morons around to do the Lord another disservice?

Well, to be honest, I think that I have been close to joining the ever-growing circle of Silly Saints. Let me invite you in on one of my past gaffes. It all transpired around 1983, a full year or so after my brother had commenced his studies in Mannheim, Germany. It so happened that he after a while bumped into a very nice girl that he decided he wanted to live, or co-habit, with.

Home on vacation, he decided to break the news to our parents. I was present, too, listening with horror to his planned course of action. My response, although he wasn't soliciting one from me just then, was an overwhelming silence, complete with lips pursed, head tilted forwards, as if grief-stricken. What was I thinking? I do not know, but I probably felt a deep conviction of sorts. Someone had to communicate to my brother the utter sinfulness of what he was about to do.

The success of my mission was spectacular. For years there would be absolutely no real contact between us. The mere sight of me would cause my brother to feel revulsion of some kind. And no wonder. My rejection of his choice was carried across with such a definite air of condemnation that he must have felt sentenced to a long prison term by this Judge of Proper Conduct and Godly Tastes.

I still do not believe co-habiting is right, but today I am liberated from this impulse that mastered me for so long: policing the lives of others instead of showing what a gracious God I am serving. He is a father constantly craving the return of his wayward sons and daughters. And He has no words of condemnation for them, only a message of reconciliation.

I may have thought I was right, but I was abysmally wrong. I was just being a Silly Saint driving people away, giving Jesus a bad name.