First piece of advice: be very careful what you put on a public blog because if you write a blog about how it is good to be scared and how you are not going to let fear hold you back, your friends WILL hold you accountable (whether you want them to or not) and you’ll get responses like this when you say you’re scared of doing something: “No. You’re going. Read your blog post again and then make this decision.” And then, when you try to justify your fear even though you know you’ve been one-upped (remember what I said about circular reasoning?), then you get: “You’re going. End of story.” Thanks Garrett, thanks.
Anyway- something I have been thinking about a lot is what I am called to do as a Christian. In an effort to spend every moment possible procrastinating from writing my thesis, I spent quite a long time yesterday talking to a friend (shocker) about my faith and what I think is important. In any interaction I have with people, I want them to come away from that conversation knowing that they are loved and valued. If they believe that God loves them and values them, that is great but even if they don’t, I want them to know that I love them and value them. It doesn’t matter if they are Christian or not, they deserve to be treated well. It is impossible to know everything that is going on in someone’s heart and you may be the one person that makes an effort to reach out to that person or who makes them feel that they are wanted. Jesus died on the cross for EVERYONE and I am not better or more deserving of that love and grace than anyone else. It is not my place to judge who deserves to enter into the kingdom of God, rather it is my place to love my neighbor as Jesus loves me.
Faith is not about following rules. People mess up. People make mistakes. I fall short of the glory of God every single day. Christianity isn’t about rules, it’s about your heart. God doesn’t want us to use the Bible as a checklist of rules to follow to a T. He wants us to love people the way Jesus loved people. 1 Peter 4:8 tells us: “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.” Being a Christian is loving people even when you don’t want to and treating people with respect not because they necessarily deserve it but because you know they are loved by God. Being a Christian is forgiving people even though the world tells you that it is okay to hold a grudge. Spreading Christianity and spreading Jesus isn’t about converting people. It is about loving people.
God doesn’t want us to go out and tell people about Jesus and then ask if they want to become a Christian and put a nice check mark down for another person converted and move on. God wants us to love people. He wants us to go out and be in community with people who are different than us and truly get to know them. He doesn’t call us to stand on the side of the road and tell people they are going to Hell for not believing the things we believe. Spreading the love of Jesus is not about keeping track of people you convert or even trying to convert anyone. It is about reaching out and being there for people when they need a friend or someone to talk to. It is about really listening to people pour their hearts out to you when they don’t have anywhere else to turn. It is about breaking through barriers of judgment and past experiences to truly connect with another person. God uses us to speak the words that people need to hear. We may never see the fruits of our work and may never know the impact that we have on some of the people that we interact with but that is okay. God does not ask us to be successful, only to be willing.
I say again- it is not about converting people, it is about loving people. Most of my friends know I’m Christian. Some of my friends are Christian, some aren’t. I hope that they ALL know how much I value them and how much they mean to me. I hope they know that they can always ask me questions about my faith or about Christianity and I will do my best to answer them (though I also hope they know that I am FAR from having all the answers). I hope they know that they never have to agree with me and I will never judge them simply because our lives look different. I hope they know that I pray for them often and thank God for the incredible blessings that they are in my life. Most of all, I hope they know that I love them and I will always be there for them.
I am not trying to convert anyone. I simply want to love people.
