Salt & Light

I was reading a blog this morning by James Emery White and he had some really great points that I wish I had thought of first! I have been thinking, reading and praying about the  "culture wars". We have always been in culture wars, the folks who have forgotten that or haven't yet learned it in history need to do some research and see for themselves. I understand that you are tired of the talk about same sex marriage and how you feel that NC is now an evil state because of the way they voted against it. I'm tired of hearing how I'm the problem and I read a Bible that's out of touch with the way we live now! Adam Hamilton may be the pastor of the largest UM church in the US, but he does not speak for me! Also, the "Christian's" that yell and scream, "Your infringing on my rights" need to learn something about grace. Yelling at people has never won much that I can think of.    


THIS is where you can read White's blog. I'm going to just comment on it and say that dang, this guy is good and I happen to believe in what he's preaching. We, as Christian's, are called to be salt and light. Not acid and bulldozers! I like what White says about salt being important to keep meat from going bad. The meat (being the culture) is going to go bad, if not eaten, that's what happens. So the church is full of salt and it is to be used to arrest, stop, halt, social decay! That can't happen if the salt stays in the shaker. We have to penetrate the culture, which means we have to have a stance, understand why we believe what we do and get out there.


The other point I really like is that Jesus was offensive! I love that! He offended everybody, all the time! There are tons of preacher's out there that are wanting the lime light, they want to be seen as hip and popular. They stand on the fence, don't say enough about anything controversial, and have taught people to say, "Who am I to judge!" (Preacher man should blog about that topic!) The bottom line is Jesus dying on a cross for everybody's sin! He didn't just die to die! It was because of sin. Jesus took a stance, said what was true, refused to bring in the big guns that he had at his disposal, and he died an awful death! FOR SIN!  


Our goal is to remove every barrier that exists between such persons and their acceptance of the scandal of the cross…except the scandal of the cross!


Sin is the same today as it's always been. It hasn't changed because we have become this new smarter generation of people. We are still called to be salt and light, not acid and bulldozers or pansies and yes-men!