Here are two quick videos about the new book, unChristian:
and
unChristian
Saturday October 6, 2007
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The lesson is, we need every witness. It's not a new lesson. It's in the bible.
Lesson 2: A portion of the Church will make claims on the lives of their neighbors and claim God put them up to it. To be a believer is to be in communion with thieves, predators and bullies. If we won't fight with our fellowship, the failure of the Church is as much on our hands as it is on those of the holy rollers and the theocrats.
Lesson 3: Being Christian is about dealing with sin as much as denouncing it. The immoral, the atheist and the really irritating, loud-mouthed and bigoted apostle are all people we are called to minister.
Whiney Christians still annoy me, though.
Doug: I basically agree. I see two major problems with how Christians are perceived, neither one of them difficult to understand, and neither one of them will be solved by reading this book.
The first is as you say, we need to be a good witness to others.
The second is a little more complicated, but more important, and the first relies on it: we need proper theology. I'm not talking eschatology, either. I am talking about issues like homosexuality, as an example. What Bible are Christians reading that makes it think it is good and right and just to say that "homosexuals" are ruining society, that they are terrible people, that they need to be stopped or shunned or attacked in any way whatsoever?
And where does it even say in the Bible that we should push for laws against homosexuality?
Yes, the Bible says homosexuality is wrong. I believe homosexuality is wrong. But I also believe God gave us liberty to choose for ourselves (there I go again about 'liberty!'): all things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. If God gives me the liberty to be gay (which I have, thankfully, not exercised), then why would any Christian think God wants him to use the force of government to restrict that liberty?
I'm not even talking about gay marriage here. That's a separate subject. I am just talking about the regular persecution of homosexuals by Christians. Yes, it's immoral. Fine. But how is it your job to enforce that on someone else?
And of course, things like this drastically affect our ability to witness.
And unfortunately, I don't think this (or any?) book can really help us in this area.
David: thought you might like to check out this interview I conducted last week with UnChristian co-author Gabe Lyons.
http://www.goodwillhinton.com/good_will_hinton_weekly_podcast_gabe_lyons
pudge,
"why would any Christian think God wants him to use the force of government to restrict that liberty?"
Why indeed?
Whatever happened to EVERY American's right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, anyway? And why would self-described "Christians" oppose it?
recovering:
Yes, why? You ... you didn't say. You appear to be implying that using the force of government to RESTRICT liberty somehow upholds our RIGHT to liberty. I do not accept that reasoning.
Either you don't understand me, or I don't understand you. And that's fine, that is why I am here, to help increase understanding. So perhaps you can expound? Or read more where I have exounded, such as in the "Bush's unintentional SCHIP sermon" discussion here.
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