Be careful, and I promise I will be too.

Well, things have been going good. I had a good time with the service project this weekend raking leaves and hanging out with the cool kids in Rolla. But, things are about to get crazy. I have this list of everything I need to do before break school-wise, and every time I look at it it feels like I'm on a ship watching the dark clouds form ahead... But, I guess you just have to take it one day at a time, eh?

Something weird happened today. Today I had my last english paper due, and all I needed to do was print it out. So, about 15 minutes before class started, I headed off to the University Center (which isn't the center of anything... it's just close to the CCH). Anyways, I get there, and there's a class going on in the lab. This has never stopped me before, most teachers don't care. Heck, I've been in labs where people come in and work on computers. It's a huge lab, so it's not a big deal. But, apparently, the class was doing presentations or something. So, I sat in the closest corner (where no one was), and I put in my flash drive. I didn't even have time to sign in before a young teacher (TA?) walked over to me and said "You need to leave." I told him I was just going to print something, and it would take literally 1 minute. He told me I was disrupting class, and I needed to leave.

Now, it was about here that something switched inside me. Every stubborn bone in my body raged, and I almost logged in and printed my paper. I had to fight with everything I had not to ignore this guy. I think I said something like, "Really?" So, I ended up leaving, but I left with an immense amount of anger. Like I said, it was really strange. It wasn't that big of a deal (I got it printed in comp sci), but I still couldn't get over the situation. Every time I thought about it, it just made me angrier and more frustrated. I'm not even sure what it means...

Now, it's time to go deep. For my gel group, we're reading through Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller. One of the chapters we went over hit me hard. The second to last chapter is on religion and what it's becoming. He talks about how we sometimes search for God not out of love, but out of a need for confirmation of our beliefs.

He quotes CS Lewis: "Most of us are not really approaching the subject in order to find out what Christianity says: We are approaching it in the hope of finding support from Christianity for the views of our own party. We are looking for an ally where we are offered either a Master or--a Judge."

Then, he dives into what I like to call 'popular christianity'. This is what hit me hard. So much of our religion is based on popularity. We are honored for memorizing scripture or for having regular quiet times. We try to throw out fancy theological ideas to gain status among other christians. I've done this, I do this. It reminds me of a verse I became really intimate with this summer at Pine Cove. It's in Matthew, at the beginning of chapter 6. Jesus tells us that what is done is secret will be rewarded by God. Jesus tells us that if our audience is men, our popularity will be all we get; but if our audience is God, we'll receive our reward from Him.

Now, I know you may think I'm a hypocrite because I just threw out some fancy ideas. But, I'm not trying to seem smart now. Remembering this made me wonder: what if I had this amazing relationship with God, but kept it all in secret? What would happen? What if God and I were inseperable, but nobody else knew?

My instant reaction is: what is the point if no one else knows? That is were I make the mistake of trading popularity among christians for popularity with God. Sure, reading my bible openly could remind other people to read theirs, but most of the time part of me wants the other CCFers to see me and say - wow he's a good christian.

So, my new goal is to do what I said earlier: have a great relationship with God, but keep it a secret. Now, I know, if someone doesn't know Christ, I'm not going to turn him away or anything and say "Well, it's a secret...". This idea is to keep my pride out of my faith. My hope is that I'll change through the process, and that is what will be seen.

But haven't you ever judged someone by the amount of bible verses they have memorized, or some belief they had? I know I have, and that's wrong. Popular christianity doesn't work. We aren't the Judge. The only thing we gain from it is recognition from people who are probably striving for the same thing.

Miller goes on with some stories that are pretty sad. One is about a group that won a bunch of challenges at a youth camp, but when the crowd realized it was a bunch of scrawny, nerdy guys, the cheering stopped. The cheerleaders and jocks in the crowd had wanted someone else, someone popular to win. He went on with a challenge to find one ugly person on a cover of a christian CD. He and a friend couldn't do it. A final example is from an usher at a huge church. The usher was told to put the good-looking people near the front because they would be the ones on tv.

I love Miller's statements: "I am only saying that we are, perhaps, even more obsessed, in the church, with the stuff the culture is obsessed with. We are hardly providing an alternative worldview. The matra seems to be "Trust in Jesus! He will redeem you to the world."

Well, looking over this stuff, there's a lot of negatives. But, I take heart in the good people out there. Because there are such people, you know. So, be careful with what you do, and I promise I will be too.

-Bryce