Rules? Where We're Going We Don't Need Rules.
That "Way of Jesus" meme going around trades a set of bad rules for a set of better rules. It doesn't go far enough.
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American Christianity has seen better days. “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity” would be a step up from our current state, in which the worst are both full of passionate intensity and lacking in conviction. They are also mostly in charge. Bleak stuff!
So I am sympathetic to any counter-narrative — any statement about Christianity that flies in the face of the prevailing winds of dominion, power and being a whiny baby. So I can understand why this little piece of writing about Christianity has picked up so much steam over the last few days. It’s refreshing. It’s actionable. It’s got some good stuff in it. I also think it gets us into some dangerous territory.
As lists of moral imperatives go, I don’t really have a problem with anything here. By my lights, it runs the gamut from good stuff (“move towards the poor”), nice stuff (“throw parties”) and harmless nonsense (“announce.”) I should probably be doing lots of these things more regularly than I do. We all should. I don’t think Jesus would have a problem with any of it. I don’t know who Dan Sadlier is but I’m sure he’s a nice guy.
But here’s the thing. I think we get into trouble anytime we start boiling Christianity down to a list of commands.
Commands to do good things are a lot better than commands to do bad things, but we’ve got to be really careful about mistaking the fruit for the root.
My mutual Adam Bryan Marshall noted that reducing “the way of Jesus” down to this list would be a little like reducing “the way of Buddha” down to doing a lot of meditation. And just like “meditation” isn’t unique to Buddhism, I don’t think any of the things on this list are really unique to Jesus. Most people, Christian or otherwise, would agree that we should be doing those things and a lot of non-Christians I know do them quite a bit better than I myself do. Make of that what you will.
But here’s the main thing. Insofar as Christianity is just a list of things to do, I am going to mess it up. The more morally right the to-do list is, the more likely I am to blow it. I need help doing these things. On my own, I am just not going to be able to forgive my enemies any more than I’m able to poke holes in oppressive systems on my own. I’ve tried. I can’t. It would take a miracle to do these things. That, I think, is where Christianity comes in. “With God, all things are possible.”
So it’s probably fair to say that if you find yourself regularly opposing the empowerment of women or despising the poor — as many Christians in America do — then you need to get your heart right, because these are clearly things that mattered a great deal to Jesus.
But I think you want to be really careful about thinking of Christianity as a matter of just getting the right list of rules to follow. You’re setting yourself up for frustration and failure. But if you start thinking of Christianity as something more than just the things you do or don’t do, then you will likely find yourself following the commands without even trying. They’re called the Fruit of the Spirit. Trees don’t have to try to produce fruit. As long as they’re rooted to the earth, the fruit grows all on its own. It’s in their nature.