The Illusion of Christianity

The greatest threat that Satan can throw at us are not necessarily the lies, but making us live in the deception of what we deem as reality.

For example let's imagine there is a small group of 10 people. Five seem to be pouring out their hearts to the small group, sharing away at their inner cores. After all the human hearts have depths of such richness that it's easy to cover up with a smile, the right actions, etc but to have it so far from the truth. But these five are sharing the whole amount, while the other five are sharing halfway.

Now for those who have been in small groups or a part of the experience, we're all guilty of this to some varying degrees. When asked to share in small group and when we really don't want to share, we have an acceptable "small group" answer ready. See cause there are two types of responses we can give when asked to share.

We can really share what's at the depths of our hearts and what's really killing us inside or we can give the half truth but acceptable answer. And the responses usually are "Oh okay. We'll pray for you." but that's the end of that.

We're all guilty of this. And what is most sad about all this is that for a lot of small groups and fellowships, brothers & sisters are interacting with each other with many living in the illusion of what genuine Christian fellowship is all about. Whether this is people who are sharing their hearts out thinking that the others in their group are too, while the ones whom are not sharing as much are living in the pretense that this is what genuine Christian fellowship is all about.

The poet Eden Ahbez once wrote,"The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return."

This may seem like a secular comment or commentary but can be linked with what Christianity is all about. In an earlier entry, there was discussion about what it meant to love other people. And part of that entails the fact that we must accept other people as they are. We must accept the fact that we are going to get annoyed with people, that we are not going to get along naturally with everyone, etc. But eventually as Christians we strive for more.

Hence when we can love others for whom they are, in an ideal sense too, this will be reciprocated if done so from a Christian perspective. Not cause it seems like the politically correct or acceptable thing to do but because we want to.

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else," states C.S. Lewis.

It is because it is through this Christian lifestyle that we live that our mind set has been transformed as Romans 12:2 tells us.

There are so many people hurting from whatever it may be that they go through and yet this illusion persist on. In the Aaron Shust song "Give me Words to Speak" it starts off with "Calloused and bruised, dazed and confused, my Spirit is left wanting something more."

People want more than this half done illusion version of Christianity. There should be a transparency that we should be able to have with our brothers & sisters in a fellowship, Bible teaching setting but yet there isn't?

And now why is that?

Why is it that in religion (if you want to call it that) or this Christian lifestyle, in which truth is emphasized that we continues to lead lives with the lies surrounding us? We're afraid to say sometimes what we really want to say because it's not the "politically correct" thing to say in a church setting.

Why does this carousel continue to go round and round? Is it cause of the judgments that we think that will ensue or is it because the very meaning of truth that is so highly value in our given lifestyle is something we do not wish to seek hence hypocrisy?