God’s priorities
Yesterday, I got a piece of mail. It was a large piece of paper with the face of Anglo-Jesus, eyes closed, shaded in such a way that if you stared at it long enough, it looked like his eyes opened. It came with a pamphlet identifying it as a “prayer rug” that could bring healing or massive financial benefits (huge emphasis on the tens of thousands of dollars God would give you for staring at this prayer rug and then bowing down to it). Four pages of testimonials. Order form and return envelope so you could write down your prayer requests, buy things, or make a donation.
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The other night, Jim Bakker was on the television saying, “I told you so.” He claimed that he had “prophesied” the earthquake in Japan — cut to footage from 2005 where he said, “I see an 8.9 earthquake in Japan. I don’t know when.” He immediately followed up with, “I said that Katrina was going to happen” and a cut to, “I see New Orleans underwater. I don’t know when.”
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Not long ago, the same television channel (hey, we only watch it for laughs when Leno is boring!) was selling “blessings”. For something like $100 a month, you could be “blessed”. They were encouraging people to go take out loans so they could donate large sums of money to their program.
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My high school was affiliated with the Church of Christ denomination. The Bible teacher taught that it was a sin for women to pray out loud in the company of men, to lead Bible studies that included men, or to be in any kind of authoritative position over a man. Thousands of ministers are teaching their congregation that it’s immoral for a woman to work outside the home unless it’s to pay for her husband to get an advanced degree and earn tons more money, at which point her sole purpose is to obey him and have children.
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This week, a man released a book in which he argues that God’s love will eventually redeem all people, regardless of their religious views, such that no one will spend eternity apart from God.
What breaks my heart is that it’s this last item that has the church riled up. We look around and see exploitation and oppression, but shrug and say “doctrinal differences,” but when someone presents compassion and hope, he gets condemned for it.
Note the difference: If your offense is just a doctrinal difference, you deserve hell. If you actually commit evil deeds in the name of God, it can be excused as a doctrinal difference. Does this seem strange to anyone?
