Blog 15: Let There Be Fruit

Greetings fellow programs.

What, has no one here ever seen Tron?

Huh. Maybe I am old. I didn’t see this coming.

Anyway, what was I going to tell you…

Oh. That’s right. The wedding. I recently had the privilege to perform a wedding for a good friend of mine. Cool stuff. Got to see some old friends and embarrass the wedding party publically. Well, I don’t know if they were all that embarrassed, but I sure had a fun time.

But let me tell you about what happened at the reception.

Let me start by saying this. Everyone has certain occupational hazards. Pastor’s, for example, might as well walk around with giant targets painted on their chests. Someone is always gunning for you. And so it was at this reception.

As I was sitting at my table laughing and joking with a couple of old friends, a couple gentlemen from another table came over. They wanted to ask the pastor some questions. Now, understand, I am always up for that. I enjoy it. It’s fun. It’s part of who I am. These guys, however, were less interested in asking question as they were going to show me how I was wrong and what I believe and teach are wrong.

At one time they had been a part of my denomination, and they came to me completely certain of what I must believe and teach on certain things. So certain were they, that they just started unleashing their ammo on topic after topic, completely certain I was going to disagree and argue with them and they were going to show me their infallible proof of how wrong the denomination is and by extension, I am.

Over the next two hours, they “discussed” 5 or so different topics that they were sure I was going to fight them on. What the topics were are largely irrelevant. Feel free to inquire if you wish. But the point isn’t the specific topics. The point is that it never once occurred to them that I might actually agree with them.

Which I did. On ever topic but one. And even with that one, I only disagreed in one area, and agreed on the rest of the point. Really, we couldn’t have agreed much more across the board if we had planned it.

And yet, they kept looking for a way to disagree. This is because, they weren’t really looking for a discussion.

They were looking for a fight.

They would launch into a scripture referencing festival, and follow it with, “how can you believe and teach this?”

To which I would reply, “Well, I don’t. I agree with you.”

To which they would reply, “No that’s not tr,… wait, what?”

Every time it was complete bafflement that I wasn’t disagreeing with them. A long time ago, they had been taught certain things. They had believed them. They had believed that this is what the denomination actually believed. Certainly, many do. But not in any official way. But they believed that it was official and that every pastor believed and taught these things. Which, as it turns out, isn’t true. They had learned from pastor’s who were teaching agenda. And these guys had bought it.

Then, one day as they were studying, they discovered that it wasn’t true. It’s funny how the truth always finds it’s way to light. It can only be buried for so long before it sneaks out of it’s prison. And it had snuck into their lives. And this is good and great. There is only one small issue here.

This all happened over a decade ago. And now, ten years later, they are still angry about it. They are still hunting down pastor’s they come into contact with.

Let me be clear. They were not mean. They were not rude. They were perfectly friendly and we had a great discussion. No one left angry. I don’t want to give the impression that this was a verbal brawl. One of these guys I had met a few times in the past before I was a pastor. It probably emboldened him some to talk to me.

But it doesn’t change the intent. They needed to let me know that I was wrong. And when they discovered that I agreed with them, they didn’t know what to do. All the fuel of their fight evaporated. Sort of. One of the two kept trying to find something else to disagree on. It was amusing in some regards.

But I keep going back to 10 years later and still angry. Or at least, still with the bitter taste. Why is that so?

Let answer that question with another question.

When people meet you, once they have met you what do they believe you stand for?

These guys clearly thought they knew what I stood for. Until they actually met me. Then they found out I stand for something else entirely. They were happy with that turn of events, but it did confuse them.

Which caused me to ponder the question, what do they stand for? Well, based on the interaction I had with them, I started concluding that they basis in religion was about confrontational biblical knowledge. Maybe this isn’t true, but having met and spent time with them, this is the impression given. 10 years after being set free with the “truth”, they are still angry, and still arguing about this truth.

Which begs the question, what did they stand for before they learned the “truth”? Where they the same, just on the other side of the fight? Angryish then as they are now, but with a different purpose to their fight?

Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll never know. And It’s really not for me to judge. I don’t point this out to pass judgment. We all have our pet peeves and pet issues that get under our skin.

I use this as an example to as my question again.

Once people have met us, what do they believe we stand for?

I don’t ask that with any assumptions. I don’t know what any of you believe personally. At least, not all of you. I know some of you are Christian, some aren’t. But you are all my friends.

But what do people think you stand for? And I don’t necessarily mean specific point of belief.

Back in January I baptized a 17 year old boy. Ha. I called him a boy. Darn. I AM old.

I baptized this kid. Before he was baptized, he came to church on Sabbath and was talking to the head deacon. Now, this kid is a bit awkward. He’s a good kid, but he has problems with being accepted socially. But he gets excited about church and God. And he was looking forward to being an “official” part of the church family. So, he tells the head deacon he’s getting baptized the next Sabbath.

Well, I hadn’t told the deacon yet.

The deacon flipped out. Instead of showing excitement for the kid, he gets angry and starts ranting about how no one told him, and now he was going to have to fill the baptistery and he only had an entire week to do it (it takes a evening of an open faucet). He does this in the middle of the sanctuary. In front of everyone. And this kid felt like he had done something wrong. This guy was yelling at him. It was totally unacceptable behavior. And all the kid had done was tell the deacon how excited he was.

The kid almost didn’t go through with the baptism. He thought maybe the church didn’t want him.

When people meet that deacon, what do they believe he stands for?

What motivates us to act? How is it that some people share similar factual details but act upon them differently? How is it that some people confuse things and turn the detail into the believe, and make the belief insignificant like the detail?

I was sitting in a board meeting the next month. We were discussing the desire some people had to put on a musical program for church performed by our own people. It was a good idea. Immediately one gentleman piped up. He wanted to know what we were going to do to sensor the music.

Now, it doesn’t matter that this wouldn’t even be an issue. We only have 2 people in that church with any music talent at all, they are both pretty traditional/conservative.

Really, he wasn’t talking about that. He was talking about the baptism. That 17 year old kid asked for a specific song to be played. It was a contemporary Christian song by the group Casting Crowns. It was a very mellow, spiritual song. Beautiful song. Completely and utterly appropriate.

This gentlemen said that if we were going to be performing music like that we either needed censorship or he was voting against it. I asked him what was wrong with the song. He responded that it was “evil.”

I asked him what was evil about it.

He said, “I don’t know, it just is.”

It just is. This was his reasoning. “It just is.”

Brilliant.

Translation? The song wasn’t evil. He just didn’t like it. It turns out there is a huge difference there.

Instead of being happy about the baptism and encouraging our people to actively participate in worship, he wanted to complain about music that was never going to be a part of the service anyway.

When people meet this guy, what do they believe HE stands for?

It doesn’t matter what we believe in life. Ok, let me rephrase that. It does matter what we believe in life. What I mean to say is, whatever we believe in life, how does that belief manifest in our lives? What do we show people that we believe in? What we stand for?

The bible uses a phrase that is applicable to anyone regardless of their belief system.

You will know them by their fruit.

That which our life produces is a reflection of what we truly believe. Not what we say we believe, but what we truly believe.

A grape vine produces grapes. An orange tree produces orange. Always. Never do these things produce any other type of fruit.

Poison oak always produces poison oak and never anything else.

What do we produce?

Back in the early church people were arguing over disputable and irrelevant beliefs. These arguments became the larger focus of their lives. The apostle Paul kept trying to tell them to forget about these things and focus on stuff that actually matters.

One example of this is the example of circumcision. Jewish Christians were trying to get gentile Christians to circumcise themselves for the sake of salvation. The only problem was that circumcision had nothing to do with salvation. But they fought about it none the less.

Paul went into a long winded argument about how pointless and irrelevant either argument was. None of it mattered. In the end finished his argument like this.

“The only thing that matters is faith expressing itself in love.”

Please stop and read that sentence again. I don’t care what you think religion is about. I don’t care what side of religion you are on. If you have missed this point, you have missed God’s point. You have missed the point who we are suppose to be. Whether you believe in God or not, the point of that sentence is relevant. The only thing that matters is expressing ourselves through love. With love. In love.

Only love.

There is no other point.

As a Christian, I believe this is the reason Jesus came to die. He came to teach us this point. He hadn’t been dead 10 years before everyone forgot that the only thing that mattered was faith expressing itself through love.

But if we aren’t producing this around us, then what are we standing for?

Once a person has met you, what do they believe you stand for?

What kind of fruit does your life produce?