Oddball Christianity?

I received an odd phone call today.  And I do mean odd.  When I answered the phone I immediately wished I hadn’t.  An overly enthusiastic salesperson (who tried to make a joke I couldn’t really understand) was on the other end of the line.  I was polite. I promise.  But I also wanted to end the call quickly. I hoped a respectful “No thank you, I’m not interested right now” would be enough.  It wasn’t.  The salesman pushed and I declined again.  He tried a third time, then finally realized I wasn’t taking his bait.

Not so strange so far, is it?  But he ended the call with the oddest statement—“Jesus loves you”—which isn’t strange in itself, but the way he said it was.  Almost as if he meant “Jesus loves you, but I sure don’t.”

His statement and the way he said it, left me cold.  I actually stared at the receiver for a few stunned seconds after he hung up.

Which made me wonder, do my words ever leave others cold?  In my efforts to be “Christian” do I spout platitudes that reek of insincerity?  Does my attitude ever make others bristle?  Does my behavior ever cause someone to think ‘if that’s what being a Christian is all about, no thank you.”

Sadly, it’s probably happened.

Several years ago JP found the following note attached to the windshield of his car.  It was such a vivid illustration of how Christians act selfishly, but spiritualize their bad behavior, that we kept it.  It read:

“Sorry for dinging your car as I was leaving!  As brothers in Christ please forgive me as Christ forgive us. Have a blessed day!”

We joked later that it would have been easier for JP to have a blessed day if the person who left the note would have signed his name so JP could have had insurance cover the car’s damage.

Behaving like a Christian means more than spouting Christian jargon or slapping Christian bumper stickers and fish on the back of our cars. Jesus said it best, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  If each of us treated other people—strangers and loved ones alike—as we would like to be treated I’m betting our words, our attitudes and our actions wouldn’t leave anyone cold.

Just something I’ve been thinking about today……