Hot Air has a lengthy montage of Jesus in grilled cheese sandwiches, sidewalks, rocks, ice cream, dirty laundry, Cheetos and more. Perhaps the reason why people see Jesus in all these wacky places is they’re desperately looking for Him and aren’t seeing him in us.
When the so-called prosperity “gospel” is an accepted part of mainstream American Christianity what credibility do we have to tell people about the real gospel? I’m talking about the gospel that gave Paul the strength to be beaten, stoned, shipwrecked, and imprisoned yet still praise Jesus. The gospel gives people suffering terrible abuse in Darfur the strength to go on because they know Jeremiah 29:11; it keeps the prisoners in the laogai singing hymns and telling the guards about Jesus even though it may earn them another beating. Not the “gospel” that leads people to believe they’re entitled to a McMansion they can’t really afford. More effort has been made to “defend” the church against Harry Potter than the likes of Rick Warren and Joel Osteen.
When we who are supposed to be salt and light allow our faith to be so watered down in the culture and in our own lives, it’s hardly surprising that people will find religious icons anywhere they can. The question is, what can we do about it?
