Culture

     A lot of people I read about who leave the faith and then write memoirs about it site wrong things Christians have said or done to them as a basis for discarding their beliefs.  This is very common for my generation--children of the 1980's, teens of the 90's, and adults of a new century.  Often, as they write these books about their journey (their "deconstruction" of their childhood faith), they talk about the sights, smells, sounds, and feelings of growing up in late 20th century Western Christian culture.  The nostalgia factor is very high for me as I read them, because I relate to that culture.  Sunday school.  Children's church.  AWANA (or similar midweek church programs).  Christian education.  Some of these stories are so close to my own for a while...until they've had enough.  Something in Christian culture ended up not gelling with them in early adulthood, and they deconstruct their faith.  

     Any group--a faith community, a club, a political party, a sports team, a workplace, even a family--develops into its own subculture.  In fact, the Christian school I teach at often refers to the culture of the school, meaning their environment, and what one can experience there.  This is normal.  Subcultures are part of the larger world, and everyone finds themselves in them.  

     Christianity is a faith, instituted by Jesus Christ, and preserved for millennia.  At the same time, it is a subculture, whether we like that or not.  As a faith, it is perfect, resting in the unchanging truth of God's Word.  As a subculture, it is flawed.  The subculture isn't based on the enduring truth of God's word.  It is based on people living out that faith, and these people are not going to be perfect.  Sometimes, Christians say and do silly things.  It is very important to distinguish between the truth of our faith, and the silliness of our culture.  We can still enjoy our culture.  We just need to make sure we're looking to Jesus and the Bible, not to the culture itself (looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith... Hebrews 12:2a)

     To give you an idea, I'm going to share some very silly things I experienced in Christian culture in my lifetime, but that were not in any way related to the truth of the Bible, or to Jesus as the Savior.  

     As a youth, I went several summers to a very strict Fundamentalist summer camp in the high desert of California.  Shorts had to reach the knee, and if they didn't, you were asked to change (I'm a rule-follower and I was even asked to change a couple of times when my shorts were a half-inch too short without my realizing).  They used the King James Bible.  If you brought any book besides the Bible (such as a novel, a devotional book--anything besides the actual Bible--the counselor would confiscate it for the week and return it to you when it was time to go home.  Rock music was said to be evil, and all music at camp was piano only.  They were very devout, with chapel twice a day (morning and evening), and we were encouraged to dress up in "church clothes" for the evening chapel.  Prayer, daily Bible reading, and scripture memorization were part of the program.  I got a lot out of this, even though I didn't 100% agree with all of their rules.  I am glad for my time there.

     In spite of being this devout and serious, they also told us some whoppers.  They told us that Indians lived in the hills nearby, and if you left your cabin at night, they might come and scalp you.  As if to strengthen their point, they told stories about a child from the previous summer who had been scalped.  They even took us on a nature hike, with a staged act where one of the counselors pretended to see an Indian chief and screamed, and had us run away back to our cabins.  No one else saw this supposed Indian chief, of course, but if we had, why not meet him and get to know him?  Why run away?  Can you believe how ridiculous?  They would never get away with any of this today, and I'm sure they don't tell these stories anymore (they might still lie, but probably not about Indians!).  One night, they took us on a hike to what they said was an Indian graveyard, and they warned us not to get too close, or we'd vanish into thin air.  Come on!  I never believed any of these tall tales, but some of the younger campers were really scared and cried.  Another lie they told us (which I sadly did believe for a while) was about the so-called sand bear.  It was a bear, they said, that lived underground in the hot summer months, but poked its nose up through the dirt to breathe.  They warned us not to kick any black rocks we saw, because it was probably a sand bear's nose.  They had a polar bear skin on the lodge wall, and they told us it was really a sand bear they had killed a few years ago.  They made up quite the tale about it, saying a child kicked a supposed black rock, and then the sand bear popped up and attacked him, until a counselor had the courage to kill him, and they hung the skin up to remind us all not to kick black rocks.  You know what's embarrassing?  Until I was in high school, I thought sand bears were real, due to their lie.  

     If they held such high standards about modesty, music, and using the King James Bible, why did they think it was okay to lie--violating a biblical command (Exodus 20:16)?  Where was their biblical standard when they told these us these falsehoods?  I'm guessing they viewed it as camp fun, their version of ghost stories around the campfire.  Still, it was wrong on several levels.  But that doesn't make the Bible or Christianity untrue.  It doesn't even make everything else related to that camp untrue.  It was a foolish thing to do.  We all do foolish things at times that we later re-think and re-evaluate.  

     There are times Christians get worked up over certain things, and put more attention into that than in anything else.  One author of a book that nostalgically talked about growing up Christian (and still being Christian, but wanting to rant against Christianity at the same time) talked about how, as a young woman, her church did a whole series to debunk The Da Vinci Code and how stilly and foolish and overdone it was.  My thought on that is, maybe they saw a need.  Maybe the claims in that book were a threat to some people's faith, and they wanted to have answers.  I remember a few years before that, a church I was involved in did a big series about The Passion of the Christ as a means to welcome in people with questions.  Again, maybe they saw this as an open door, though it became kind of gimmicky.  I personally believe that simply teaching the Bible addresses anything pop-culture throws at us, without the need for a special sermon series about it.  Maybe these things were just silly and foolish.  But again, maybe upon thinking about it much later, they realized this.  Or maybe it really helped someone at the time.  

     I've had pastors I've really admired say incorrect things.  Most of the time, they meant well when they said it.  As a fourteen-year-old, I was wounded deeply in church in a way that still affects me today.  Some very wrong things happened to me.  At the next church we were at, while I was in high school and as a young adult, I loved the pastor dearly, but I disagree with some of the standards he upheld.  He believed so strongly that women shouldn't have spiritual authority over men (per his interpretation of First Timothy 2:12) that he wouldn't let woman teach any males over sixth grade.  Our high school class had a husband and wife teaching team.  One Sunday, the husband woke up sick, so the wife came alone.  The pastor only let the girls go to the class and made the boys go to the adult Sunday school class, because he really believed that to let them attend the high school class with the woman teacher without her husband was a violation of this verse.  After I did a mission trip (which the church supported), I was only given five minutes in front of the church to share a two-month experience, because he believed that if I went longer than 5 minutes, I would be preaching, thus violating that verse.  He had a stopwatch while I shared.  On the other hand, a man in the church who had also done a trip was given the whole service time to share.  You know what?  I might think this pastor's application of First Timothy 2:12 to be a little extreme, but I respect that he honored his convictions.  I personally don't think letting the boys go to Sunday school that day or giving me more time to share about my trip would have violated the verse, but I am glad that this pastor had his own convictions and wanted to do what he believed was right.  That's what integrity is. It would be easy to poke fun of it, but I am thankful for everything I learned from him, and I am thankful that I have formed my convictions about these things too.  

     There are a lot of foolish things Christian culture perpetuates.  Other believers might even let us down sometimes.  But that doesn't mean we give up the truth of God's word, nor does it even mean we stop living in community with other believers.  Hebrews 10:25 says, Let us not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.  Fellow Christians can encourage each other in the truth of God's word.  Maybe you can be that voice that speaks truth and rightness when you see something wrong.  Is your faith in the unchanging truth of Christ and the Bible, or is it in your pastor, your Christian friends, your circle?  Don't make the mistake many do.  Love your culture if you want, but love Jesus and the Bible more.  If your church or friends ever come crashing down around you, you will always have an anchor in Him.  We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. (Hebrews 6:19).  

     Next time you're tempted to give up on church or Christianity, rethink it.  I alluded to a very hurtful experience I had at 14 from people I trusted at church.  That experience destroyed my self-image.  To this day, I struggle with confidence because of it.  It's one of those things I have to keep choosing to forgive and put back in God's hands.  I expect I will until I'm perfect in Heaven.  Because I didn't go to counseling until several years later, I continued having hurtful things happen to me that compounded the pain.  I remember as a college student, facing another rejection, telling a friend, "My faith feels so weak right now."  To this, she replied, "Don't focus on your faith.  Focus on Jesus."  The best advice anyone has ever given me.  I'm where I am today because she uttered that God-inspired sentence.  And I now encourage you to do the same.  Focus on Jesus.  He won't let you down!