Sunday, March 26

Welcome to Christianity.

I am having fun having a car. It is a good thing to have. I've been reconnecting with some friends that I was only acquaintances with until the last year and a half or so. It has been so much fun to be around a new group of people. I have been hanging out with my friend Joe, Chad & Christy and the rest of their friends. I actually met Chad & Joe through another friend of mine, Brian, that I have been friends with since I moved to Columbus.

I went to their young adult meeting tonight and I realized something: I think I am ruined for churches for the rest of my life. Every time a preacher gets up to speak I find so many holes in things that are said. It bugs me. For instance, the pastor tonight was talking about when Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well. John 4:1-42.

He was making a point about how shocked the woman must have been when Jesus asked for her to fetch her husband. It just kind of bugged me that the pastor didn't know his cultural history. Bakc in those days it was totally socially inacceptable for Jesus to talk to this woman. One: he was a Jew and she was a Samaritan, a people thought unclean by the Jews. Two: he was a single man speaking to a woman in public. It would have been completely inappropriate for him to holla.

Which was the point of why Jesus said to her to go get her husband. He was playing the role of the socially acceptable Jew. In turn, that was even more odd because Jesus was mostly purposefully avoidant of socially acceptable practices and traditions. He ignored them to make a point. And it pissed off the people who added to the scriptures, making these social rules that begot legalism, which is why the people crucified him.

The pastor later made some really good points about being a socially relevant Christian in today's society, whcih were lost on me because of his previous misstatement.

And not to mention that after the meeting we all went to B-Dub's and discussed issues that are happening within the young adult ministry at their church. Which takes me back to the fact that the American church today has serious issues. And I had better leave it at that or I'll be typing all freaking night.

I had a good time, though. Those guys are pretty funny. And girls.

2 comments:

The Sasquatch said...

We're girls? I don't follow you.

Seriously, though, I think it's a difficult thing to say that Jesus wouldn't necessarily have spoken to the woman next to the well. Jesus did a lot of things that were "uncouth," several examples of which being dining with Zaccheus (or however you spell his name), doing what many believed to be work on the Sabbath, and going around claiming to be God and forgiving people's sins. It could be that Jesus was making a point about the uselessness of cultural norms and trends when it comes to a person's ability to genuinely interact with God.

You could make the point either way.

But I could be wrong. What do I know, really? I am bald, after all.

:)

Meg said...

Yeah, Sasquatch, you are probably right. Looking back I think I was more overreacting than anything. And when I typed this, I sounded really pompous. Who am I to act so arrogant like I know more than a pastor? Questioning is one thing, what I did was wrong. I am really sorry about that.