A new way of living (and thinking)

Published 10:00 pm Wednesday, September 2, 2015

By Rev. Jeff Harris

The sky is falling!

At least that’s what it sounds like whenever I read about the current state of the church. My email inbox and Facebook feed are filled with articles about declining church attendance and participation (I guess that’s one of the hazards of having “preacher” friends).

 People are attending church less often. And more than a few struggling congregations will shut their doors in the years to come. A growing number of people—sometimes called the “Nones”—

no longer consider themselves “religious,” while others prefer titles like “Spiritual But Not Religious.” However you examine it, institutional religion in North America is on the decline.

There are many reasons for this shift, and quite a few of them are our own fault. Too often Christians are known for hostility instead of mercy, condemnation instead of grace, and anger instead of love. There is no doubt that those of us who claim to follow Jesus often do a lousy job.

But I can’t help thinking that one of the reasons for the decline is a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to be Christian (this, too, is our fault). Too often Christianity is presented as intellectual assent to a particular set of theological presuppositions. In other words, Christianity is mainly presented as a system of belief. And while I have great affinity for the particular (and often peculiar) doctrines of the Christian tradition, this is not the starting place.

The essence of Christianity begins with Jesus’ invitation to “follow me.” “Follow me” means that Christianity starts with a certain set of practices (ways of living) before it gets around to a certain set of beliefs.

We would do well to follow the words of the Franciscan mystic, Richard Rohr, who writes, “We do not think ourselves into a new way of living; we live ourselves into a new way of thinking.”

Jesus invites us into a new way of living, a life of service and sacrifice, a life of generosity, a life that welcomes strangers, practices justice and forgiveness, and loves not only friends and neighbors, but also enemies. This kind of living is at the heart of Christianity, and you cannot simply think your way into this kind of life—you can only arrive at this life through concrete practices. And if you are going to be any good at it, that is—if you are going to reflect the love and life of Jesus—it’s going to take a lifetime of practice.

I do not mean to imply that if Christians were only “nicer” then churches would be full and the number of self-identifying Christians would no longer wane. That would be an unwise correlation. But it would be helpful if we were clearer about what it means to be Christian.

It would be helpful to communicate that authentic Christianity requires more than simply “believing in God.”

Authentic Christianity is following Jesus into a freeing, demanding, transforming, rigorous way of life. I’ve been at this way of life for a number of years now, and the truth is, I’m still not very good at it. That may sound strange coming from a “religious professional” but as a parishioner once told me, “Being a professional doesn’t necessarily mean you’re any good at it, it just means you get paid for it.”

 I know this: trying to follow Jesus is not boring. This new way of living, which has led to new ways of thinking, is certainly not boring. It makes for an interesting life.

I’m afraid that many folks are missing out on this interesting life because we haven’t offered them a true picture of what means to follow Jesus.