I suppose I’m not always the most level-headed person. After all, I get irrationally upset about sports, and sometimes, I get worked up over petty day to day things like traffic or McDonald’s food quality or the fact that Facebook keeps changing its format (ok, so I don’t actually get that upset over that. But it sure seems like other people do).

 

My point is this: despite my best intentions, I can be, from time to time, described as ‘hostile.’ And as a Christian, I suppose that makes me a ‘hostile Christian.’ But I give you all – that’s right, YOU – permission to slap me across the face the moment I start acting like these guys.

 

Who are they, you ask? This ‘ministry’ (in quotation marks, since I can’t imagine who they might be serving) is devoted to angrily bashing other Christians. In other words, they’re like the angry Christians who rail against everything in society (I believe I’ve spoken of them before), except they’re turned against their own.

 

Of course, they don’t see it like this. Nope. To them, if you’re not down with their own particular, narrow view of God/Jesus/Christianity/the Bible, then you’re a hell bound sinner. And you’ll be there, along with the Catholics and Mormons, the Evangelicals and Independents, the Emerging Church and the Pentecostals, anyone who’s read anything by Rick Warren, Shane Claiborne or Beth Moore, and, of course, the members of the Southern Baptist Convention. Truth be told, after a brief survey of their rants, I’m not sure exactly who IS saved in their book. It’s certainly not me – after all, I disagree with their Calvinistic views of Total Depravity and Regeneration, which I’m sure means I need to ‘repent’ of my ‘ear tickling heresy.’

 

That’s the thing about being angry all the time – you’d better be right! After all, if you’re going to hold other people to ridiculous standards, then you’d better be prepared to defend those standards to the death. And the truth is that I disagree – sometimes in a big way – with everyone above. Does that mean they’re hell-bound sinners? Uh… no. Maybe they are, and maybe they’re not. That’s up to God. But if they are (hell bound, I mean), it’s certainly NOT going to be because they disagree with me.

 

In times like these, it seems like a good time to remember how Jesus dealt with situations like this. There was one time when his disciples took issue with someone preaching who didn’t look or sound just like their little group. Jesus’ reply? Leave them alone! After all, if they’re not against God, they’re for him! And if they’re not right with him, HE’LL take care of it. He doesn’t need you to do that.

 

So I’m asking for accountability. I’m not always all that reasonable, and I need your help. After all, a slap in the face every now and then is a whole lot easier to deal with then being angry all the time!

Where do you want to be in ten years?

I know, I know - it sounds like the type of question you may be asked a job interview, or maybe even part of a questionaire for an internet dating site. But still, it's a question worth asking. After all, where you want to be in a decade should change how you live today. And what you do today WILL follow you; just ask Katy Hudson.

In 2001, Katy Hudson was a young, hopeful gospel singer in Nashville. Just sixteen, Hudson had already landed a record deal, and released a self-titled album singing love songs to Jesus.

Of course, you probably have never heard of Katy Hudson. That's because after her debut flopped, she changed her name to Katy Perry, and after landing yet another record deal, she released One of the Boys in 2008. With songs titled, 'UR So Gay' 'Waking Up in Vegas,' and 'I Kissed a Girl,' let's just say that her subject material changed slightly.

Now, this is in no way, shape or form intended to be an attack on Katy Perry or a judgment of her faith. For all I know, she could still be a committed Christian, albeit with a different view of a relationship with God than my own. That's not the point. The point is this: ten years ago, assuming she was sincere, Perry was a wide eyed teenager with dreams of ministry and making an impact for her Lord and Savior, Jesus. Now? She's rich, famous, and as far as I can tell, completely out of touch with her original intent in being in the musin industry.

For you and me, let this be a sobering reminder that no matter where we are now, we ALWAYS have a choice to make. And just because you're following Jesus right now, that doesn't mean that your growth is over. That's why the term 'Cultivate' exists in our 'Connect.Call.Cultivate' mission method. Being a disciple of Jesus is a life of constant growing up and growing closer to God.

In the New Testament, the apostle Paul wrote a pair of letters to a young preacher, encouraging him in his ministry. In the second such letter, he discusses how other people are falling away from their faith. And so, he tells him where to find his hope: in what he did before. He wrote,

But don't let it faze you. Stick with what you learned and believed, sure of the integrity of your teachers—why, you took in the sacred Scriptures with your mother's milk! There's nothing like the written Word of God for showing you the way to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. - 2 Timothy 3:14-15 (The Message)

Right now, if you're a Christian, you've been taught hope and salvation through faith in Jesus. The future, though, is entirely up to you. You can either hold on to what you have and build on it, or you can leave it behind.

Just remember: where you are in ten years has an awful lot to do with what you choose today.

The day a person gets their driver's license is one they will always remember. For me, I'll never forget just how excited I was the day I was officially able to legally drive a car: I just drove and drove and drove. I didn't have anywhere to go, and I didn't have anything to do, but I just loved driving. It was exciting, a sign I was growing up, and, most importantly, it represented freedom that childhood could never offer.

Of course, it took roughly a week before the novelty wore off, and now, I can truly say that I hate driving. There's a lesson in there somewhere.

All of this explains why, on a recent trip to Indiana, I was able to think in great depth about a bumper sticker I saw. With literally nothing else to save my mind from intense boredom, I was probably more excited than I should have been to notice the following message on the bumper of a fellow traveler:

DEAR SLOW DRIVERS: STAY OUT OF THE LEFT LANE. AMERICA THANKS YOU.

At first, I chuckled. After all, the 'Dear' so and so comedic device always makes things funnier, and let me tell you - this was the mack daddy of all bumper stickers, stretching the length of the car. It was pretty fantastic.

Thinking about this, though, I looked at what lane I was in: I was in the left. And I then looked at my speedometer: I was going a touch under the prescribed speed limit of 65 miles per hour. Putting two and two together, and I realized something even better than the sticker itself - the owner was the biggest hypocrite in the world! I mean, the guy was so bothered by slow moving traffic that he said to himself, 'self, I will make a statement on my bumper alerting everyone to my views!' And yet, he wasn't apparently bothered enough by slow moving traffic to avoid adding to the plague. The whole situation delighted me to no end as I passed him on the right and left him behind.

Unfortunately, hypocrisy is really no laughing matter. As a Christian who tries to keep in tune with the pulse of non-believers, my entire life there has been one predominant complaint about the church: we're all a bunch of hypocrites. We can't 'practice what we preach,' and because of that, people 'like our Christ, but not his Christians.' It may be cliche, but it's the truth.

You know what the irony is, though? The person who might have been bothered the most by hypocrisy was... wait for it...

JESUS.

For you and I, then, we need to make a practice of checking our motives constantly. After all, we'll never be perfect, which means that there's truthfully nothing we can do that will make us able to actually follow all the wisdom of the Bible. What we can, do, though, is be sincere. And sincerity is exactly what the religious people that Jesus encountered lacked. As he put it,

Everything they do is for show. On their arms they wear extra wide prayer boxes with Scripture verses inside, and they wear robes with extra long tassels. And they love to sit at the head table at banquets and in the seats of honor in the synagogues. They love to receive respectful greetings as they walk in the marketplaces, and to be called ‘Rabbi.’ - Matthew 23:5-7

The sad fact is that there are many in the church who care only about what others think, and because of that, they've gotten great at playing church and putting on a good show. What Christ wants from us, though, is to care more for what HE thinks than anyone else. And considering Jesus is omniscient, the only approach that makes sense in your relationship with God is an honest one. It's high time that you and I stopped worrying about what anyone thinks of us but the one that matters - God. And when we do that, we can live without fear of being hypocritical, and instead, live out a sincere faith, no matter what anyone else sees.

^{After all, when we put on a show, eventually, the truth will be seen.}

I've wanted to be in ministry since I was fourteen years old. That means that today, at twenty five, I'm doing exactly what I've always wanted to. And I wanted to be a preacher for one reason and one reason only: I wanted to help people have a relationship with Jesus and spent eternity with God. That's it.

As I've learned, though, that's not all ministry is about. And there are times that I feel amazingly small and insignificant, times that I feel like just about the most unqualified person in the world to be representing God and sharing his word with people.

This is one of those times.

Earlier this week, an old friend of mine alerted me to the fact that this happened. Truth be told, insulated in the American machine of pop-culture 'news,' I was completely unaware of the tragedy that an entire nation was experiencing. But my friend didn't just want me to know about it. Instead, she had a question - 'how is that fair?'

And that, friends, is a good question. It's one I've been considering for about four days now. And you know what? I'm no better off than I was Tuesday. I have no idea. Oh, sure, I know, on an intellectual level that the evil in the world comes from sin's presence dating back to the Fall in Genesis 3. And yeah, I get that God allows free choice, meaning that we influence the world around us, positively and negatively. But there are some things that are so senseless that the textbook answers don't help.

So I'm out. I don't have another answer. All I can do is trust my Lord and Savior, Jesus. After all, if nothing else, I know he understands. As the writer of Hebrews writes,

So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. - Hebrews 4:14-16

I know it doesn't change anything, and I know that, for a lot of people, it sounds silly/childish/ignorant. But that's what I've got. I believe in a God who became a man, and as a man, Jesus laughed and cried, felt pain and pleasure, and experience friendship, love, rejection and hate. He was a man who bled and died and because of that, he understands exactly what it's like to be us in times like this. He understands that helpless feeling, that voice inside us that says, 'this isn't right,' and he gets completely what it means to feel absolutely miserable.

That's my God, the one I serve and the one I trust. And I get it - that doesn't change last Saturday, and it doesn't change all the other senseless days in my twenty five years on this planet. But if nothing else, it's comforting to know that when my prayers are more angry than thankful and more hopeless than hopeful, that Jesus knows exactly where I'm coming from. He understands.

And that's a good thing in a world where your preacher doesn't.

Golden Yukon Potatoes

Heavy Whipping Cream

Milk

Butter

Salt

Pepper

Six ingredients. Together, they form the most perfect mashed potatoes in the history of the world of the earth. Really - they're that good. So they're a staple in the Snyder household, even as I attempt to diet. I can cut a great many things from my life, but mashed potatoes are not included in that list.

So last night, I did what I've done so many times before - I made mashed potatoes. And when they were finished, guess what? They were great. Really. They were. Unfortunately, as I was pouring myself a glass of milk to go with my dinner, I noticed the expiration date on the outside of the container:

4-6-2010

For those of you scoring at home, yesterday was April 11, 2010. And that means our mashed potatoes were spiked with rotten milk. I'll spare you the gory details, but let it be known that the rest of last night was spent feeling like a family of badgers made my colon their new den.

All that, from one out of six ingredients. It just goes to show a principle that the Bible teaches on more than one occasion - it doesn't take much to ruin something. Everything in your life can be going swimmingly, and suddenly something small just torpedos the whole thing. 

The reason is simple: just like ingredients in mashed potatoes, no sin or false idea is actually 'small.' Something may seem insignificant, but our lives are such a balancing act full of different variables that nothing lacks significance.

So what can we do? For one, we can stop tolerating wrong things in our lives just because they're 'no big deal.' That's a lie, and anyone who believes it will learn otherwise quickly. More than that, though, we need to fully place our trust in Jesus. Because life's balance is so delicate, we need to do away with the notion that things will be great all the time. They aren't. Life is a constant struggle, and that's why we need to focus on something that will last beyond our years in this world - our relationship with Jesus.

After all, just about anything can ruin perfection!

I don't mean to pick on McDonald's. I really don't. Oh, sure, I've called their burgers 'Grade Q Muskrat meat' on more than one occasion, but hey - some people like muskrat. And I'll admit that even I do from time to time; no matter how low quality it is, it just makes me happy to eat it sometimes. But with all that said, the meal that's supposed to make everyone happy is, officially, indefensible.

For your viewing pleasure, I present to you, dear reader: A One Year Old Happy Meal.

Of course, you'll notice there's not much difference between a fresh Happy Meal and a year old Happy Meal, except, perhaps, the temperature. And that, friends, is deeply disturbing on more than one level. If a full calendar year of nature can't break down the meal in the slightest, it's no wonder our bodies have such a difficult time.

But that's not nearly as disturbing as what I like to call (read: decided to call for the sake of this blog) 'Happy Meal Christians.' You know the type - they believe in Jesus, make a decision to follow him, and then, that's it. There's no growth, no change, no metamorphasis into something new. Sure, there's a decision, and of course, a salvation based on grace, but other than that? No change. Just like a year old Happy Meal.

And you know what the most disturbing part is? A lot of the time, the Happy Meal Christian that bothers me the most is ME.

Unless I'm alone in this, it'd be a good idea for each of us to heed the advice of the Apostle Peter in his first letter to the church: grow up! And through a committed and constant relationship with Jesus Christ, we can do just that. God has given us all that we need for spiritual growth - the Bible, church, prayer, the Holy Spirit, etc. - and so the ball's in our court. If I - and you - want to grow up, I can. It's all up to us. We CAN be spiritually mature, committed followers of Jesus make an eternal impact on the world around us.

And that sounds MUCH better than being a Happy Meal!