This week’s bizarre Christian headline is about a nice Christian lady who agreed to be a surrogate mother and then once she popped the twins out, decided the child’s parents weren’t of the right moral caliber to raise children. (For the full story, click here.)

So, what we have here is a Christian family that made a vow to carry a child for another family. Then they found out something they didn’t like about the other family’s past, so they decided to steal the baby. If you’re keeping score folks, that’s four things I’m fairly certain Jesus wouldn’t do. We have:

• Breaking a promise or not honoring an agreement.
• Being judgmental.
• Refusing to forgive past mistakes.
• Stealing. (That’s breaking a commandment, for those of you who place the Ten Commandments higher than anything else in Scripture.)

Aside from that, there are a couple of other observations I’d like to make. The first, is that Christian’s today aren’t terribly good at honoring vows or contracts. We seem to have it in our heads that because Jesus will forgive us, we can weasel our way out of any agreement for any reason. This story illustrates something that has been a growing concern to me for several years, and that is that a covenant between Christians means absolutely nothing, when the Church should be the one place where we see agreements being honored.

Another issue I’d like to point out, is the morality issue. For some reason, we have become so consumed with moral issues that we now place them over everything else. Morality becomes the primary aspect of our faith, to the point that it has become more important than forgiveness. Our strong position on the moral issue of abortion has led some Christians to go as far as commit murder in response. Our view of homosexuality as a sin has prompted many to treat animals better than gays. Our distorted view of mental health problems as an issue of morality has caused us to act in ways that simply are not Christ-like and to do horrible things like what this family in Michigan has done.

We have to learn to love. We have to learn to forgive. We can’t keep destroying lives in the name of Christ.

It hasn’t even been 24 hours and already Pat Robertson is beating his little, “look at God showing his wrath” drum. He reminds me of a line from the movie “Oh, God!” In it, God, speaking about a Robertson-like pastor says, (and I paraphrase): “He says he speaks my words, but if you ask me, he ran out of my words a long time ago.”

This is a disgrace, to say the least. I invite Mr. Robertson to go to Haiti, serve the people there, get to know them. Perhaps he would learn a Biblical value called compassion.

Last week, female Facebookers around the world felt compelled to post their bra colors under the guise of raising awareness for breast cancer. I must say my awareness of another underpinning of Christian subculture was raised. While my non-Christian friends posted non-vanilla colors like pink, red with white lace, blue, purple and black, the majority of my Christian friends posted two colors: White and beige.

That’s it. Explains a lot doesn’t it. For me, this was a small illustration of a bigger problem. The Church sucks at sex. We have all the teens in our youth groups afraid that not only will they catch a disease if they have sex before marriage, but most of them are afraid sex itself is a disease. Oh yes, in the last decade or so we’ve gotten pretty good at reminding them that it is a beautiful gift from God intended for marriage, yadda, yadda, yadda… but, we also make sure they know that God will strike them with syphilis or a baby if they do it too early.

Fast forward to the marriage bed, and newlywed Christians are as lost as a monk in a porn shop. This “beautiful thing from God” still feels dirty and shameful. That is—of course—if the teens in the youth group listen. If they rebel, they kind of turn out normal, and many of them rebel.

Here’s an idea: what if the church taught young people about sex, explained abstinence as the pathway to finding a mate who loves you enough to wait? What if we didn’t make such a big deal about sex? Maybe if it wasn’t so taboo, teens wouldn’t make such a big deal out of it. Maybe if we were more honest and mature about sex we would see more honest and mature Christians—or at least we could be a little less screwed up under the sheets.

So, this week, after church (or before if it suits you,) make a vow with your spouse to have some good, passionate and possibly kinky sex. Break out the KY Jelly, go buy a red thong and don’t be afraid of flavored condoms—who knows, you may discover that God made sex to be a beautiful thing.

The so-called War on Christmas rages on.

Now, Christians who like to go around being offended can go to a nice little website and rate their Christmas shopping experiences. I kid you not, folks can now nitpick about everything from signage to whether or not the teenaged minimum-wage earning cashier slighted them by not choosing to wish them a Merry Christmas.

Stores can be rated as friendly, negligent or offensive, and of course comments are allowed so visitors can explain just what it is that warmed their hearts or chapped their hides. Well, since we’re going around taking the name of Christ as an excuse to be offended, let me tell you what offends me about this “War on Christmas” nonsense.

I am offended by the complete bastardization of the reason my Savior came.

My Savior did not come so that you could think about Him once a year while buying presents and saving money.
My Lord did not walk this earth so you could lord your feelings about the phrase “Merry Christmas” over cashiers and stock people who probably have to work right up through Christmas Eve while you’re going on your 3 week Christmas vacation.
My Savior did not come so that you could attempt to take away other people’s livelihood just because they don’t wish you a Merry Christmas while you’re getting 10 percent off on Joel Osteen’s latest drivel.
Jesus did not come so you could try to exclude everyone from celebrating a holiday held in honor of His birth.

Let me remind you of a phrase you quote every holiday without realizing its power:

“Do not be afraid, for I bring you good tidings of great joy that will be for all people.”

All people.

Jesus, Savior to all.

Let’s step back for a second and look at this. The majority of Americans put a Christmas tree in their homes. The majority of Americans participate in the celebration of Christmas. The majority of Americans are partaking in a small or large way in the celebration of the birth of a Savior who was for all people.

And you want to condemn people over two words? Even atheists feel the “spirit of Christmas.” All across the world, people are kinder at this time of year and are much more charitable. This is the work that only Christ can do. This holiday is an example of the Holy Spirit showing Christ to all people.

And you would exclude some of those people because they don’t repeat two “magic words.”

Sounds to me like it is the Christians in this scenario who are profaning Christ’s name.

It’s not even Thanksgiving yet, and my “brothers and sisters” are already starting to get riled up. They are angry and suited up for battle. They are ready to reclaim what is rightfully theirs and they are fully prepared to win this war— that nobody else even realizes has been declared.

Oh, if you ask my “brothers and sisters” they would say the other side fired the first shot and now the Christian community has had enough.

What is this war?
What? You haven’t heard?
Haven’t you read?
Do you not know?
There’s a war on Christmas.

That’s right folks. The stores are using the phrase “Happy Holidays.” How dare they try to make a profit at the end of the year by drawing in Hanukkah shoppers or attempt to make a couple of bucks off of Kwanzaa! How dare they be so inclusive in the name of staying in business. My brethren are, quite frankly, pissed off and have vowed not to do their Christmas shopping at any store that has a sign that reads anything other than “Merry Christmas.”

Because Christmas is about stores and shopping and merchandise. It’s all about presents underneath a tree. It’s about good, old fashioned American consumerism and part of that high Holy tradition is the phrase “Merry Christmas!”

Bah Humbug!

Setting aside the debate about whether or not Halloween is Satanic, a Catholic holiday, a night of pagan debauchery or an innocent night for costumes and candy for a moment, I would like to focus on the Halloween mischief conducted by some churches during the month of October.

Since some Christian persuasions believe Halloween to be evil and don’t desire to partake in it, they have chosen to take another tact. It’s essentially a haunted house for churches, only not nearly as much fun and far more frightening than a few ghosts and goblins. Every year, some churches endeavor to – quite literally – scare the hell out of people just before Halloween.

Using names such as “Judgment House,” “Hell House,” “Revelation Walk” and “Tribulation Trail,” these spectacles show those unfortunate enough to have walked in with a ticket what it might be like were they to go to Hell and suffer an eternity of God’s wrath poured out on the wicked. Some of the scenes depicted are often more gruesome than Hollywood’s best shot at violence.

The intent is supposedly to share the Truth of Christ with an unbelieving world. The method is the age-old tactic of scaring people straight. Having attended one of these little damnation walks before, I am convinced that regardless of how effective this might be, it isn’t the best way to introduce people to Jesus. From all I have seen and heard on this journey, I just don’t think scaring people half to death with consequences reflects Christ’s heart.

That should be our concern, shouldn’t it? If we are going to claim Christ’s name, shouldn’t we also make it a top priority to reflect His heart and His actions as much as humanly possible? Jesus didn’t go around frightening people into taking Him seriously. He went around loving outcasts, healing the broken, forgiving sinners and teaching those hungry for His words.

Anyone can manipulate people into coming around to their way of thinking through the use of scare tactics. Judgment Houses are not terribly different from being forced to join the local Rotary club at gunpoint. That’s not what Christianity is all about. It’s not how Jesus would do it. This is about heart change. It is about a person whose heart loves himself coming to a place where his heart longs for God. You can’t force that through fear. Jesus is the patient husband of an unfaithful wife. He is the father of the runaway son. He loves and He forgives, He doesn’t use guilt trips or fear-mongering. We shouldn’t either. Life itself is scary enough without having to resort to such tactics.

In a disturbing example of putting politics before faith, Conservative website Conservapedia has announced they are working on a conservative translation of the Bible. Apparently, not only is the media bias, but Bible translators have an inherent liberal bias as well. In this translation, Jesus would not say “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” because it doesn’t square with conservative thinking that all are responsible for their actions.

The group also isn’t a big fan of the story of Jesus and the adulteress, which could have been added later, but instead of waiting for the discovery of more manuscripts to bear out this controversy, Conservapedia has decided the passage was added as part of a vast left-wing conspiracy a thousand years ago. Also, the shrewd manager is no longer shrewd but “resourceful” and language that encourages “social justice” is out.

Most interesting to me was the creative tinkering they have done with John 1:16. The original verse (from the King James, which they compare it to) says “And of his fullness have all we received, and grace for grace.” The conservative Wikipedia knockoff has decided to change the wording a bit and has come up with this: “And by His abundance, all of us have benefited, indeed, with grace and bounty for grace and bounty.”

Yes folks, it is abundance teaching, the hallmark of conservative excuses not to do as Jesus called us to and help the poor. The abundance teachers reckon there isn’t one pie that some get a larger slice of than others on this earth, no the earth’s resources are limitless. There are several pies, all you have to do is find your pie and not be too lazy to take it. The hungry go hungry because they choose not to find food and the poor stay poor because they have no real desire to work hard and be rich. Meanwhile the rich are free to own five luxury cars, three mansions and grumble about how the government takes too much of their money.

I wonder what these fine well-meaning folks will do when they get to the verse about the camel and the eye of a needle.

It all began about a quarter century ago. A husband and wife, both very talented attorneys, decided to have their first child. She was always a prodigy; at eight months, she spoke her first sentence: “I love you.” She wasn’t allowed to watch much television, but she could read any books she wanted. After spending time in a Presbyterian preschool, her parents decided to send her to Sunday school at a Baptist church. At age three, she applied to and was accepted to a prestigious preparatory school, where she would spend fourteen years. I always seemed to have pretty much everything going for me in life; I was very fortunate in many ways. Unfortunately, the mind can be its own worst enemy.

I don’t remember how the thoughts began. I can remember horrible guilt as early as age eight. I was terrified of becoming pregnant or catching diseases from the television. I can remember feeling the need to bargain in my head and what I would find out later go through motions known as “rituals” or “compulsions.” Still, I was always a bright child; I wanted to go to college at fourteen, but my parents thought it would be better for me to go through the social experience of high school. A mere week or two after I began high school, I had to be pulled out. I had stopped wearing contact lenses. I had stopped bathing. I had no idea what was wrong with me, and I didn’t receive a correct diagnosis until I was twenty-one: I have severe obsessive-compulsive disorder. I’ve been told many times that it’s a miracle I’ve been able to excel in so many areas with my mind essentially battling itself.

Many of my obsessions were related to my Christian faith. I was constantly terrified of hell, sending other people to hell, somehow causing the world to end, or something else Biblically catastrophic. One day a few months ago, I finally decided to write a letter to the church which had treated my disorder in such an irresponsible manner. The letter says it better than I could by simply re-iterating my experience, and so I offer it here, despite the fact that I have yet to actually send it to the church…and I don’t know if I ever will:

I want to begin by stating that I consider myself a Christian. In fact, I attended First Baptist until around the age of 15. Unfortunately, the reason I feel the need to mention both of these points is that I feel otherwise, your church will find it far too easy to ignore the contents of this communication, and this information could be crucial to the lives of many of your members.

When I was fourteen, I essentially had a nervous breakdown. I stopped speaking, and I was constantly terrified of going to hell despite having been saved and baptized, partly due to the strong “hellfire and damnation” emphasis of the church. To add insult to injury, several members o the church took my condition to mean that I was either possessed or haunted by demons and that although I thought I was saved, I may not have been saved “right.” I was given ritualistic prayers. In addition, I was discouraged from seeking regular psychiatric treatment, as the individuals involved were absolutely convinced that what I actually needed was spiritual guidance, not medication. I was told unequivocally that if I simply tried hard enough, these worries and thoughts which had been with me since very early grade school would go away and that their continued presence indicated that I was not "right with God." I was also instructed that there might be objects in my home harboring demons and that I was to walk around my house praying over objects, setting fire to the ones which I felt might have a demonic presence.

While it is true that directly addressing the church on this matter does give me a certain degree of comfort, I am far more concerned with the effect these attitudes may have on other youth in similar positions. First Baptist in particular treated my illness as entirely spiritual, only adding to the feelings of guilt and shame that already pervaded my life. In fact, because people whom I perceived as authorities repeatedly assured me that this problem was demonic in nature, when I did see a psychiatrist for medical treatment, the process was even further complicated as several doctors could not determine if I was suffering from schizophrenia or psychosis when I repeated the information I had been given.

It took seven long, painful years to get a medical diagnosis and even longer than that to develop an effective treatment plan. My problem is not caused by spiritual issues. It is not caused by a need to be “right with God.” I suffer from severe obsessive-compulsive disorder, and even now, having completed college and graduate school, it still hurts me to look back and see the devastating effect caused by the well-meaning advice I was given by your church.

My point is simple: I would like to urge the church to develop a better understanding of psychiatric conditions and the physical, often genetic abnormalities that can cause them. I am hoping that in the time since I attended, you as a whole have become more educated in these areas. If not, I believe it absolutely crucial that you do so as soon as possible. Many members and leaders of churches are seen as guides and counselors for young people, and to refrain from teaching them about genuine mental illness would be a terrible thing. I do not want another person to experience what I have. I do not think it is right or responsible to discourage individuals from seeing medical professionals for mental issues; in fact, even the Catholic church requires medical evaluation before deciding that a person’s problems stem from demonic forces. Please don’t let another child spend her teen years in complete fear, feeling like a spiritual failure because of her inability to control an issue with the physical structure of her brain. Please don’t let anyone else who may be suffering feel unable to face these problems without distancing herself from the support system of the church. Young people in these situations need all the support that can be made available.

Information on many of the mental health problems adolescents may face is easily available on the Internet. It should also be fairly easy to get information from one of the local hospitals.

That’s what I want. I just want people to be informed. I don’t want anyone else who is already suffering to be put through further torment through his or her own faith, which should be a source of comfort. I’m understandably nervous about putting this information out so publicly, but I think the potential good to others outweighs any negative effect it could have on me.

Steven Curtis Chapman, who has at least 10 more Dove Awards than days and nights during the Great Flood, released a song titled “For Who He Really Is” in 1988. The song contains this lyric:

He slips into church and he puts up his guard;
They look so happy but his life’s been so hard.
He keeps his distance so they won’t see the scars;
It’s just a religion that’s all dressed up in white,
And God is love as long as you’re living right.
But does he know that Jesus also has scars,
And His love can reach Him no matter how far.

The song then asks if others can see God for who He really is when they look at us. Fast forward about two decades to the present, and we have Casting Crowns. Here are some lyrics from “Stained Glass Masquerade”

Are we happy plastic people
Under shiny plastic steeples
With walls around our weakness
And smiles to hide our pain
But if the invitation’s open
To every heart that has been broken
Maybe then we close the curtain
On our stained glass masquerade

That’s not all. Take a look at “Does Anybody Hear Her” also by Casting Crowns.

Does anybody hear her? Can anybody see?
Or does anybody even knows she's going down today
Under the shadow of our steeple
With all the lost and lonely people
Searching for the hope that's tucked away in you and me
Does anybody hear her? Can anybody see?

And one more from Casting Crowns called “If We Are The Body”

It's crowded in worship today
As she slips in trying to fade into the faces
The girls teasing laughter is carrying farther than they know
Farther than they know

Each song addresses issues of isolation in the church as well as the inauthentic aura that covers the vast majority of church attendees. What kills me, is that these songs are 20 years apart, and these are not unknown artists— or songs for that matter. Every self-respecting Christian in the 80’s and 90’s owned at least one Steven Curtis Chapman CD, and Casting Crowns has been the top of the Christian charts since they debuted a few years ago. These artists are among the most influential in the church.

It’s been two decades and our top Christian song writers are still writing about the same unresolved issues in the church. This is heartbreaking. It means that not only are we aware of the situation, not only have we been told about it, but we’re not dealing with it. We continue to be fake, we continue to build walls, we continue to pretend we have it all together, we continue to exclude others, we continue to put on a self-righteous front and we continue to ignore this problem.

Where did we lose our ability to relate to other people? What does it take turn this around? Will another 20 years pass only to see a world of changing values and technology but the same issues plaguing the church? We need to love and serve one another and the outside community better, I know that much. I’m not sure exactly how to do that, but I’d definitely be willing to try.

A 2005 survey shows 75 percent of Christians in the United States believe the Bible teaches “God helps those who help themselves.” That’s three-quarters of American Christians who believe this phrase is found in Scripture, a phrase that practically discounts the entire message of the Bible.

Anyone want to guess where the phrase actually comes from? Benjamin Franklin. The idea that God helps those who help themselves is an American one, but it isn’t a Biblical one. Yet, we’ve allowed this incorrect commentary on the nature of God to creep into our theology. It has gripped our belief system so much that it overtakes actual Scripture.

We would rather believe God helps the independent and the self-sufficient than to believe that Christ loves the helpless and calls us to feed the hungry. I’m not sure about your church, but I know at mine there are people who actually believe that the poor are poor by choice and that if they wanted to be rich, they would simply make money.

This philosophy is greed, not God. The God of the Bible is the savior of the helpless. He brought a group of helpless slaves out of captivity, rescued a prophet from a den of Lions, and gave His life for a world too lost in sin to find its way out. Jesus healed lepers and forgave prostitutes. These are not stories of the self-sufficient being aided by the Almighty.

But we’d rather help ourselves. We prefer to confuse our financial shrewdness with a blessing, and we call what we have earned through greed “God’s favor.” We’ve been helping ourselves for so long in this country, we don’t even remember that Jesus told us to look out for “the least of these.” Here’s a brief list of some of the things that have been going on while we’ve been helping ourselves.

• 39.5 percent of Americans now live below the poverty line, and this is according to the Census Bureau, statistics that were calculated before the recession.
• In 2004, 20 percent of requests for emergency food assistance went unmet. These are real people who were allowed to go hungry. How much food did we let spoil in 2004?
• 9.6 million people in the U.S. experience hunger. 3 million of these are children.
• In 2001, over 23 million Americans turned to food banks. 40 percent of these were working families.
• The majority of those below the poverty line are working families. Two out of three impoverished families include one or more workers.
• Almost half of all Americans will have experienced poverty at some point in their lives by the time they reach age 60.

Poverty is a real problem. There are no excuses. Jesus commands His followers to have compassion for those who are in need. They are not deadbeats. They are not lazy. They are people in need of Christ-like love. These are people who cannot help themselves, but whom God has called His people to help.

This is not a political issue. It is not a debate about whether or not government should provide aid. That is irrelevant if we call ourselves Christians. Regardless of what you believe about the role of government in fighting poverty, as a follower of Christ, you are commanded by the One who’s name you claim to do something about this problem.