An American Friend living in SA wrote this
I think it is more than worth sharing.
In all the busyness and continual motion of life, God has still been challenging me in new ways. Through out the past month with certain experiences here in South Africa, several challenges I heard at conference, and conversations that Ive had, I know Im being called to embrace life and the gospel in deeper ways than I have before. At the core of this is the desire to embrace the love, care, defending of humanity that the gospel speaks about but the Church can easily ignore.
Growing up, I was mainly influenced by the conservation Evangelical Church in America. There are benefits of this, which Im grateful, but one thing the church can easily dismiss is the display of true love and compassion for people because it is so focused on defending their faith and having people get saved. With this as the number one priority, efforts to step out into the real world where people are hurting is considered secondary or optional. It didnt used to be this way, before the 20th century, gospel message combined saving faith with love for poor, compassion for widows and orphans, and help for the oppressed. Since then, the church has split into conservative and liberal camps. And these camps have effectively split the message of the gospel saying that loving God and saving people for the next life is more important than caring for them in this life and vise versa. Its as if the two greatest commandments (love God and love your neighbors) actually work against each other rather than with each other.
Last week I went to see a doctor. With my allergies and exhaustion from traveling my body couldnt fight the sickness any longer. This is first time Ive been to doctor since living in South Africa. When I entered his office, he started checking me over and then realizing I was American, he started asking me questions about what I was doing in South Africa. When he found out I was a missionary, he shared that he was a Christian, and he immediately started talking about all the problems we have in South Africa. In my response, I mentioned I thought one of the biggest challenges in South Africa is AIDS. And to my surprise his immediate response was, Oh, AIDS is not a problem, once everyone becomes a Christian theyll become celibate and AIDS will disappear. I thought to myself, That is the lamest answer Ive ever heard! But that is so typical of a conservative evangelical response. The mentality is, Just get people saved and that will take care of all the problems we have. And they can completely miss any opportunity to care for someone right in their midst.
I also think back to my last year at Bethel College (a conservative Evangelical school) when I was a Resident Assistant on campus. During the year one of the guys on my floor stopped fighting his homosexual feelings and became openly gay. Numerous guys on campus would leave him nasty phone calls calling him fagot, pervert, and many other obscene names that I wont repeat in this e-mail. These Christian guys would come to his room late at night and repeatedly pound on his door calling out these obese names as well. One night in my dorm he is telling me all of this stuff, and fighting back tears he tells how in the last months he has suffered from depression and has contemplated suicide because of all the guilty feelings he has and all the abuse he has received from other students. At this Christian college why were more people attacking him and talking about him behind his back rather than befriending him? Why does the churchs aggressive attack against homosexuality always result is aggressive feelings toward homosexuals?
I think back to my past. How many times have I chosen to stand by my faith rather than seek out to befriend others? How many times have I missed the opportunity to care for someone because I was so consumed with issues of faith rather than issues of love? I desire to live a life that embraces the whole gospel. I desire to truly love people day in and day out without losing focus of Gods desire to know them, to weep with people when they weep and also offer them hope of a future God has provided, to defend races and people groups when they are taken advantage of and also point to a life where there is no difference between Jew or Greek. Its only then, I believe, that people start seeing the real gospel.
This is a journey Ive been on the past few years and God is calling me much deeper than Ive gone before. For the rest of this year, Im committing to read the Bible through the eyes of compassion and social concern rather than through just faith and doctrine. Already in reading through Ephesians, I see that at least 90% of Pauls writing is focused on changing life for the better now in heaven. I cant help but see the numerous times in the Gospels when Jesus healed, showed compassion, or loved others without telling them the way to be saved. And I cant read about Moses and the Exodus from Egypt without seeing issues of racism throughout the story.
