The Great Antelope Massacre

       Today is just another day in a small college town.  I am privileged enough to be able to be a part of a Christian community here. I love the fact that prayer, missions and general service is commonly encouraged and preached. I am proud of the fact that a great ratio of individuals here share a commonality with me: salvation in Jesus. That being said, something of quite an opposite nature is soaking into this happy little life on the mountain top, and it grieves me.
      I'm sitting at the brand new coffee shop near campus and people watching. Some people watch birds, others- squirrels, but psychology majors, we watch people. People are so diverse in their characteristics, much like any creature, and watching such spectacles in their habitat just seems natural. When large groups of people collect in any given area, their conversation reaches a public decibel of loudness, and I happened to over hear a conversation of ministry students as they discussed why they didn't associate with or "click with" certain individuals. Was the reasoning due to some personal harm caused or unrepentant sin? Sadly, again and again the reasons given were materialistic: gender roles, style, seminary of choice, reformed or free will, southern Baptist or not. "She didn't talk about Jesus enough", "He only uses this Bible", "She has different ideas about gender ministry roles" and my favorite, "He doesn't like Matt Chandler..."; I was frankly appalled. Have we limited our fellowship to superficial associations that just happen to have Jesus as a common denominator? Have we reduced our bond as the Body of Christ to a bunch of shallow, middle school interactions?  If this was you then,YOU CAN'T SIT WITH ME, YOU ARE TOO CLOSED-MINDED!! I jest, but seriously....
      When observing nature in all its beauty, one will eventually see something repugnant and stomach churning such as a lion devouring and ripping apart an antelope- it's not lovely, but it's reality. That analogy is really graphic and dramatic; I literally just giggled at myself after I read over that pretentious statement, but when I get stirred up, said ridiculousness finds a way out of my mind. Figuratively speaking, I experienced the massacre of an antelope. In the beauty that is Christian community, the predator that I have seen rip us apart the most is "Status Quo Christianity". What I mean by Status Quo Christianity is this: we have disillusioned ourselves with the asinine idea that being a Christian is a desired social status in which one is expected to meet certain ridiculous miniscule criteria.
     I'm not saying that we don't have certain people with whom we just connect with, but if we are turning our nose down to people because we equate holiness with a legalistic checklist of what a person has to encompass in order to fit in our little inner circles of Christian brotherhood, then WE ARE WRONG! No, I'm not saying that standards are wrong. A standard is a deep seated conviction that YOU hold YOURSELF to. If someone is negatively affecting your walk with Christ, then remove yourself from that association. However, to herald your walk above someone else due to preference or stylistic differences is WRONG, it is SIN. Throughout the past few years, I have seen this societal disease affect the local Body of Christ in my college and even hometown communities, and I have been affected by this myself on a hurtful level. This may sound like some knew-fangled, mutated sin that has hybridized and evolved since initial depravity, but actually, this nonsense affected the early church as well.
      In Acts 10, the Lord approached Peter in a dream commanding him to eat from "unclean animals". He uses this symbolism to allude to the cultural, preferential snobbery that was happening with the Jewish believers towards the Gentile believers. There was a schism in the church due to cultural minutia. The Jewish believers didn't believe that salvation was available to the Gentile believers because of their uncircumcision and non-kosher diets. God assertively tells Peter in verse 15 "Do not call anything impure that I have made clean." Initially this may seem to be in reference to the non-kosher food that the Lord requests that Peter eat, but this dream in the passage's context is allegorical to the "reject" Gentile believers. To paraphrase the Lord here, "Leave them alone, and quit being snobs; they are enough."
       We are all equal in sin, and we are all equally valuable in the blood of Jesus. Your Chacos, Holman Standard Bible, and your seminary aspirations do not make you any better than your more humble brothers and sisters serving Jesus in a less intellectual manner. We focus so much on the minutia, the little insignificant things, that we forget our commonality! The bottom line is this: as long as we agree on doctrine-depravity, sin-debt, the cross, grace, redemption through faith, salvation through Christ alone- we are equal and compatible for communion as Christ's body. I'm not saying we should all be besties for the resties because we love Jesus and therefore should go get brotherhood tattoos (ummm....nah), compatibility and commonality on a preferential level is needed for intimate friendships, I get that! That's not wrong, but we shouldn't base a person's relationship with Christ on our preferences. Our personal convictions are just that...personal. What you feel led to do stylistically is exclusive to your own walk.
    Lastly, we also need to shake one another and shout the mantra "Jesus is not a designer label"! Jesus is not a fashion statement. As long as you are dressed in a way that is not incongruent with scripture, you're fine! Jesus is more than a fad. Jesus isn't a style akin to hipster, grunge or preppy. Jesus is a call to destroying stereotypes. Jesus is a call to risk comfort on behalf of one another. Jesus is a call to accepting diversity. Jesus is a call to worship beside those that are different than us. Jesus is a call to be unique and individual but common in our love for Christ and each other. Jesus is a call to sacrifice. That's what Jesus looks like! Wear your mission t-shirts, or don't. Sport your bag made in Africa to support the End It movement, or don't. But DO love Jesus. Do be kind and understanding of others' differences. Jesus received water from an unclean woman at the well, can we at least commune with one another as brothers and sisters despite our differences?