A Message To My Christian Brothers & Sisters

This one is for my co-religionists, so here’s a cute animated gif of a bouncing cube of red jello for the non-Christians.

I’ll see the rest of you after the jump.

If you are a Bible literalist, and if you are so opposed to same sex relations that you try to deny gays their legal rights, then you are in serious danger of hellfire.

Remember this?  It's a little number we call The Parable Of The Unjust Servant:

Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?

Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king, which would take account of his servants. And when he had begun to reckon, one was brought unto him, which owed him ten thousand talents.

But forasmuch as he had not to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, and his wife, and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.

The servant therefore fell down, and worshipped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.

Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt.

But the same servant went out, and found one of his fellowservants, which owed him an hundred pence: and he laid hands on him, and took him by the throat, saying, Pay me that thou owest. And his fellowservant fell down at his feet, and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.

And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he should pay the debt.

So when his fellowservants saw what was done, they were very sorry, and came and told unto their lord all that was done. Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me: Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee?

And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.

So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.

This was not the only time he taught on this topic.  Here he lays down the smack in explicit, literal language:

Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:

But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.

Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison.

Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.

Jesus was drawing his point from the Old Testament, both the Decalogue (a.k.a. Ten Commandments)…

Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

…and the story of David and Bathsheba:

And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds: But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter.

And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man's lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.

And David's anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die: And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.

And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man.

Make no mistake about it: If you call on God to forgive you for the wrongs you do, then you have neither the power nor the privilege of judging -- much less condemning -- anyone else.

And you most explicitly do NOT have the power nor the privilege of calling down God's wrath upon them.

A lot of you pooh-pooh Christians who bring up this teaching of Jesus:

Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

You cheerfully ignore what Christ proclaimed as the heart and soul of his gospel:

And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

Because instead of extending the same rights and courtesies to others that you expect (if not demand) for yourself, you do exactly the opposite.

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I’m seeing too many people expressing sentiments along the lines of “it is a very big thing especially among young, quote unquote ‘do justice’ only Christians. Not much talk of repentance, sin, a time where they found the Lord and turned their lives over to him as well as a lot of talk of baptism with no talk of The Salvation the moment when you know you need Christ, are a sinner and turn your life over to Him, trust in him and then a changed life follows!”

They refer to social justice (as if that were a bad thing!) as “hippie love”.

Let me remind you: The dirty #@%&ing hippies were right.

Right now mainstream denominations are imploding in this country. It’s not so much that the number of unchurched people are growing so much as those who grew up in purportedly Christian churches compared what purportedly Christian people were saying with what they were doing, and said “none of that for us, thanx.”

Seriously, you may say “In this supposedly enlightened ‘return to the Gospel’ that some of the church body is talking about where love is seemingly our only required expression, if what you believe about you and God, i.e. your theology, does not include the act of repentance, then look that word up so that your understanding can be deeper, and more complete” but what those leaving the church in droves are hearing is “we demand you jump through our hoops to prove your worthiness to us, because our feces are non-odiferous.”

Nay, I say unto thee, thy feces are most vexingly odiferous indeed.

To quote Jesus yet again:

Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?

And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

If we do anything except show love, compassion, generosity, mercy, and forgiveness to others, we are not following the teachings of Jesus. If we refuse service to a person because they fail to meet our rigorous personal standards, we are behaving exactly contrary to the way Christ lived.

WE are required to be repentant, not them.

We are to ask God to forgive us in exactly the same way we forgive them, judging us in precisely the same manner that we judge them.

• We are required to love our enemies, not them.
• We are required to turn the other cheek, not them.
• We are required to go the extra mile, not them.
• We are required to give freely to whoever asks, not them.
• We are required to love those who persecute us, not them.

Only when we repent of selfishness & pride are we truly following the teachings of Christ.

Remember, Jesus literally got down on his knees to wipe shit off the feet of his disciples.*

Stop harassing people who have done nothing to you, who pose no threat to you, whose existence does not affect you in the slightest.

You think same sex marriage is a sin, don’t marry someone of your sex; otherwise bake the cake, arrange the flowers.

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* We say “dust” in church because it’s a nicer, politer, more non-odiferous word than “shit”, and the little old ladies and snooty young men won’t get offended at the idea of dust because dusting is the least taxing chore to do around the house, a few quick swipes and you’re done.