I find the Christian life actually quite difficult. I’m sure you all have your own sufferings, hurts, prejudices, and various other opinions, skills and abilities that make you uniquely you, so you probably know what I’m talking about. Life, quite often, sucks. There is no getting around it for me. Everywhere I turn and everything I do, I usually find myself alone and struggling. Certainly, it would appear is if most of my problems are my fault and I can’t really complain about the natural consequences of my sin but during my Christian life I’ve found that things which I assumed would be easy are in fact much harder than they’ve ever been. Is it just me who has these problems?

Christmas is a time when personal pain is most keenly felt. I’ve spent years now faithfully attending church and singing songs to God and I find myself almost devoid of any special sentiment towards this person. Who is he, and why do people think he’s so great? Do we think he’s great, or have we missed in some way the essence of who this person is? He came to forgive sins and that really is a fabulous thing but when you haven’t been forgiven by your peers yourself, it really doesn’t make you want to shout about his forgiveness from the highest point of the city, too much. I quite often say to him, “get it out of your system this year Lord! I don’t want to go round this particular mountain again next year.”

I’ve studied the life of Jesus and I suppose it’s because I’m a man with only small amounts of faith that I just haven’t “got” the message of Christianity yet. But what actually is the message of Christianity? I’m sorry to have to say that after almost a decade of attending church I honestly couldn’t tell you one way or the other. If we take, for example, Jesus’ words to “forgive each other” and to “bless our enemies”….well, is it just me? Can you honestly say that you’ve ever witnessed this type of behaviour, let alone done it yourself? Is this perhaps the problem in our churches?

What I will say is that Jesus is markedly different to anything we have ever thought he might be. We look at the life of Jesus and think, “yey! I’m forgiven! It’s all okay now, isn’t it?” Well, no it isn’t actually. It’s certainly the starting point for your faith. You can’t love other people unless you’ve first been loved. But it isn’t supposed to stop there. We’re not called to live in a holy onesie while people who actually need to be shown love are left wondering why the hell everyone is waving their hands around saying, “I love you!” I love you,” to God.

Think about what the bible says about Jesus. Yes, it does say that he’s precious; yes, it does say he’s wonderful. The bible tells us that everyone loved him, for a while. But it also says that people hid their faces from him. When the shit hit the fan, everyone deserted him. Why do we think we’re going to be any different? Are we any different? Is there any situation is your life where you’ve deserted God, where you refused to do something for the least of his followers?

The truth is that we are embarrassed about the cross. We look at the cross and we see, for the most part, our forgiveness. But this attitude will blind us when God is revealed in our own day of judgement. Why? Because the cross doesn’t just say that: It says that you and I are forgiven and more importantly than that, that the price God paid for you is exactly the same as the price he paid for me.

You see when God died on the cross, he disseminated himself throughout all space and time. For all the wonder that is ours in the forgiveness of our sins, think about the judgement that is also true if we do not live like Jesus in this world. Think of his words. When he says that you are in danger of the fire of hell if you curse your brother, is that any less valid than, “there is now no condemnation”? When you add to that that the scripture actually says, “there is no condemnation for those who belong to him,” and also that he says, “if you love me you will do what I tell you,” are we not a little remiss to say that, “I’m forgiven so it’s okay”?

Seriously, I’m left with a feeling of deep concern about the surface of the church. I don’t think we’ve gone deep enough. We can’t hear his voice because we’ve refused to listen to the full truth for so long and it isn’t going to get any better. The cure is heeding the word of God. Heaven knows that we need to do that. We each have our own individual reasons for not believing God but we don’t feel his pain or his love for the fallen. We are embarrassed by the message and that brings its own punishment I’m afraid.

“When did we ever refuse to help you?

When you refused to do it for the least of my followers, you refused to do it for me.”

“Heaven and Earth will disappear, but my words will never disappear”.

Where have you put your hope, church?