SAFE!!

Our world is safe. We live in a culture where everything has been institutionalized and inspected for safety a hundred times over. Truck drivers on the interstate have signs on the back of there trucks that say "Lights On for Safety." Our cars are designed with safety in mind: seat belts, air bags, crash test ratings. Our water, Internet, TV and food are all treated - filtered and preserved for freshness.

...And convenient. Everything we need to live and enjoy life can and is delivered right to our door for a nominal fee and/or tip. Even now I am posting information on my blog from my Uncle's computer over a wireless network three hundred miles away from my home. My previous post was made from my phone!

The shirt I'm wearing says "Relax - I'm a professional." That's what the world's goal is isn't it? Everyone is working to become a professional in order to give someone else the comfort and peace of mind that is worth the extra cash they will use to buy their comfort and peace of mind. In short: Our society is plastic. We are plastic people in plastic houses complete with plastic doors, plastic windows and even plastic mouses.

Casting Crowns warns us in their song "Stain Glass Masquerade" not to be "happy plastic people under shiny plastic steeples." As Christians, we are living life as foreigners. We may have had our start here being born into this world sinners, but we are now in Christ. Our past shows our justification on the cross of Calvary. Our future holds our hope of glorification and reigning on high with the King. But how do we work out our salvation right now? We must be daring. Living without risks is living without faith. How would Indiana ever have shown his faith if he would have been able to see the bridge at the Leap from the Lion's Head?

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

- Hebrews 11.1

When Indiana Jones believed in his heart that something would be there when he took that step, that was the substance of his hope: faith. He took the risk by sticking his foot out, it was either a firm footing awaiting him or death. He walked across and then turned and threw the dirt over the bridge. I like to say that the dirt was the evidence of things not seen. It was his faith being playing out.

Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my
works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe--and
shudder!

- James 2.18-19

Showing your faith apart from your works is simply lip service. What an easy life. A plastic life is one without risks, without faith. Without failure...sure, but also without flight.

My pastor recently received an anonymous card in the mail. Looking like a Thank You card, he was disappointed to find that all it said was that it was hard to hear him in the back pew so he should turn up his mic. Talk about going out of your way to make sure you take no risks! There wasn't even a return address. Whoever this person was, they didn't even have the backbone to ask the pastor in person to turn up his mic so they could hear. Of course they wanted the best of both worlds - they wanted the convenience of continuing to sit in the back pew along with the safety of anonymity. What a silly thing to be afraid of. What would've been the risk of asking him to turn up the mic in person?

The church needs a backbone. We need to have the guts it takes to step out in faith to proclaim the marvelous love of Jesus Christ as well as the impending wrath of God if you reject Christ. With this risk comes persecution, an inevitable side effect of proclaiming truth, and seeing souls saved. What a glorious adventure we are to live.

Are you plastic pawn? Or are you an armed warrior made of flesh, ready to fight and die for the cause of Christ?