I am certain over the past ten years I have logged a couple of hundred hours watching someone else prepare fabulous food. I am familiar with many cooking styles and techniques, from Cajun to continental, braising to broiling. It is possible that somewhere in the dark regions of my brain I have the ability to create exotic dishes, I know I have watched hundreds being prepared, but invariably I stare into the fridge and fix the same 5 dishes every time.
I have just taken a break to eat breakfast, I am in the mountains so some survival instinct is triggered and I consume 6 times the necessary calories in case of flood or blizzard or something, and fixed pancakes. I know I have seen multiple episodes on the proper balance of flour, salt, soda, etc. I know the dangers of over stimulating the glutens and producing tough pancakes. I know this, but still I reach for the box that requires nothing more than water. If you can pour water, you can make these pancakes.
Here is my observation: I am fixed on watching someone else prepare food using ingredients I cannot find , with pots, knifes and gadgets I could never afford, in a kitchen that is larger than most of the entire homes I have ever lived in. Does watching someone else do what I feel inadequate to do, count as doing it? Am I chef because I like to watch chefs?
You may draw your own analogies, but I think there is something eerily similar to what we call being a Christian. As a faith culture we tend to primarily watch. I think if you were to analyze the most frequent activity of people wanting to be Christian, it would be watching. Watching someone else, who seems to have tools and spiritual gadgets I have never heard of, tell me how to live. How is it that in spite of all Jesus said about giving, loving, feeding, clothing, visiting, that we squandered the vast amount of our money on buildings? And have you noticed the buildings are not becoming smaller or more simple? Why? Because it allows us the best opportunity to do what we have come to believe will make us Christian–watching. We watch singing and call it worship, but that is just the set up, the appetizer, to the main dish, preaching. (I realize this is more descriptive of the evangelical church, especially those that emphasize Bible teaching versus liturgy). Ok, find me a time when Jesus said that listening to sermons was the most important thing you could do, and therefore justify the billions of dollars to accommodate that?
Watching cooking shows does not make you a chef, watching church does not make you Christian. What are your thoughts?
July 4th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
Then do we head toword small groups? Yes IF we do as Jesus told us to do - giving, loving, feeding, clothing, visiting. That is where the habit has to be broken. The habit of seeking exclusive isolation, safety, familiarity. Small groups can do the same thing as big churches - crowded loneliness and small groups within the large group. It is not safe to reach out, to give without expecting something in return, to be present for someone even when they don’t meet your expectations, to listen and really hear someone. I don’t think we are capable of that as people but I think we are if we allow Christ to move through us in His spirit. We need to fellowship, share, guide, and learn but never to the point of a closed unit. Jesus went with his friends INTO the world. He still is … if we let Him.
July 9th, 2007 at 5:04 am
Karl,
Thanks for writing. I agree with you…I love to watch and I often don’t do any cooking myself. Participation can be really difficult.
I find that what hinders me from participating is the idol of large buildings, great musical and rhetorical performances on the stage, and the idea that in order to cook, so to speak, I really do need all of the tools that I’ve spent so many years watching the experts use.
I’m to the point where I think that God must be unknowable, because I can’t even read the scripture for myself without first thinking I should consider the Greek, Hebrew, the word for word vs. the phrase by phrase translation, what certain doctrines could be derived vs. opposing doctrines, what the overall context is, the Jewish perspective vs. the Hellenistic one, etc. etc. ad nauseum! I’m not even a seminary student!
I end up feeling quite unworthy to be a participant in the end. And somewhere in the midst of all of this crap we’ve created around him is Jesus, trying to help me through to him.
Thanks for all that you do.
July 17th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
hey buddy the answer is quite simple, why we watch and don’t do. watching is oh so easy, but it is so very hard to do. especially, if we don’t have any tools. when all you feel you have is a rusty old hammer and a bent screwdriver. (that’s what i always thought my tools were compared to those of the professional christian and his black and decker power tools). i’ve come to believe that the worship and the preaching etc. are not real church. the doing. the hanging with people. being involved in the messiness of real everyday life. unconditional love. grace. that is what real church is to me. i think i’ll take the money i was saving to buy the new table saw and go buy some nails and help somebody built a new life with that trusty old hammer of mine.
mike
August 27th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
The Lord tells us that we have a lot of bad ministers pastoring that puts a hault or pastors leaving out the whole FAITH truth.
In Romans it speaks a truth that most of us don’t know; baptism is no longer a rule with water- the moment someone speaks to our Heavenly Host and cries out Jesus my Lord, at any tone, without punnishing with what is said, but asking for faith, and sending Him a big gift of thanks and praise, no matter how long it takes to say. that we are acknowled as Children of I Am that the Lord Jesus blessed just for saying i know you are here to Him!