FOR OR AGAINST

The other day my wife and I were watching the game show Jeopardy. The game is played were an answer is given to which the question is provided by the contestant. On this particular round the answer was: A Dan Brown novel were a murder occurs in the Louvre in Paris. The correct question to that answer: What is the Da Vinci Code? Ironically, none of the contestants knew the question. Once the host gave it there were nods of, “I knew it, I just couldn’t pull it out of the memory banks.”

I commented to my wife how strange this was. After all, it wasn’t too many months ago when the world was caught up with this compelling novel. The Church rallied itself to oppose this individual’s attempt to undermine the very foundations or our faith. It became the church’s opportunity to once again stand against heresy and apostasy. A cottage industry of anti-Code resources was created. Yet that which stirred so much controversy and angst was unable to be dredged up from the memory wells of a game show contestant. When was the last time you thought of the Da Vinci Code?

Christians can be a reactionary bunch. It seems we have to be against something. Our attitude of fighting what we perceive as evil somehow gives us a sense of meaning and mission. We are defending our God! As if God needed us to make a point.

When will we realize people would be more interested in what we are for, than what we are against? Why can’t we just be for Jesus? What happened to the simplicity of the gospel? The reality that God so loved that Jesus was given, and Jesus came into the world not to condemn it, but to save it.

You see when all the rhetoric is over. The last words of “defending” the faith have been spoken. The most current “Da Vinci” foe has been vanquished. When the riot has been quieted and protectors of the faith patrol for another enemy. The cross will still stand!

The cross is a poignant reminder that Jesus did come into this world with a message of hope, love and meaning. We need to be for that cross. We need to be for Jesus. And when people see what we are for we can stop attempting to convince them of what they should not believe, they will simply be compelled toward Jesus.