Random Thoughts and Ramblings

Tag: religion

  • What You Need to Know about the Starbucks Thing

    12191473_10153269148716243_8618275217776874800_nEarlier today I decided to take a drive and I ended up having lunch at a Mexican restaurant in Ravenna. As I was munching on my chips and quac while waiting on my actual lunch to arrive, I found yet another post about the Starbucks red cup thing. Now, like many of you, I’ve seen lots and lots of posts about people complaining about people being offended by this whole mess. But then the thought occurred to me: I’ve yet to see anyone actually complaining about the cups, nor do I even know how this whole thing got started.

    Off to the Google I went. And what did I find?

    If you’re reading this and you’re one of the people upset because Starbucks decided to remove snowflakes from their cups, you need to know that you have fallen for a scam.

    The whole brouhaha was begun by a Facebook and YouTube famous guy named Joshua Feuerstein (I would link his website here normally but I refuse to contribute to his clicks and page views). If his name sounds familiar, that’s because this is the same guy who tried to get a bakery to make a cake with hate speech inscribed on it. When the bakery refused, he took to social media to bash them and this ended in the owners receiving constant abuse, including death threats. He is also a conspiracy theorist who claimed that Walmart and President Obama were in cahoots to round up Christians and kill them. The evidence of this is a video which, for the reasons stated above, I refuse to link to but I watched part of it (as much as I could stand anyway) and he is pretty clear that he really does feel this way.

    There are also other allegations against him but I could not find anything other than hearsay about that so I will not link to my sources for that. Feel free to search it out for yourself, however.

    Folks, this guy has absolutely no credibility. Based on the number of videos and the fact that he seems to feed off of publicity the guy simply wants attention and we need to stop giving it to him. He certainly is not a voice for the vast majority of Christians, as I stated above that I have seen nothing from anyone who claims to actually be offended by Starbucks’ 2015 holiday cup design. Yet, the media has pounced on this and made it a story. Even Starbucks has taken advantage of this for their own purposes (draw your own conspiracies on that). In short, this is all ridiculous and not worthy of our time.

    Stop it, American media. Go cover some real news (but why would you do that? Y’all never do that as it is).

    However, I do feel that this speaks to a larger problem that tends to make its presence known more during this time of the year than any other. The problem is the persecution complex that American Christians tend to have. I will see post after post on social media about how Christians are being “oppressed” and “persecuted” simply because a store clerk doesn’t wish them a “merry Christmas” or because a secular company doesn’t have “Christmas” decorations up in their stores.

    Quite frankly, I’ve had it with this mentality so I’m just coming out and saying it: STOP IT!

    Someone wishing us “happy holidays” is not persecution. We have many examples of real persecution going on throughout the world. We have real suffering going on all over the world. Christians all over the world are losing their lives for their faith and are otherwise discriminated against in a systematic fashion. When you claim that someone not saying the right thing to you after you swipe your credit card for a widget is persecution, you’re marginalizing what real persecution is.

    It’s not Christ-like and it needs to stop.

    Jesus didn’t come to the world as a baby and eventually die for you to have a latte in a cup that ascribes to your beliefs. Jesus died so that you may live an eternal life in His presence, healed and restored to God, cleansed from your sins. His teachings dictate to us that we are to be transformed and to go out and tell others so that they may love Him as much as he loves them and us. He teaches us to love our neighbors as much as we love ourselves.

    He does not teach us to protest over a coffee cup or a glacier display or the phrase “happy holidays.”

    If we really want to be upset about some things, I have some suggestions. For example, I live in Powell County, Kentucky which has a poverty rate of almost 30%. Let that sink in. That’s much higher than the national or the state average. Why not be mad about that and take action to help? We have children who would love to be adopted, yet likely will not be and will be turned out on their own with no help once they “age out” of the system. Why don’t we get angry about this? Or, how about we get angry about the fact that domestic violence is often a tolerated sin within Christianity and hardly anyone bats an eye?

    Folks, we have got to do better. I can’t help but think Jesus would want us to be more upset about those kinds that actually matter instead of the design of a cup or “happy holidays.”

    I know this might be coming across as a little strong but this really fires me up and I just can’t stay quiet about this anymore. The American Christian Persecution Complex has to stop. If it’s going to be changed, we – as in you reading this and I – have to be the ones to start that process. Please, let’s do better. Let us live as redeemed, restored, and Christ-like Christians. To do anything less is a disservice to Jesus.

    Jonathan

  • My Testimony

    The following is a testimony that I’ve typed out. At the request of a couple of my Twitter followers (speaking of Twitter, you can find me here), here it is in blog form. God bless!

    Many of my earliest memories involve church. From as early as they could, my parents had me in church as much as possible. However, this wasn’t always possible because I spent a large percentage of my childhood in a hospital bed. I can remember many instances where my pastor or the hospital chaplain would visit and pray, where other people would pray and of course my parents would pray. I was told about Jesus at an early age so I have a hard time finding a time where I never believed. Jesus was a part of my life from the beginning.

    As I got older and learned more about the faith, I joined my church and became active in the youth group. There were many times where I questioned whether I was really saved or if I was playing church. One evening when I was about 16, my youth group went to a play at a Meridian church. The drama deeply affected me and I wanted to make sure that I wouldn’t spend an eternity in Hell. When the invitation was given, I responded.

    Later on I graduated high school and went to college and I did the things that college kids do but I always knew that I was doing wrong and that Jesus expected more of me. However, much to my detriment, I continued down a bad road. Eventually I moved to Indiana and it became even worse, mainly because for the first time in my life I was truly on my own and thought I could do anything I wanted to without consequence. You name it, I did it.

    One night when I was about 25 I was laying in bed, having problems sleeping because I kept thinking of all the junk in my life. The Holy Spirit had been working on me for quite some time and that night He made Himself known beyond a shadow of a doubt. I heard a voice say “you can’t keep doing this.” Right then I hit my knees, repented of my sin and rededicated myself and my soul to Jesus Christ. Soon after that I became active in a great church, surrounded myself with strong Christians and I was even re-baptized.

    Now that I’m back in Mississippi, here I am: A man who’s still a sinner but who realized the way he was living was wrong, the things I had placed more emphasis on rather than Jesus were wrong and that I was trying to do it all myself. I can’t. No one can. Only Jesus can save us and I thank God that I came to realize that. I married a Godly woman, I am involved in an amazing church and am seeking out God’s will for my life. I’m proud to say that I love Jesus and I want to serve Him in all ways as possible. My road has been a bumpy one but I thank God that I went down it because it helped me learn to rely on Him and that without Him I am nothing.

  • A Pastor That Leads

    Today I heard one of the best sermons I’ve ever heard in any church that I’ve ever had the privilege of worshiping in.

    My church – Central United Methodist Church of Meridian, MS – has decided to undertake a very bold and brave experiment in order to find ways to help the church grow. Before I go any further with that, let me just say that my church is very healthy and is growing by leaps and bounds. However, in the years to come, this might not be the case. The reality of any church is that members have a finite lifespan either through things like moving, death, poor health or other factors. In order to ensure that the church continues to grow and is able to sustain a healthy membership in the decades to come, the sooner we begin finding the ways to make that happen the better. The experiment I speak of involves reversing the order of our worship services.

    Central has two services on Sunday mornings: A contemporary worship service at 8:30 and a traditional service at 10:55. Each week attendance numbers are published in Central’s newsletter and the early service is a much larger draw (normally over 200 – sometimes close to 300) than the late service (normally less than 200). The Administrative Council voted to try an experiment in which the times for the services will be reversed. The purpose of this is to find out if more people are coming to the contemporary service because of the time and also to find out if having a contemporary service later in the morning may attract even more young people to church who currently are unchurched.

    It’s bold and different. I also fully support it.

    Our Senior Pastor, Dr. Bob Rambo, spoke today in length about the experiment and how he understood that some people don’t support it because it’s different. Let’s face it: A lot of people don’t like change. A lot of people don’t like the boat being rocked and thus they’re opposed to anything that will shake up their lives especially when it comes to church. However, Bro. Bob reminded us all that we have a mission: To offer Christ to as many people as possible in as many ways as possible and as many times as possible. He acknowledged that change is never easy (and also emphasized that this just a month long experiment, not a permanent change being made at this time) but that it’s necessary in order for the church to continue to grow and be sustained in the future.

    A church that doesn’t experiment and try new things is a church that will die. It might not be tomorrow but it will happen eventually.

    Bro. Bob related a similar situation that arose while he was serving a congregation in northeastern Mississippi. A large sum of money was left to the church but with the stipulation that the money had to be used to help people, not to be used for the church budget. A committee (we United Methodists love our committees!) determined that a big need in the community was for more daycare services and their recommendation was to use the money to start a daycare service. A faction within the church was opposed and did all it could to derail the decision – including physically threatening Bro. Bob and members of the committee who made the recommendation. By the time it was all said and done, the final decision was made to start the daycare. Many years later Bro. Bob returned to the church to preach at their homecoming and he found a congregation that was vibrant and growing. Many of the new families who came to the church did so because of the daycare. Some of the people who were opposed to the idea sought Bro. Bob out to apologize to him and to let him know that they were wrong.

    The congregation that Bro. Bob served had an opportunity to do something bold and many people didn’t like it. However, the experiment worked and the church is still growing today because of the vision for the daycare.

    I applaud Bro. Bob for having the forethought and vision to propose this idea. He knows that he won’t be at Central forever (UMC clergy are moved every so often) but he wants the church to survive and thrive long after he’s gone. I also applaud the Administrative Council for being willing to take a risk and try something bold that may very well help to sustain the church long after all of us are gone.

    Today Bro. Bob spoke to the congregation about our mission and how sometimes we have to do things that are uncomfortable in order to further the gospel of Christ. While the growing pains may be difficult, it’s well worth it in order to serve Christ and help others see Him. Bro. Bob showed us all what a pastor should be and that’s a leader with vision and the boldness to want us to try new things.

    He also showed that a pastor should not only serve the current congregation but also consider those who will come through the doors after his time at the church is done. Not only is he helping us now, he’s seeking to help future members of Central by laying a foundation now.

    This, friends, is what a pastor should be doing.

    Jonathan