What If Christians Grew Up?

What If Christians Grew Up? The very definition of growing up is to take responsibility for ourselves. To be a child is be in a place and time where other people are taking care of you. Our teens and twenties are so turbulent because we are making the transition from being taken care of, to taking care of ourselves, to hopefully being able to help take care of others. So the question I propose to the Christian community is this: What if Christians grew up? I mean this in every context. What if the story of Scripture is the story of humanity growing up in the care of a loving Father? What if the incarnation of Jesus Christ and the New Covenant was a right of passage from God? What if our future isn’t set in stone? What if, even now, we need to see the whole Church in the light of constant growth and change? It is my belief that if we could learn to teach the Gospel in this light, we would begin to change the helpless and self-deprecating attitude and behavior of mainstream Christians. We would learn to open our eyes and see that the world we live in is the world we make. We would learn to see our potential to continue to learn, grow, and mature. Most of all, I think we would reclaim a love of Scripture as the story of a loving and dedicated Father raising the very difficult child called “humanity,” but raising it nonetheless. Over the next few chapters we are going to review the story of Scripture in this context. We will discover how the real story of Scripture has been speaking this message all along, we have just been missing it. We will discover how the story of the Gospel isn't the story of the infants of God, but a Church which grows up to become the heirs of God. ...Children Grow Up Many Christians struggle with how differently God seems act between the Old Testament and New Testament. What an example of our thick-headed perspective! We look at the difference between the Old and New Testament and our first question is “Why did God change?” For some reason we think of all the variables, God must have been the one that changed. Did we ever think that WE CHANGED? Did your parents spank or ground you when you were a child? Do they spank or ground you now that you are grown up? When you were an infant your parents changed your diapers and spoon fed you. Do they change your diapers and spoon feed you now that you have grown up? No? Well, tell me, what changed your parents? Nothing! You grew up, you changed. If you want to understand the “God of the Old Testament” all you have to do is think about how you treat a child when they are a toddler. You can’t explain to a toddler the complexities of ethics, nor can you teach them reason or judgement. You say “don’t do that” and “do this.” You give them clear rules and expectations. You punish them when they disobey or act destructively, and praise them as they develop. Now we can confront another misconception among Christians today. We are not the always the same, we are ever changing. And we aren't getting worse either, we are growing. The Church is growing. Humanity is growing. We are growing. We are the Children of God, we are being raised by a perfect and loving Father, and we are growing up. I know a lot of you reading this are thinking that this is the opposite of what you have been taught. Many Christians come from the stories we discussed in the first chapter. We are told humanity is getting worse. We are told we are hopelessly corrupt and inherently evil. We are told the world is “going to hell in a handbasket.” This is simply not true. First of all, it is an offense to God. If God is our Father, then how can his children be doing anything other than growing? Second, it is contradictory to Scripture itself. The Scriptures not only tell us a story of our growth, it clearly states that Christ was sent to us, and we were given a new covenant, because we grew. In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. - Galatians 4:3-7 (ESV) The apostle Paul is pointing out in this verse that being a child is like being a slave. You are always having an authority figure tell you where to go and what to do. You are not free to make your own decisions, decisions are made for you. Children experience both love and reliance on their parents, but also a bit of resentment. We look forward to the freedom of adulthood. If the story of the Old Testament is the story of our infancy, then the New Testament is the story of our adolescence. We were created to be the Children of God, made in his image, but now we are more than children, we are heirs. As a parent treats a teenager differently than a child (or at least should) so does God now have a different relationship with us than when we first began. This new relationship has a lot of ramifications for what God now expects from us, both as individuals and as his Church.