Whitewashed Tombs?

Well, I haven't written a "Christians are hypocrites" post in awhile, so I suppose it's time to do so. Please note at the get-go: I include myself in this category of self-righteous, hypocritical, agenda-laden folks for whom Christ died.

Yesterday, I was in mourning. I witnessed the passing of a childhood hero. As I stated in the previous post, Puck was the player everyone on my little league team wanted to be. Even the Brewer fans were likely to imitate Puck when they stepped into the batter's box. There was just something special about the way that guy played the game--a hard worker on the field, a model off the field.

A model off the field, you ask? Yeah. That's what I said. An often overlooked fact is that, besides taking a vested interest in the Minneapolis community in various ways, Kirby's celebrity 8 ball pool tournament raised over 4 million dollars for Children's Heartlink.

Four Million Dollars. Not to mention his quarter million dollar endowment to the University of Minnesota. The guy was generous, as well as being a motivator for many young African Americans that (in Kirby's words), "You can do anything."

I know he wasn't always a model citizen. Kirby made some grave mistakes in his private life. Cheating on his wife, abusing his wife. There were other things. The man definitely had some personal problems. I'm not interested in debating the truth of these things at the moment.

What does concern me is why so many Christians I talked with yesterday were interested in discussing these latter, ugly aspects of Kirby's private life rather than the former. The discussions I had yesterday generally went something like this:

Me: I'm really bummed about the Kirby thing. He was a childhood hero of mine.

Christian: I just can't respect a man who did all of those things. I could never look at him the same way again...I don't know if it's right to have a guy like Kirby as a hero.

What is wrong with us? Why are we so intent on pointing out other people's flaws? I am absolutely ticked about this. Do we even consider the fact that the guy was getting his life cleaned up? How about the possibility that the guy (for all we know) could have been truly repentant for his actions--which, by the way, is what Tanya implies in the Star Tribune this morning. What gives us the right, as Christians, to speak so ill of someone when their body has hardly cooled in the casket? Does the thought of tactfulness even enter the consciousness of Christians with regard to these things? Or are we justified in taking pot-shots at a guy the day after his death?

But there's something that concerns me more than the lack of civility and tact. Have we forgotten that we are saved by grace? Have we forgotten that there was nothing special about us?

Nothing.

God wasn't sitting up in heaven thinking, "Oh, I really need Tim on my team. I haven't seen him do anything wrong in weeks." Geez. It was more like, "Look at that filthy, despicable, self-righteous, angry, putrid, sorry excuse for My image down there. My Son died for him."

I'm so tired of this judgmental attitude amongst Christians. It seems like our greatest concern with the world is that they are sinful. OF COURSE THEY'RE SINFUL. That's why they need Jesus. Us trying to put verbal bandaids of condemnation on their oozing wounds of sin isn't going to work. What they need is a Healer. They need the Great Physician. If you are one of those Christians who has not been leaving room for the judgment of the Lord, especially with regard to non-Christian behavior, repent now. I have been, and you need to do the same.

And, lest you doubt my Biblical support for saying these things, I encourage you to peruse 1 Corinthians 5, particularly the end. Paul spends most of that chapter talking about our duty to keep those within the church accountable for their behavior. But then at the end, he almost laughs at those who want to hold those outside the church to the same standard.

Christians, let's get over ourselves and get on mission.