February 16, 2007

A friend asked me to read a book by Donald Miller, “Searching for God Knows What.” So along with three other books on my list this week I sat down with it. I’ve enjoyed Don’s earlier book and expected to find both pleasure and challenge in this one. I wasn’t disappointed.

I like Mr. Miller for his disarming skill in sharing his journey as a Christian in a secular world. In one section that stuck in my mind he compared how we define what it is to be a Christian to what it means to fall in love. So I took this comparison and asked a group of 5th and 6th graders about it. I wonder how you’d do?

First list what a person would need to believe or how a person would need to act in order to be a Christian.

Now make a second list noting what a person would need to believe or how a person would need to act in order to fall in love. Valentines Day came this week, so this seems like an appropriate question.

I hope you did as well as the students did. Both of their lists were very relational. That is the core of being a Christian – a relationship. How you become a Christian is no different than how you fall in love. There’s magic and mystery and chemistry. It’s just that for a Christian it is Christ who is the center of our love and affection.

Now after we’re ‘Christian’ our understanding of God and His will for our lives (we call all that Doctrine) can strengthen and protect our relationship. But doctrine cannot replace nor become synonymous with the relationship.

Here’s to your love life.

“Long ago the LORD said to Israel: “I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself.” Jeremiah 31:3

Rejoicing in hope,
Pastor Steve