I get embarrassed of admitting that I'm a Christian a lot. I've found that is has nothing to do with the God I follow, but that a big problem for me lies with those who claim to follow Him, the Christians, and what we do to give the title of "Christian" a bad rep to have.
One of the biggest embarrassments to me in the Christian world is our words and actions during political season. Honestly, every time I saw a hateful post about another political party, it made me cringe for a number of reasons-that person was being uninformed, was trying to start unnecessary quarrels, and being hateful and judgmental towards people they don't even know. You guys honestly had me really embarrassed, and I tried to stay out of political posts as much possible for that reason.
Why do I say I hate being a Christian during political season?
First, we often have zeal without knowledge. We tell ourselves "Republicans=good and Democrats=bad" or vice versa without even researching the issues. We vote for one candidate because we feel like as Christians that's who we're supposed to vote for without even thinking for ourselves. Then, we get flat out ugly with anyone who disagrees. Suddenly our political views turns more into a whole Twilight craze "Team Edward" or "Team Jacob" thing-you're either the hero or the enemy. The question is, can we provide true facts, thought-out opinions, or just a bunch of political propaganda when talking about our candidate? As Proverbs 19:2 tells us (and I have this highlighted in my Bible), "It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way." I think that our intentions are good, because we want to convince ourselves that we are fighting for God and standing up for His truth. But I think that in the long run, God wants us to fight for truth in our daily actions in our lives that show other people God is who we say He is, not posting political propaganda that we think is true.
In fact, that's one of my biggest pet peeves-starting unnecessary fights and quarrels-and its prime time is during political season. I've seen people call Obama supporters "ruthless baby killers" to be exact and harshly argue on Facebook with people they've never even met before. I pray that people realize that their words and actions are not going unnoticed by many people of my generation who already have a bad taste of Christianity. If the point of a debate is to share in love something you feel convicted about, that's fine, but very rarely that's the case. Pride is the main contributor to a debate. Be careful-Proverbs 20:3 says "It is to a man's honor to avoid strife, but every fool is quick to quarrel."
People honestly just like a good fuss, and Christians aren't excluded from this. But our judging hearts turn people away much more quickly from God than they turn people towards the idea of God. Our Facebook rants about how we despise Obama-a man we do not know, probably will never meet, and is not responsible for the moral decline of our country but instead we as the American people are-just comes across as hate-based to me. It especially comes across as hate-based and judgmental when the next status that comes up on some people's newsfeed is something completely un-Christlike.
I don't have my political views listed on Facebook, and I probably never will have my true views listed. Instead, I quote this from Micah 6:8: "seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly." God never commanded us to be conservative or liberal, Obama-adoring or Romney-rooting, but to do these three things. Perhaps this is where most of my embarrassment comes from-the lack of these things in our Christian bubble.
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