Offended by Christ?

Matt at The Church of No People posts this provacative piece:

The apostle Paul called the cross “offensive.”

 

He said it was a “stumbling block.”

 

It’s easy to see what he meant.  No one had contemplated the idea of worshipping a man who died disgracefully.  A slave’s death.  A notorious death.  The cross was a symbol of “Pax Romana,” the peace that Rome enforced by executing enemies of the state.

 

But I wonder…are people really still offended by the cross?  (Not just because we are inundated with violent entertainment.)

 

Are people really stumbling over the gospel?  Are they tripping over Jesus’ words?

 

Jesus said that people would hate us, his followers, on account of him.

 

I’m not sure Jesus’ words are all that true anymore.  People aren’t offended by the cross or stumbling over the gospel or hating us on account of Jesus.  The fact is most people can’t get close enough to Jesus to be offended by him…

 

…They’re too offended by us.

Ooooooh, those are some fighting words, Son!

I never understood commercials for milk.  I mean, the “Got Milk?” ads were catchy.  But who doesn’t already know about milk?  Who watched one of those ads and thought, “You know, I had forgotten milk existed!”?

 

No one, that’s who.  Everyone knows about milk.

 

Chris Broussard has done a bang-up job of creating a similarly useless publicity campaign.  When he explained his position on Jason Collins’ homosexual lifestyle, he added absolutely nothing to the conversation.  No one heard what Chris had to say and thought, “Oh, that was helpful.  He certainly cleared up some questions I had about what many Christians think about gays.”

 

Instead, he just gave people who are already opposed to Christianity, already offended by Christianity, already convinced that Christians are a bunch of hateful prejudiced jerks, the chance to blast him.  Chris had the chance to share the gospel on cable TV, and he wasted it by talking about a certainly prominent, but nevertheless tertiary issue.

I’ll concede that point. Those “Got Milk” ads were kind of useless.

Chris is hardly the first Christian to neglect a chance to talk about the saving work of Jesus, his offensive death and resurrection?  How often are we tricked into this?  We have the chance to talk about Jesus.  But we are convinced that it’s somehow more important to share our feelings about the contemporary issue of the day.  (i.e. who’s going to hell.)

Smh. Word. Click this link to read the rest and don’t mind my weird interjections. I just had a classic neuro fall (you know, tripping over air), my knee hurts, and I need to finish drinking my coffee. Oh, and I was listening to Biggie and Bone Thugs yesterday. “Armed and dangerous…”