I was speaking with a teen once when he asked me "what's the point of being a Christian?" He qualified the question by telling me about his friend who he had brought to a Christian event and at the end had said, "That's all great but why do I need God? Can't I just do the good things that the Bible suggests, like helping your neighbor, not having sex before marriage, not hurting anyone, etc. and reap the benefits of a well-lived life because I really don't feel anything missing in my life, or have any desire for God?" The teen had no answer and found himself haunted by that fact. The more he pondered it the more he questioned his own relationship with God. He didn't find himself depending much on God and wanted to. He began to reason that his lack of desire for God came from not actually experiencing the need for God in his life. He was born into a Christian family and knew nothing else. He figured that the healthiest action he could take was to walk away from God, to do life on his own. If he could make it on his own, then his friend was right. But if he found himself missing something, then he could come back to God, re-invigorated by his new realized dependence on God. He was honestly in a struggle of faith. He looked around at what he considered the "great" Christians, Christians who actually changed the world, who made a difference. In his experience, all of his heroes of the faith had become Christians at some later point in their lives rather than growing up in Christian homes. All of them had experienced depravity and so grace meant so much more. They were energized by being Christians, they were alive in relationship with God and their lives showed it. He pointed to the famous, like Billy Graham but also to members of his family and individuals he knew personally. If he was going to be a Christian he only wanted it in the form his heroes embodied, not in the way he was presently living life.

And so the question remained..."What's the point of being a Christian?"

I think it's a question that many of us ask but unfortunately not out loud. It is not really a safe question to ask in many Christian circles without being barraged with well-meaning bits of advice given to help encourage your relationship with God but often they just compound our disillusionment with Christianity.

I recently watched Rob Bell's Nooma DVD "Dust". In it Rob asks the question, "Believing in God is important, but what about God believing in us?" Do we actually believe we can be the people God saved us to be? He points out how the disciples didn't choose Jesus, Christ chose them, and what's more in the Rabbinic tradition that means that he thought they could do what he did, that they could carry his yoke. This is why when Jesus walks on water Peter got out of the boat and even thought about walking on water also. If his Rabbi was doing it and he wanted to be like his Rabbi, then why wouldn't he get out? But if you read the account, you read that Peter begins to sink and cries out to Jesus to save him. So Jesus reaches out his hand to him and says "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" (Matt. 14:31). Rob Bell points out that we often think Peter was doubting Jesus, but Jesus was standing on the water just fine. Peter doubted himself, that he could actually be like his Rabbi and do what his Rabbi did. And to this, Jesus responds, "Why do you doubt that you can be the person you were meant to be?" I think Peter's doubt is in a lot of us, Christian or not, but especially those of us who grew up in Christian homes.

I think the teen I was talking to really put his finger on this issue when he observed that his heroes of the faith were all people who had not grown up in Christian homes. Often those are the people who have seen life without having life, who have experienced the darkness and now desperately grab onto the light, who have seen that living life their own way is totally out of tune with the way the world really works. They experienced God choosing them, saying "I think you can actually be like me" and believe it. But those of us who grew up in Christian homes, who experienced God choosing us in terms of choosing our family, grace has abounded in us. And so, I think, there is often a tendency in our churches and families to remind ourselves of our sinfulness, of our nothingness, of our simply being a vapor (James 4:14). The thinking behind this is that we have experienced grace and so must know what we are being saved from (i.e. sin and grace must be understood in connection). And thus, we start setting up rules/boundaries to help guide us through our lives, rules that we depend on. Rules like don't have sex before marriage, don't drink to get drunk, don't cuss, etc. The problem is that these "rules" only make sense when lived as part of a relationship. By themselves they are horrible as an emphasis, simply because it is not what God emphasizes. Religion is created by "don’ts" but Christ came to show us the "do's," to show us how life is supposed to be lived and to make such a life possible. By boiling Christianity down to do's and don'ts we have effectively created religion and destroyed relationship, a relationship where God comes down to us and says, "Because of what I've done and accomplished, I know you can be the people I saved you to be." God didn't come to earth for the sake of Christianity, to have a bunch of churches with crosses on them. He came to earth to make life possible for humanity, to show us true humanity at its core.

It seems to me that much of Christianity has forgotten this message or has never heard it. To be an apprentice of Christ (i.e a Christian) is to be a person who has what it takes to do what Jesus did. Even when I spoke with some other teens about this, they responded "yes, we can do what Jesus did, even though we are nothing." Why clarify this statement with the after thought of "we are nothing?" We clarify this point for fear that we will start to view ourselves as sinless or something but God has already made the point pretty clear when he sent his Son to die on the cross for us. We are of worth because God values us, you are of immense value to God. No "ifs" "ands" or "buts" - God sees you and sees someone who can live life the way it was meant to be lived. He believes in you. So perhaps we should start viewing ourselves as God does.

Perhaps if we started living like we couldn't fail (because we can't) we'd find less and less of us asking what's the point of being a Christian. Rather than telling people to have a relationship with God, perhaps we should live like we actually have one ourselves. Because, to be honest, I'm with the student. I too don't want a passionless faith, one where I feel restricted rather than being empowered. Such a Christianity must beg the question, "Why bother being a Christian?" When life is lived in response to what God has done for us, we realize that not only is it the only way to live, we realize it is such because there is no other way to experience life at all.

Matt