Tony Jones and Trucker Frank hit the road to explore the changing landscape of American Christianity. Frank talks about his life in and out of the church. Great testimony.

[go to part 2 here]

I was talking with a pastor this week and we got onto the subject of the ineffectiveness of the church. I told him that from working with, in and around churches for the past seven years; I’ve lost my faith in religion (and the institutionalized church), but never in Jesus. From there, I continued the ideas from this conversation to others with my wife, co-workers and friends. And from those conversations we all agreed that something has definitely been lost. The church has:

lost compassion towards people in word and deed

lost touch with people on the the outside walls of the church

lost the reality that culture exists and matters (because it mattered to Jesus)

lost our love and mystery in pursuing God

lost our humility and the fact that we’re all sinners

lost our alien and nomadic nature

lost the journey in pursuit of the truth and being right

lost authenticity by refusing to be honest and broken and taking up the cloak of rhetoric

lost the here and now of the Gospel and traded it for the “was” and “will”

lost the grandness of following Christ and replaced it with a manageable life

Any to add? Any to argue?

“Jesus did not die at the hands of muggers, rapists, or thugs. He fell into the well-scrubbed hands of deeply religious people, society’s most respected members.” -Brennan Manning

If this is true… then why do so many Christians aspire to be so religious?

Why is worship music always pretty? You know it sounds so… so nice and holy. We don’t live pretty lives. We don’t have pretty struggles. So why does our worship music seem to only come that way. I mean who started this? Pretty = Holy? It just doesn’t seem right.

Now, I’m not saying that we can’t have any nice, fluffy worship music (ie. Tomlin or Camp) from time to time. All I’m looking for is something with a little more teeth. Something raw and real. Something beaten and broken. If I’m torn up inside, I’m not looking for fluffy worship.

Our lives are hard. Read the psalms. David is not always a happy camper. He was raw and emotional. So why doesn’t our worship music reflect our struggles. Why doesn’t it feel like the grit under our fingernails or the sweat on our brows. Why doesn’t it sound like something raw or rough? Why doesn’t someone like Springsteen write worship music. Just a thought.

[ht: become a robot]

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