Categories: uncategorized
Date: 30 September 2007 21:15:17
After work on Friday night, a small bunch of us went out for a few drinks. Most of the group were from the team that work at the other end of our office, who are all pretty good for a laugh or two. However, there are two guys in particular who have a tendency for friendly-but-heated arguments; and lo and behold, they only went and had one about Christianity in the middle of our drinking session.
More specifically, the argument went thusly: Colleague #1 made some reference to his being a Christian, and Colleague #2 countered that by asking on what grounds C#1 was a Christian. C#1's reply? "Well, I was in the Boys' Brigade when I was a kid, and I try to live a good life and, you know, think about God sometimes..."
Anyway, this went on for some time: C#2 questioned whether this was enough to qualify as a Christian, and C#1 said he was clearly more of a Christian than C#2 because C#2 is gay and therefore lives a lifestyle that God doesn't approve of, and C#2 countered that firstly he was an atheist and therefore likely to be less of a Christian than C#1 anyway, and secondly that C#1 lives with his girlfriend and so is living a lifestyle that God doesn't approve of just as much as C#2 is. But C#2's most convincing argument was that, if C#1 actually believes that there is an amazing, powerful, mighty God who has made us all, then (in C#2's words) "surely you should want to say 'hello mate' to Him from time to time, and actually acknowledge that He exists". Meanwhile, Colleague #3 and I (the only two people there who would be considered "Christians" by the mainstream definition of the word) listened intently, chortled a little, and struggled to get a word in edgeways.
This wouldn't be so bad if, in C#1's mind, living a good life and thinking of God occasionally was enough for him to go to heaven. But from what he was saying, C#1 doesn't think that; it sounds like he knows he has to turn away from everything that doesn't honour God, but he intends to leave that part of it until the last minute so that he can do whatever he wants and enjoy himself up until then (because everyone knows Christians aren't allowed to ever have fun or enjoy themselves because God hates That Kind Of Thing, right?). C#1 reckons this will be enough to get him into heaven while C#2 will be burning in hell with all the other gay atheists and suchlike. As you can probably guess, I'm not so sure.
I don't claim to get everything right, and I can't take a speck of wood out of someone else's eye if I have an entire tree in mine. But it just shocks me to think that so many people who would call themselves Christians, and genuinely honestly believe they are Christians, might not actually be Christians at all, and might not realise it until it's too late.