Gratitude 35

I am grateful for Easter.  I am grateful for Jesus.  I am grateful that he did not stay dead in the tomb but rose to new life imparting to us the promise of new hope and new life.  I am grateful that this year, despite my lack of church attendance, that this beautiful truth is more real for me than it's ever been.

I am also grateful that I no longer feel obligated nor under pressure to convince or explain to atheists and other nonbelievers about this beautiful truth.  It is a waste of breath, time and energy.  In fact, I will only  speak openly about my faith to others if it is really clear that it will be a positive and constructive conversation.  Otherwise, much better to keep my enlightenment to myself and just hope and pray that in the way I behave towards others there will already be plenty of information to persuade others about the Gospel.  On one of my better days, maybe.

I think that refusing to swallow the bait is even more important than talking about it.  This doesn't mean that others still won't be offended.  I remember one visit years ago, back in 2002, I think when I was having tea with my step-cousin, now sadly departed from us.  She had a friend over.  When I was asked about where I would be going the next few days I replied vaguely about wanting to go wherever God appeared to be wanting to lead me.  Her friend tried to get a religious discussion going.  I sensed his lack of good will and refused to nibble.  I politely replied that my faith is something very personal and I usually prefer not to talk about it.  An uncomfortable silence followed and a few months later my step-cousin very rudely ended our friendship, accusing me of being a religious bigot, even though I'd said nothing.  We since reconciled, happily, and when she left this world, we parted as friends.

It is especially difficult explaining the many crimes of the church to someone who is already prejudiced against the Christian faith.  Today I mentioned that I had been watching a video about how the Catholic church was influential in kicking the Moors out of Spain, without realizing beforehand that I would be getting a less than charitable reply of how intolerant Christians are.  Without pursuing the argument I simply replied that I am a Christian and you already know that I'm not like that.  This helped end the discussion but not without a certain sense of discomfort that lingered like smoke in the kitchen after toast has been burned.

I am not interested in educating those who have already made up their mind.  If they are so uncharitable as to think of me as deluded for believing that God, in his love, came to the earth for us as Jesus, died for us and rose from the dead, then I suppose that is their right.

My right, and certainly my obligation as a professing Christian is to respect that they choose not to believe and to live my life in such a way that everything I do and say is infused with the light and love of Christ.  If anyone chooses to believe through my influence then it is going to be from the way that I live my life.  Words, on their own, don't really cut it.

Now, let's see what I do to blow it.