July 17 - What She Could

Mark 14:3-9 She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. (Mark 14:8 ESV)

As Mary anointed Jesus with the costly perfume people grumbled at the apparent waste of such an action. Jesus chastised them, declaring her sacrifice to be a beautiful and selfless act of worship. She had done what she could with what she had. It was her way of offering all that she had to God.

What does God ask from us? Better yet, what has God already done for you, or given to you, that He might be asking for you to use for His Kingdom? Mary did what she could, whatever she was able to do she did for Jesus. Furthermore, her faithful act of worship had a part to play in God's work of salvation.

What can you do? I think it's high time that we in the American Church stop showing up to sponge off of the insight and experiences of the few. God still speaks to us, He still reveals Himself to our hearts, He still challenges us to take up His cause. What are we going to do about it? When will we cross the line and stop merely being consumers?

Mary did what she could. I don't know what we can do, but I think it's time we found out.

Merica's gods: Greed & Consumerism

I've spent the last several months thinking about the utter waste in our nation. We waste resources, education, and effort on a wealth of idolatrous pursuits that are at the epicenter of American culture. It makes me sad. It is deeply sinful. And one of the saddest parts about it is that the American church has done or is doing very little to call it's people to repentance. Shame on us. Greed is the root of all evil. Every type of evil imaginable can be traced back to greed. Pride is essentially having a greedy opinion of yourself and wanting others to as well. Envy is the greedy instinct to desire something not in your possession. Sexual addiction, gluttony, and theft are all sinful results of greed.

In many places around the world greed takes the form of another idolatrous monstrosity known as consumerism, but perhaps no one demonstrates it as obviously as America. We don't know how to separate want from need, and even if we did we probably wouldn't have the self control to bother with it. We pursue possessions. Having and buying are at the heart of what many think it means to be American.

Sadly, this same mentality is too often reflected in the Church. We "shop" for places of worship and evaluate them based on ideas of what we "can get out of it" or how well "we are being fed." It's deeply tragic when we place value on a place of worship based on the scope of their facilities, size of their budget, or compartmentalization of their programs.

Because we consume so greedily, often there is little left from the church budget to things of incredible significance, like outreach. We spend selfishly.

What would our Church look like if we were generous, and not so self centered or glutinous in our spiritual consumption? What if Jesus wanted us to stop thinking of ourselves entirely?

More posts in this series:

Etiquette, Etican, Etican't

Football, Athletes, and Idolatry

Mirrors, Models, and Muscles

Education

Sex

Culture Wars

Religious Tradition and Dissidence

Intolerance

Greed & Consumerism

Merica's gods: Sex

I've spent the last several months thinking about the utter waste in our nation. We waste resources, education, and effort on a wealth of idolatrous pursuits that are at the epicenter of American culture. It makes me sad. It is deeply sinful. And one of the saddest parts about it is that the American church has done or is doing very little to call it's people to repentance. Shame on us. Sex is the Herculean demigod of American idolatry. A rampant problem resultant of several other converging erroneous western ideologies, sex, or more accurately our cultural obsession with it, is a wildly dangerous god set loose upon this society.

The prevalence of pornography and abortion are probably two of the largest indicators that society's sexual climate has experienced radical change in recent decades. The consensual relationship between encroaching perversion in mainstream media and the common consumer's acceptance of it only further illuminates this change on a societal level.

Like all American gods, regular sacrifice is offered to the very real sexgod; and in a way that almost mirrors the abhorrent idolatry of ancient Israel. Whereas most idolatrous action is a display of misplaced passion, resources, and affection, each with their own varying degrees of affects; sex results in a host of other problems as well. Disease, broken families, perversion, and murder of the unborn are all results of sexworship.

The scary part is how little we even acknowledge how deeply it has affected our nature. Hollywood frequently champions the push to expand sex's reach, but advertising is a close runner up. Promiscuity, permissiveness, and the ongoing proliferation of sex have created an acceptable culture of sexual consumerism that degrades the delight of marriage, distorts the dignity of the human body, and destroys the dynamic of God-given gender roles.

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More posts in this series:

Etiquette, Etican, Etican't

Football, Athletes, and Idolatry

Mirrors, Models, and Muscles

Education

Sex

Culture Wars

Religious Tradition and Dissidence

Intolerance

Greed & Consumerism