Counter-Culture

 Do you know that Christianity is counter-culture in many many ways. Even in the days of the Roman Empire, Christianity was counter-culture.  I have gradually realized over time that I needed to change my thinking. We grow up in a culture that has been demeaning to others and even to women. I remember after my last divorce that I began praying differently, Instead of asking God to help me find the right woman after my fourth failure, I was asking God to help me be the right man. Change me. In more recent days I felt convicted of my divorce stories. These exes of mine are God's daughters. God loves them as much as he loves me and if I tell my story that puts them in a bad light, I may be hurting one of God's children. I never really looked at it like that. We have modern music that uses the words bitch and whore when talking about women and it is wrong. You may say it is just our culture but it is wrong. We as Christians need to be counter-culture. When society tells us Blacks are not equal, we need to be counter-culture. When society tells us all white men are White supremacists, we need to be counter-culture. Jesus gave us one commandment, love as he loved us. "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."  John 13:34-35.  Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her... Ephesians 5:25. These things I command you, so that you will love one another.  John 15:17.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, Philippians 2:3. These are different than what we have been schooling ourselves in our society.  These are counter to our culture. We feel good if we become a part of an organization like Black Lives Matter and our culture tells us we are wrong for not supporting an organization like that but it is supposed to be every life, that matters and when we differentiate between man and woman or black and white we are wrong. These scriptures should speak to us regardless if male or female,  black or white. We are to love even our enemies. Our culture is using these things to divide us and drive us apart, setting us up against each other when Jesus, John and Paul are telling us to love one another and value, respect, honor one another.  Christianity has been counter-culture for centuries and we need to continue to be so. I am sure if I tried I could find so many examples. Listen to Joe Namath and so many other celebrities on commercials, over and over we are bombarded in our society with things that are just plain wrong. Often we don't even think about it. Our culture is teaching us so many wrong things in our music, our advertisements, our TV shows, over and over we are bombarded with so many anti-christian behaviors, and most often we pay very little attention to the messages we are hearing over and over again. Love one another, it is so simple, that is God's message to us. We are being taught to hate and to divide through social justice warriors, like ANTIFA, BLM and climate change and so many other social issues. Jesus is telling us to follow his example and love as he loved us. Before we were even Christian, he loved us. While we were still sinners, Jesus died for our sins.  God bless, LVZ.