I saw a shirt today that said 'I love haters'....

And I thought it was funny, but my integrity and pride wouldn't let me buy it. Why? Because I don't love haters (something I gotta work out, I know). Ha. Pretty straight forward right? And I know it's meant in jest and I know that it speaks to the 'shake them haters off' mentality. BUT I can't help but be extremely, utterly, agonizingly annoyed by haters...or in my world, fakers.

Wanna know what keeps people out of church? And in a very real sense away from Jesus? It's not that we don't have enough lights-God knows we put on a small rock concert every Sunday and Wednesday. It's not that we don't have enough 'amenities', it's not even the messages. Ghandi said "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ." And I think that's a very fair perception the world holds towards 'Christians.' We go to our services once, twice a week, we become borderline groupies when we have a guest speaker, maybe we even take notes and serve on some sort of ministry. But when we leave that building, we are the same hypocritical, back-stabbing, gossiping heathens we were before we got 'saved.'

I think this is what keeps people from church. Oh but it's not about the numbers right? People will come when they feel 'lead'. FALSE! When you're talking about people and souls connecting with their Creator and ultimately their destiny, it very much is about the numbers because every single number represents someone that came to Christ. And people will never feel 'lead' when all they see from this organized religion we so earnestly cling to is a mob of liars and hypocrites.

Are we called to be perfect? No. Absolutely not. But when someone asked Jesus to sum it all up for us and put His entire message in one cute little nutshell, what did He say? Love God and love people. A lot of us get so caught up in our lofty, self-serving 'callings' that we somehow think we're exempt from loving God and loving people. Oh yeah we're amazing speakers, we're amazing organizers, we're amazing artists, etc. But what are we doing to love people? We can't even love the people we worship with, let alone people outside of our church building. How are you showing love? Are you gossiping? Are you being rude? Are you judging? Because all those things are things that can easily be found in the world. So if we have nothing better to offer our neighbor than a rock concert and free babysitting, what is going to bring people to Christ?

I challenge you: forget about your 'amazing' calling and 'heart' for whatever ministry you think you're called to. Try to stretch yourself beyond your own comfortable sphere of self service and get back to the basics. Love God and Love People. And from here on out I, too, commit: I love haters. And fakers.