News and social media are filled with commentary about Christians, Christianity, and what it all stands for. Particularly notorious are certain self-described conservative Evangelical movements claiming to be Christian nationalists, aligned more or less with the current administration and its MAGA core supporters. They seem able to attract large crowds of adherents while giving Christianity a bad name at the same time.
When Jesus found himself surrounded by crowds—people in addition to those he called disciples—he explained the marks of a true follower, believer, and disciple in ways that identified them with greater clarity. Faithful followers of the Way are not better human beings than others. They remain the same complicated, sometimes doubting people that we all are. The difference is a rule of life that guides and corrects them toward following, in ever greater measure, the way of Jesus Christ.
They can be identified by their commitment to mercy over judgment, and by their recognition that they are, after all, not very good judges of others. They understand that they themselves are often poorly judged as well. They desire to be peacemakers—not only by de-escalating violence, but even more by healing and reconciling relationships, including their own. Even the most humble among them exhibit strength and courage in the face of injustice affecting the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized.
While deeply religious, they are unlikely to parade their piety in public. There is a kind of religiosity that is acted out as public performance art, using God as a stage prop. It is not the Christian way. Faithful followers of Jesus tend to keep their prayers simple and direct. When they offer prayer in public, they seek to invoke God’s presence rather than entertain listeners with elaborate promises or vindictive condemnations.
They have a curious relationship with money and the competitive struggle to climb social and economic ladders. They may acquire great wealth. They may find themselves among society’s elite. Oddly enough, neither of those will be very important to them. Their greatest desire is to do what is good and right—and to do it well—in whatever work engages them. They experience the same pressures and anxieties about daily life as everyone else and, like most people, desire success in their professions and trades. They make the same mistakes and errors that we all do, but somehow the way of Jesus remains at the center of all they do, the compass that brings them back when they lose their bearings.
Their faith is a sacred treasure. It is to be treated with reverence. No authority in heaven or on earth can hold a higher place.
These Christians are not more perfect than anyone else, nor do they consider themselves more righteous. They are not naïve about who they are as human beings. Indeed, they recognize all persons everywhere—regardless of place or condition of life—as being made in the image of God, loved by God, and desired by God to be blessed in abundance.
Christians who follow in the way of Jesus do not claim to have all the answers or to understand everything that Scripture and tradition have offered them. They are willing to knock, seek, and ask, fully expecting God’s Holy Spirit to open doors, help them find what they seek, and respond to their deepest questions. Nevertheless, they remain aware that they understand only in part, knowing that God is still speaking and still creating.
Not every voice that claims to be Christian follows in the way of Jesus, and not every person who claims to speak for God can be trusted. Jesus warned that there would be many false prophets using his name. Faithful Christians test every voice. Is it consistent with what Jesus did and taught? Does it proclaim love of God and love of neighbor—especially the stranger, the alien, the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, and even those whom we may dislike or distrust?
Christians have no illusions about the changes and chances of life. Good times and hard times fall on everyone alike. What they hold with certainty is a faith grounded in the way of the cross, a faith able to endure whatever comes and to lead through the gates of death into new and better life in God’s presence. In the meantime, they are compelled and commanded to do what they can to bring some measure of the kingdom of God into the places where they live and among the people they encounter.
What you wrote today, Steve, just as what you have repeatedly written before, is a particularly important reminder as we continue to face the “march” of Christian Nationalism (an oxymoronic expression) in this country.
But as I keep on repeating myself in my comments to your reminders, the “battleground” today is not in events that end up as headlines in the New York Times. Rather it is utterly and completely local in face-to-face engagement with specifically *this* person right there in front of you. If the “Kingdom of Heaven” *may* take place “on earth,” it *can* only *begin* to do so right there in-between you and this other person.