NOTE (1/12/18): We’re all learning and growing.  Some of the stuff I’ve written in these old posts may no longer be exactly what I believe or think, or at least may not be articulated the way I’d do it nowadays.  I preserve them in an attempt it to be transparent about my journey, and in the hopes that readers may still glean some insight from the core ideas found here.  Thanks for journeying with me!

As I was walking through a hospice lobby the other day, I overheard a man telling the receptionist about 5 recent back surgeries he had had.  Noticing he had a cane, I stopped and asked if he was in pain.  I talked to him a bit and told him that I pray for people and see them get healed.  I have seen plenty of people get healed of all sorts of stuff, but especially back problems – so I had great faith that if I were to lay hands on him and speak healing, something would happen.

So I asked him if I could pray for him.  And he nicely declined.  He did seem thankful for the offer, however, and stuck out his hand.  I shook it and said “well, be healed!” (because it says believers will lay hands on the sick and they shall recover in Mark 16:18, right?) and headed on my way.

On the drive home I pondered the incident.  I can’t say I handled it perfectly.  But the man’s response reminded me of something that had dawned on me back when we lived in San Jose that I want to share with you now.  The thought was perfectly summarized by a pamphlet I got in the mail….

The pamphlet was called “You can avoid becoming a VICTIM OF FRAUD”!  Check out how it describes how to identify a scandal in the picture.  Sound familiar?  I inserted a few Scripture references in there in case you’re a bit lost.  Yep – reminded me a lot of the good news of Jesus.  The realization then came to me – that when the gospel is accurately presented to many of us cynics, it could easily sound like a scam.

Think of it!  God wants to heal all your sicknesses and diseases.  You need to know Jesus because you can only be saved from eternal destruction through Him.  It costs you your life, but don’t worry, you don’t have to do a thing to earn salvation – it’s freely given because you’re special to God.

An amazing message, but the devil has done his best to make counterfeits. We see ads on every webpage we visit about being the millionth visitor to a webpage and we’ve won some great prize.  TV infomercials rave about how buff your pectorals can be in two weeks if you would just use this fantastic, unbelievable ball.  We use positive words in such great wasteful quantities that no one believes them anymore. It’s gone so far that we’ve retaliated to the point of ignoring anything and everything that contains goodness that we can’t account for. Why?  Because we believe that  we already know what the fine print says – “Some conditions apply.  Side effects may include this.  We are not responsible for that.”  Or, the ever-popular: “By agreeing to this, you bind yourself to us in an unbreakable contract so that we may burn, pillage, and destroy your life without you having any legal right to stop us.”

Or there could be no fine print, just complete lies.  It’s rampant in the world.  And why, people ask, is Christianity any different?  Look at the church.  We have scandals, corruption, and everybody asking for money.  Let the devil keep feeding all this stuff to the media, and voila, the world sees  just another multibillion dollar business waiting for some poor broken victims to fall into the trap, get brainwashed, and lose all their money without ever realizing it.

Unfortunately for the devil, some have discovered that God is, in fact, real.  And actually, the truth that Jesus offers is better than anything this world has to offer.  The thing is, in order to show this to people, we have to get past the initial walls people may have. These walls are the result of hurt caused by the devil’s counterfeits of a foundation of the gospel – the idea of someone giving for the sake of another, no strings attached.

But we already have a good start.  I mean, everyone knows deep down there’s more to life than what we see.  People are hungry for truth, even though they’ll throw up anything you try to shove down their throat. The key is to live in such a way that people see your good deeds and actually see God in them (Matthew 5:16).  I mean, Jesus told very few people He was the Messiah, yet he had thousands of people following him!  Why?  Because they saw something real in him.  They saw  miracles and healings – but not because Jesus wanted money or fame.  He did it out of compassion.  That better be true of us. Don’t be discouraged if it takes time to build enough trust with people to let them see that you’re not crazy – that you actually do want to help them live life to the full just cuz you love God and everyone He made.

Let’s keep it simple, and make sure no strings are attached to the Gospel.  Paul was so passionate about this that he worked as a tentmaker while sharing about Jesus so that the Good News would be clearly presented as being free of charge.  No strings attached.  People don’t have to come to your church.  Keep it to the point – God is good, He loves you, he wants you to know Him, and that’s all I want for you too.  This is all I have given my life for.  I don’t want your money or even your praise, because I’ve already got the source of life.  I just want you to live free and eternally happy.

My prayer for you, dear reader, is that your life – a life well-lived – will magnify the fine print for the world, so they finally can read what it actually says – “side effects may include frequent fits of joy, heavenly encounters, increased appetite for the Kingdom come, and the world getting back to where it came from.”  Live it real.