You think so?

One upon another, building blocks are stacked, first one, then another, and another, and so on. My brother has these legos, and whenever he starts a project, he begins with the foundation and builds to the top, to the climax, the finished product.

First block: questions such as, "How can you tell if someone is a Christian?" Answer: by their fruit.

Pretty simple, right? Wrong.

Second block: beneath the surface. I'll take an excerpt from "Growing Up Christian" by Karl Graustein -

"Robert was the kind of next-door neighbor every suburban family wants. Friends and neighbors described him as a patriot, quiet, and professional family man. His reputation in the community was exemplary. [....] He was also a man of character and conviction; for three years he'd served on the Chicago police force, weeding out crooked cops. After that, he'd gone on to work in government law enforcement, landing a job at the state department in Washington D.C. [....] Robert's deep religious convictions left an impression on his coworkers and neighbors. He was a devoted member of the Catholic church, as well as a conservative organization within the church called Opus Dei. At times he boldly extended his convictions into the workplace, challenging coworkers regarding what he believed were sinful behaviors. If you walked past his comfortable brick home on any given Sunday, you would see him loading his wife and six kids into their modest van. [....] Another (neighbor) said, 'The kids are great kids - well-educated, polite, nice kids. It's just a great family.'
"Then the bombshell dropped. On February 18, 2001, neighbors awoke to see crime-scene tap surrounding Robert's home. Curiosity gave way to shock and horror as the story unfolded. Instead of celebrating his retirement in five weeks, this quiet, reserved father of six would be facing trial for treason. Robert Hanssen was a spy for Russia."

To round things out, Robert Hanssen had, over twenty years, sold over 6,000 pages of classified documents to the Soviets (Russians), documents coming from the FBI, CIA, the White House, the Pentagon and the National Security Agency.

Someone, who outwardly exhibited "Christian" behavior - ministering to coworkers, attending mass, successfully doing his duty weeding out bad cops - someone like that... failed. The facade, the face he had put on for TWENTY years, and no one knew any differently. Though his fruit may have appeared good, inside, it was rotten.

Third block, motives: Why do we do good things? To be seen by others so they may think better of us? To make ourselves feel less guilty and more "acceptable" to God/man/whomever?

"These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." Matt 15:8

We've heard that before, those of us who've spent our childhoods going to Sunday school, been roused by parents to 'get up and be ready for church'. But how many times do words fall on deaf ears? How many of us don't even hear the words as we watch the pastor in the pulpit and think about what movie we want to see, or our crushes, or how it might be possible to fix a relationship, or how our backs hurt on the wooden pews? I declare myself guilty!

"Back home church services had all but anesthetized me; I had become wonderously adept at dialing my mind to "off" for every word that the minister said and all that went on in church serices, and to "on" for whatever was more interesting to ponder. Already my brush with raw life in the mountains had blown away much fog. Either this Christianity was true - or it was not." (Catherine Marshall's, Christy)

How many times I've been guilty of this, of pretending to listen, or pretending to care, or going along with "Christianese" - as Marko calls it - and never really take it to heart, or care to learn what it means. Guess I'm in need of a heart transplant.

The night I opened "Growing Up Christian", I didn't know what I was in for. I found the book lying in my dad's office, took a peek inside, and whisked it away to my bedroom where I could read in depth. Unlike most study questions, I actually fully answered these in my head, being completely honest, perhaps for the first time in my life.

Why do you pray?
Why do you read your Bible?
Why do you go to church?
Why do you do good works?
Why do you acknowledge sin in you life?
Do you talk about God with your friends?
Do you enjoy spending time with true Christians?
Do you desire to serve others?

Shamefully, I found myself lacking, short of anything I had expected or hoped for. I saw positives and negatives in the answers I gave to the questions, but the negatives stuck out like an ugly reminder that I couldn't ace this test. Before, when I thought of myself, I had thought, "Yeah, that was good of me," or "I haven't done _______ today! I must be improving." Hah. "For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out." -Romans 7:18

I tried to do things on my own, to be good, to do what was right, but I am now thoroughly assured that I'm worse than I ever had seen before. But it was at that moment, when I saw how I'd failed, when I broke down and cried out to God saying, "Lord, how do I know I'm saved? Am I saved? I want to please You, to make something good, but I can't. How do I know, Lord, how? Am I a Christian, or have I been pretending? Is it just because of the environment I'm in that I can't tell the difference between what is real and what's just what I've grown up with? Lord, please show me!"

With damp eyes and a crumbled spirit, I returned to the lesson. "I know church kids who feel guilty if they do not pray and read their Bibles every day or if they miss a youth meeting. They are the type of church kids who also tend to question their salvation even though they are true Christians. Scripture is clear that if this description fits you, you can have assurance of your salvation. If you are a genuine believer who trusts in Christ and can identify clear, godly fruit in your life, you should praise God and rest confidently in the great work he initiated in your heart."

There I sat, in the middle of a pile of clean laundry, leaning against the foot of my bed, my eyes spilling over with fresh tears of happiness. From hopelessness to gratefulness, from being disgustingly self-righteous, to being humbled. The comparison was striking, as I saw the damage my blind self-rightness had caused. How could I continue to treat people the way I did and claim that "I'm better" or "I don't associate with people like that." God doesn't make the separation, how can I? Jews and Gentiles. Churchy kids and drug addicts. Academically smart people and those who aren't.

Who gave you the right to decide who is worthy?

It is an ever-present danger when we are lulled into a false sense of security, believing we are saved when in actuality we aren't. What do you think it is? Are your parents believers, thus you must be too? Wrong. Do you do good things for people, hoping God will see that you are a good person? Wrong again. Do you know how long it took for me to get that? I'll tell you: I knew it my entire life... I just didn't try to understand and apply it until this year.

"It is a good thing to eat your breakfast, but it is not good of you to do it. The thing is good, not you." -The Princess and Curdie

The same applies to the walk we as Christians must take. We may give to charities, plant churches, go on missions trips, tithe, etc., all of which are good things, but if our hearts aren't in the right place, then it is all for nothing. Nothing. Our righteousness is as filthy rags to God. (Isaiah 64:6) He will have nothing to do with us trying to be perfect on our own, it's either through him, or not at all.

Something to leave you with, to ponder and to pray about with fervor, because we easily fall offsides and miss the goal...

"Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you - unless, of course, you fail the test?" -2 Cor. 13:5-6