Faith at center of life will attract more people

We have many edges in our lives these days. There may be even more edges than the proverbial “good old days” – whenever they might be for you.

We hear about leading-edge technology. I use Edge shave cream.

Extreme athletes talk of living on “the edge.” Many people regularly live to the edge of their monthly income.

Now, as reported on this page in a recent Associated Press story, there is a store in Kansas called Extreme Christian Clothing where you can purchase cutting-edge commercial Christianity.

A chain of stores in Southern California called C28 also sells extreme Christian clothing. Owner Abe Hernandez says: “Kids want to be bold about who Jesus is in their life, and that is why we are here. Edgy sells well.”

So it would appear that life on the edge is not only a happening place to be, but it’s good economic business. There is an ever-growing market for Jesus-related clothing, accessories, books and trinkets.

This trend is grist for what could be a healthy discussion and/or debate about what merchandising is healthy and which marketing cheapens “the faith.”

I think this could be a significant conversation, folks. It might actually get us away from the edge and closer to the center of our faith witness.

Sometimes our witness is more caricature than truth.

So I begin with a simple question: If you want to live on the edge, have you first really found your center?

Take these T-shirt slogans, for example: “Got Jesus?,” “Fear God,” “Satan Sucks,” “To Hell with the Devil” and my personal least favorite, “My God can kick your god’s butt.”

Yes, they are a bit clever. But I have to ask: If these slogans are leading-edge Christian witness, where is their center? To what do they really witness?

A college professor, Craig Detweiler, was asked about these slogans by the Associated Press. He was concerned they might be highly offensive to those outside the circle of faithful Christians. (Actually, I consider myself inside that circle, and I’m frankly offended by many of these and other so-called Christian slogans.)

Detweiler’s response was clever, but more to my point about “center”: “Did Jesus build bridges or burn them? Did Jesus ever say they shall know us by our T-shirts?”

That tongue-in-cheek question refers to Matthew 7:16, where Jesus is quoted as saying: “You will know them by their fruits.” It is a small part of Matt. 15-20, in which he warns the people to “beware of false prophets.”

We likely will find more false prophets on the edge of Christianity than at its center.

I am sure than many people who design, manufacture and sell Christian merchandise today are very well-meaning people who believe in what they are selling.

I also happen to think so much of that merchandise suggests a shallow – if fervent and enthusiastic – understanding of the Christian faith.

But I do respect those who market it enough to ask them to ask themselves: Is what I sell at the true center of my faith, or maybe does it represent only the edge of that faith?

I take these entrepreneurs seriously as people. But I wonder if they really have compared the cleverness of their messages with the deeper center of their own spiritual journeys.

Do they truly think their merchandise moves others to more fully understand how God lives and acts in their lives?

I read a Wall Street Journal article about Hernandez, the man who founded the C28 stores in 2001. It is an honest attempt by him to put into a successful business the passion of his religious conversion of some years ago.

While I disagree with some of his merchandise and the hip image he tries to create in his stores, I’m intrigued by the religious passion that motivated him to name them C28. It is actually a biblical reference, to Colossians 1:28.

This was a letter the apostle Paul wrote to the church in Colossae of ancient Greece: “It is he whom we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.”

Paul speaks of wisdom and maturity in this passage. So my initial question is modified somewhat: Is Christian wisdom and maturity found on the cutting edge of life, where too often people seem so centered on themselves? Or is it found more often in the center?

I’m convinced it is in this center that Jesus teaches us to reach out to others in compassion. It is in the center where our courage of conviction will draw people toward God rather than exclude them because they don’t pray, vote, believe or live exactly as we do.

I know where the edges of life are. Been there, done that.

My journey takes me farther away from the edges to find ways to live more in that center.

Care to join me?

There’s so much more room for us to live together in the center than on the edges.