Christianity in 280 Characters, or less
How a simple question showed the depths of my shallowness
I was raised in a self-proclaimed “Soul Winning Church,” which meant that our mission was clear: Rescue people from the flames of hell before it was too late.
What wasn’t so clear was how to do that.
And oddly, the Bible wasn’t helpful …like, at all.
The Bible never gives a “4 Step Guide to Salvation” anywhere. And for all of the prayers it contains, none of them come remotely close to a “Sinner’s Prayer.”
Those facts should have been a 🚩, a clue that we had missed the mark, but we were so convinced of our mission that we never stopped knocking on doors long enough to think that we might be causing more harm than good once those doors were opened to us.
Rather than build relationships with people, we learned a set of rules for engagement to convince them to buy our product: Jesus.
This was spiritual warfare, and we knew that this required various strategies to employ our battlefield… people’s porches.
We were trained in a plethora of tactics, er… tools, I mean, to get a person across the Finish Line of faith as efficiently as possible:
The Roman’s Road — a random I’ll-never-remember-these collection of verses from the Book of Romans intent on convincing them of their sins and the need for antidote.
The Morbid Question — “If you were to die tonight, where would you spend eternity?” This one was effective; fear is a powerful motivator.
The Guilt Trip — “If you were to show up at the Pearly Gates tonight and Saint Peter were to ask, ‘Why should I let you in?’, what would you answer?” And then the clutch followup: “Are you sure it’s gonna be good enough?”
The Wordless Book — a book with colored (but otherwise blank) pages that told the story of salvation. Black was sin. Red was Jesus’ blood. White was our clean soul. You get the picture.
Etc.
Our job was simple as Christians: Get them to pray a prayer of repentance, assure them of forgiveness, shake their hand, and move on.
Ugh.
It was exhausting.
Physically exhausting. Emotionally exhausting. Spiritually exhausting.
And it was guilt-inducing.
I was NEVER good at it. Something about it always felt a little too Amway (MLM/Pyramid Scheme, for the young folks). I was always making mistakes and errors in what I was supposed to do and say in these moments.
But I had a second deeper problem that I couldn’t shake free of, no matter how hard I tried.
I was always putting myself in the shoes of the person answering the door, “the sinner.” That was a no-go, but I couldn’t help but feel what I imagined they were feeling in the moment of ambush… and it messed with my head.
I’ve since learned that feeling is empathy.
Empathy is something I’d soon learn is not a quality most Christians tend to embrace or encourage. Stepping out of one’s shoes and into another’s requires a great deal of self-control… even self-suppression.
Hard as it may be, I’ve tried to cultivate empathy in my faith over the years. It’s a journey, and I still often fail.
But I was about to need every once of it in order to respond to this tweet:
Bam! All of those tenuous topics I had buried in my past—Soul winning, salvation, empathy, and error—had been resurrected and were suddenly now circling my soul again.
I realized that, sadly, for much of my life I could not have answered Douglas’ question in good faith.
My deep indoctrination had created a strong desire to destroy the defenses of others and insert my convictions in place of theirs.
This was the chance to prove to myself that I could respect others’ journey, even when it diverged from my own.
But to answer in good faith, I realized I needed some ground rules:
280 Characters, or less. A single tweet, nothing more.
Respect boundaries. No conversion passages, or anything smacking of trying to convert. On the surface, this sounds difficult, and it would have been for the “Soul-Winning Kevin” years, but my faith was now deeper and more complex. More mature, in a way. I understood that Christianity was about more than a “fire escape.” At least, mine was.
Avoid Hebrew Scriptures, if possible. I know that Christianity and Judaism are inexorably entangled, but he asked specifically about the Christian faith, not it’s Jewish roots. This was difficult, because I love the Wisdom Literature (Psalms, Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, Job, etc.) and the Christian faith is wrapped up in many of those texts. It also meant that I had to give up the one verse that I think best encapsulates the mission of the Christian in the world: Micah 6:8 (“What does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”). Ouch. How could I leave so much good on the Cutting Room floor?
Longer passages > Shorter texts. Christians often get in the bad habit of pulling a verse or two out of context and then copying-and-pasting it to prove a point that the passage it comes from isn’t really making at all. I wanted to avoid doing that by offering longer passages of complete thoughts, but nothing book length.
Focus on Jesus, alone. Cutting out the Pauline texts was less difficult than I imagined, but it was also going to open my response up to greater scrutiny from my peers. Paul is the go-to guy for a lot of inner-faith arguing. Cutting out Paul would be a shot across the bow of every Soul-Winner, Apologist, Pastor, and Theobro. But I rationalized my decision by saying “Kevin, Paul is a lens through which we better see and understand the Christian faith, but he is not the Christian faith.” And much wailing and gen ashing of teeth were heard over me saying that! It isn’t that Paul is unimportant, far from it of course, but I had far too many texts from Jesus to fit within the 280 character limit to justify a jump to Pauline commentary on Jesus. Just stick with Jesus. He is the author and finisher of the faith, right? (Heb. 12:2).
So with boundaries firmly set and a lot of stress, I timidly typed out my response:
Was that what you were expecting? If not, here was my thinking:
Matthew 5-7 (Sermon on the Mount). The Beatitudes were the first thing that I knew needed to be included. They were never in question. They are the rudder that should guide the rest of Christianity. As I kept reading after the Beatitudes, though, I realized that should include the entire sermon that contains them. The Sermon on the Mount includes snippets of Jesus’ most important teachings on Love of Neighbor, judging others, the Kingdom of God, the oppressed, etc. It even includes the Lord’s Prayer. So this was the most important passage of all to include, if one wants to understand Christians.
Luke 10:25-37 (The Good Samaritan). This passage was also a non-negotiable. From the earliest days of Jesus’ ministry, this story/parable sets the tone for Jesus’ advocacy of the oppressed and expresses his concern with religion devoid of humanity. More than just a moral story, though, the Good Samaritan is a radical expression of the upside-down Kingdom of God, one which both his original hearers and we ourselves continue to having difficulty grasping.
Luke 15 (Parables of 3 Lost Things). These stories deal with those who are far from God and how God responds to the situation. The stories of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son(s) show that God is patient, passionate, and persevering. Rather than repentance being about our actions, these stories tell of God’s reaction: Love, forgiveness, joy, and celebration. In particular, the story of the Prodigal Son may be the most important story ever told… especially when one realizes it was the Older Brother who was the prodigal.
Mark 15 (Jesus’ Crucifixion). Jesus’ journey to and through the cross is critical to understanding Christianity. I selected Mark’s telling because it is the oldest account, the shortest telling of the events, and my favorite gospel. While the cross was not central to the early church’s theology, it is now, due in large part to the suffering that Christians underwent during Late Antiquity. They came to see the cross and Jesus’ suffering as a model for how to endure their own.
Luke 24 (Jesus tells his story). The Road to Emmaus is one of the most under-valued stories in the New Testament. Here, Jesus tells his story through the lens of the Hebrew Texts. For me, the inclusion of this passage is a way to honor and include Christianity’s Jewish roots, as seen through Jesus’ eyes. Expanding to the entire chapter allowed me to include the Resurrection (the catalyst for the Road to Emmaus), a meal/communion with Cleopas and another follower (Jesus’ aunt Mary?), and the disciples’ reactions to the resurrection. But at the end of the day and as important the resurrection, the true magic in this passage is Emmaus and the meal.
Acts 2 (Start/Mission of the Church). I broke the “only Jesus” rule for this final text because I wanted to show how Early Christianity differed from much of what passes as Christianity today. For that reason, Acts 2:42-72 was the go-to text. It shows a radical Early Church that looks dramatically different from today. Expanding to the entire chapter, though, allows one to see how Peter interprets his Jewish roots and what he felt was the good news (gospel) of Christianity offered in Christ.
Done.
I looked at this list of 6 passages, and I felt a pit deep in my stomach. Had I missed the mark? Maybe. But also, I didn’t want to overthink it either. So I hit send and then texted a friend to see if I had completely blown it.
😬 I hadn’t included any Paul.
😬 Jesus’ most important moments were spent over meals. I’d included only one, kind of.
😬 There were so many passages where Jesus spoke about and commanded love, I’d them mostly out.
😬 What about all of the miracles?
In the end, though, I felt like this list hit all of the right notes… if not all of the right passages.
But I noticed something else that kind of bothered me about the texts that I’d landed on.
While I had tried to avoid passages that focused on conversion, I kind of failed. Several of my chosen texts still featured forgiveness, and redemption was woven all throughout these most saccharin of sacred texts.
My heart skipped a beat, thinking I had broken my promise to avoid conversion.
But then it hit me.
I hadn’t failed; I had proven that we misunderstand conversion.
Perhaps, salvation comes not through the contrived repackaging of texts never intended for soul-winning, but instead:
Perhaps salvation simply comes through making a journey with Jesus along The Way of the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the Via Dolorosa, and the dirt road to Emmaus.
Perhaps salvation is a journey, not a destination.
I taught adult SS for years at a prominent SBC church in Nashville. They had a particular evangelist that would preach at the church every year and his sure-fire trick to fill the alter was to ask if everyone if they could remember the date and time of their conversion. That led to some "lively" discussions the following week in Sunday School. So I raised the following question: Can you tell me from your reading of scripture when and where the apostle Paul was converted? All hands went up as everyone knew of the Damascus Road experience. Then I asked when Peter was converted and there were plenty of plausible answers, but no one could really say. When he was called to discipleship? When he saw the empty tomb? When did Thomas become a convert? No one can say for sure. I'm certain that salvation is instantaneous for some but for me I will "work out my own salvation with fear and trembling" - which is the way I would describe any dangerous journey.
I’m just taking my first few steps in my deconstruction/reconstruction journey. Finding your Twitter and this blog is helping me immensely. I’m a trans/non-binary person, so I have a lot of guilt and trauma associated with my identity as a Christian. Thank you for sharing this.