The Rose

I believe today's Christianity is a field of weeds surrounding a rose, where the weeds are traditions of men.

History and logic demand that caution be taken in accepting human interpretation of anything. There are far too many variables involved, including ignorance, language/cultural barriers, tribal mentality, territoriality, selfish motives and social/political/intellectual inertia.

I accepted Christ as my Savior and was baptised in a little Baptist church in 1959. Later, I served as music director, Sunday School teacher, bus driver, etc. Still later, I was married in a little Independent Fundamental Bible-Believing Baptist church. I was very active in church for many years -- but, I was always something of a fish out of water.

In college my undergraduate studies were in biology (zoology). However, in church I was careful not to mention the E-word, because humans "are not animals" and they did not "evolve from monkeys". In addition, tree-huggers threaten the Capitalistic system with which God built America.

For some silly reason, I was also a firm believer in the big helping the little and the rich helping the poor. But I learned to keep my mouth shut about that, too. Such socialistic blathering is not very popular in Republican-dominated churches. Besides -- Peter, Paul and Mary were Commies.

Theologically, I could never quite understand the logic of the churches' exclusionary tenets. They outlawed from Heaven, not only my own Native American ancestors, but almost every human who ever was or would be.

So, I went on a quest. I visited other Christian denominations and a few so-called "sects" -- and studied their tenets in depth. While they didn't all have the same weeds, they all had weeds of some kind. Truth is, I really did not know at the time that I was searching for the rose. I only saw the weeds.

So, I eventually dropped out completely and started my own church, where the altar was a stump and the congregation was made up of two faithful members -- me and my old hound dog Jake. It took a while for my brain to de-program before I could understood some things more clearly -- like the real meaning of love. It was there where God finally allowed me to understand what the rose was and where it could be found.

I still have membership in a church. I even attend once in a while (such as when one of my grandkids are involved in something). I'm even able quite often to get a glimpse of the rose among the weeds.

Some have asked me why I don't use a weedeater if I don't like the weeds, instead of "copping out". Truth is, I've worn out many weedeaters and I finally realized I was causing more harm than good -- and that's not love. God loves the people in Christian churches, and they are only guilty of following their consciences according to how they were conditioned.

You see, one of the things God shared with me at that stump was that He allowed people to keep their weeds (traditions of men) as long as they nourished the rose.

What is the rose? It is the unselfish, sacrificial love that is in our hearts -- for our Heavenly Father and our earthly brothers and sisters.