Have you traded your Passion for Glory?

When we first started to follow Christ, we were so passionate about God and just worshipping Him and telling others about Jesus, it was as if that’s all there was. And then after a few years we get bogged down with the things and details of “church stuff” that we begin get our priorities mixed up. Our faith used to be an adventure, but now it is more like a weekend country club.

For many of us as Christian parents, we inadvertently give the impression that Christianity is about what we do and don’t do. We say it’s about a relationship with God, but we live a life that exhibits the fact that our Christianity is bound up in two things: rules and busyness. We don’t do certain unbecoming things (at least not openly) and we busy ourselves in the multitude of programs, Bible studies, seminars, so-called “ministry opportunities”, and church events that keep us safely ensconced behind the fortress walls of our church buildings or within our tight circle of Christian friends. We surround ourselves with all the accoutrements of middleclass suburban evangelicalism and we don’t realize that we have traded our passion for glory, we have left the adventure for the country club.

Our children see the protected shell that we call Christianity and it’s no wonder they want out. God has placed within us a longing for adventure. Our kids have that longing and the irony of the situation is: if we were truly living out our faith as the passionate adventure that it was intended to be, they would actually be drawn to it, rather than repelled by it.

Is your faith a passionate adventure or a safe hideaway?