Often, I hear complaints about what is going on in the world today and in churches. People have become disillusioned with society and even with church. They are mad at their government, upset with society with its wicked pop-culture, critical of churches, and always blame someone else for whatever woes have come there way. We blame politicians for their corruption, the government for deceiving us, the schools for brainwashing the children, the church for not being exciting enough or having enough ministries and the pastor for not being deep enough/hard enough/soft enough/or inspiring enough or whatever criticism we have. Then everyone seems to have a “disease,” a trauma, or a disability, giving themselves an excuse for what they do or why they allow sin in their own life. As bad as all these things are, they are going to continue. The world will still be wicked and hate God as the Bible says. When the world speaks well of the church – woe to that church or preacher (Luke 6:26).
We live in a generation that loves to interpret the Bible in a way that fits their lifestyle. I have heard this a lot lately and even this week as I was talking to someone about the Lord when I was out running an errand. They said: “I just think God has such a sense of humor and that Jesus is displaying his sense of humor throughout the Gospels.” The notion being that Christ was a light hearted jovial Savior and wanted everyone to have a good time. We often don't have a clear picture of who Christ was because we often only see what we want to see. Even at Christmas time, we tend to place an overly glorious emphasis on it. Certainly the angels proclaimed "Glory to God in the Highest," the shepherds came and worshipped that first night, and later - the wise men came from afar. Other that those three instances the circumstances around the birth of Christ were at best mundane, often straining, and even terrifying. Imagine, living in a day where you had to travel ridi