Salad Bars, Smorgasbords, and Potlucks

Do you like salad bars? Smorgasbords? How about a good old-fashioned potluck? As a preacher I can do potlucks blindfolded, salad bars don’t get me too excited, and I don’t remember the last time I was at a smorgasbord, although I loved them when I was younger. You know the drill, get a plate, survey the offerings, and fill your plate with everything you love while bypassing the things you don’t like.Growing up my oldest brother loved it when my Mama asked him to dish everybody up. He knew exactly what each one of us didn’t like, so, accompanied with a stupid grin, he would heap our plates with the stuff we didn’t like while quoting the rule, “Was auf dah Tisch kommt wird gessa!” (What’s put on the table will be eaten).How do you approach God? Jesus Christ? Church? The Bible, God’s word? Are all three of them something you loved when you were younger but now you have developed a more discerning palate, a more selective taste when it comes to spiritual things? Do you get out your plate and fill it with all that you love while bypassing what’s not to your liking? Have you shifted to a different cuisine altogether?How do like God? Cuddly and warm? Spicy or just a tiny hint? Loving or just? As the main dish, or side dish, as a dip, or as “but hold the …?”Jesus Christ, do you consider him as a “got to have it,” or “I have to be in the mood,” or “yuck”?What about church? Only if you have to, when it gets scooped onto your plate whether you like or not, but preferably not? Are you the food critic every time you show up?“Oh the Bible, please only the sweet things in it?” “No, just the low calorie stuff, I hate that bloated feeling, some things take forever to digest.” “I have several food allergies, so I have to be very careful what I eat.”The truth is the living God cannot be dished out in portions to our liking, religion can be but God and Jesus Christ cannot. The truth is that my Mama was more like God than my oldest brother (sorry Michael). He delighted in making our lives miserable (he’s changed), she delighted in keeping us alive, in us being well fed, and seeing us grow. She didn’t just give us what we liked (although she often did), she gave us what we needed. “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” Matthew 4:4 (ESV, emphasis mine). The truth is when you treat God, Jesus Christ, the church, and the Bible like a salad bar, smorgasbord, or potluck you end up with eclectic and empty spirituality, or with a flabby Christianity with plates full of what we like, yet far from what God and Christ would have us to be; or you become a mere critic of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ, and of his church, and of his word.Allow me to put something on your plate from the Bible, something not all that tasty, but something we need as we try to cope with barbarism, terrorism, evil, enemies, and hate, "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” Matthew 5:43-45 (NIV). “Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when he stumbles, do not let your heart rejoice” Proverbs 24:17 (NIV). “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” Romans 12:21 (NIV).To God be all glory, love you, Pastor Hans