Sigh.
I understand people being disgusted with Christians. Heck, there are lots of times I'm embarrassed, frustrated, disgusted, even angered with my fellow Christians. We're definitely going to answer for a lot of shit, and a lot of us who expect a thumbs up from the One on the judgment seat are going to be disappointed.
And yes, I know about the Council of Nicea. Though to be precise, it wasn't at Nicea that the Bible was written. The books, even those of the New Testament, were in existence long before 325. What Nicea did was choose the "canon."
One can I suppose dispute whether they chose the correct things to include or not. Given that any human-transcribed book is, in the end, a
human-transcribed book, and humans get things wrong. Its what we are. So maybe this book or that book isn't as canonical as the Nicean powers-that-be thought, and this book or the other should be included a la
The Da Vinci Code.
It seems to me, however, that all those questions of how human beings have reduced the Word into words are at best second-order questions, and perhaps even beside the point.
The important point is not what Christians do or don't do. It isn't about whether they were good or not, and it isn't about whether some Nicean prelate or me or Richard the LionHearted or Pope Whoever were hypocrites or evil or delusional or whatever.
The important point is what one believes about God.
Does one believe that God is able, if he wishes, to inspire a human amanuensis to put the Words in particular words or not?
To move a group of self-interested, political, self-serving, factionalized, even corrupt eusis d they were inspired by God a question that is more important is whether one is willing to believe that God interested in inspiring someone to write his Word in the way he wishes? To, centuries later, move others, just as self-interested, political, etc., to translate that Word into the words of other languages?
If one says, "No, I can't believe God would or could do such a thing?" well, then you can go and say The Bible is just another book. Maybe a historical book, or a set of novels, or whatever, put together in 105 or 325 or 1560 or 2005 or whatever by plagiarizing or adapting this or that pagan, and I don't really know what to say save to say I pray you will change your mind before you die.
It comes down, as it always must, not to "religion", but to one's willingness to take God on faith. If you can't take God on faith, if you insist on letting the misbehavior of other flawed human beings (those you or they call "Christians") determine what you believe about Him, if you insist on making Him into the reflection of ANY human being other than Himself incarnate in Jesus, "bad"
OR"good", be it Paul or Mark or Pagan X or Constantine or Athanasius or Billy Graham or Oral Roberts or Mother Theresa, then ... well, then, I don't know what to say save that I will pray that God is okay with that for you.
I'm not going to justify God by claiming that Christians are good. I'm not going to justify God by claiming that Christians are somehow superior beings to non-Christians. And I'm not going to try to justify Christians at all. God doesn't need my help, and I don't have the power to justify any human being other than myself. And the only power I have in justifying myself is my willingness to believe that Jesus is *my* Savior and to trust that He will guide me how to interpret both the Incarnate Word which is Himself and the written word called "The Bible" which he inspired Paul, et al to write, Constantine, et al, to canonize, and thousands upon thousands of others who helped translate and maintain and attempted to interpret those words over the better part of two millennia.
It
is a step of faith to accept that this young guy from Nazareth was the Messiah. And I am saddened, Troy, if those long dark nights of the soul at the Mayo Clinic led you to reject Him because you find wanting those of us who label ourselves as His. Finding us wanting -- I understand that fully. We are. We have done nothing worthy of special emulation. We Christians have done as much evil -- or more -- as the next guy. Call us damnable sinners, and you have it correct. Call us worthy of damnation, and you have it correct again? Call us hypocrites and bigots and unworthy of imitation, we're all of those things. Call us whatever names you want? Its a fair bet that we deserve even worse.
But what we "Christians" are or do is irrelevant to the question of whether you believe in Him or not.
Or it should be. Because salvation doesn't depend on who among us you think is worthy, it doesn't depend on our worthiness at all. It depends only on trusting and loving Him.
Everyone knows how I love to quote and paraphrase the Great Commandment. But the flip side is that that Great Commandment also shows His greatest gift to us: He knows -- based on His experiences with everyone from Adam to Saul-become-Paul -- that we aren't going to be able to avoid breaking that Commandment. Yet He still saves us as long as we focus ourselves on him and strive to follow His example.
Go ahead. Shit on Christians all you want. But please, reconsider, the state of your belief about Jesus.
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)