The Disturbing Nature of Christianity

By Lance E. Clippinger

The Disturbing Nature of Christianity challenges the reader to look at the central truths of Christianity with unflinching honesty.

Excerpts from The Disturbing Nature of Christianity:

The message of the Bible is clear. The great majority of humanity (including that humanity we personally know) will be offended and reject the salvation offered by God the Father through His Son. Do you find that truth disturbing? If so you are experiencing a natural consequence of taking Jesus teaching seriously.

Jesus told us that if you are a Christian you are in a tiny minority. And as we have seen in our study the true Christian is in a minority even in conservative evangelical churches.

In his classic book The Cost of Discipleship, the world-renowned theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer explains Christs teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. The following is teaching I never heard from any pulpit or any Bible teacher in my 35 years as a Christian.

(Concerning Matthew 7:13-14)
A little band of men, the followers of Christ, are separated from the rest of the world. The disciples are few in number, and will always be few. The saying of Jesus forestalls all exaggerated hopes of success. Never let a disciple of Jesus pin his hopes on large numbers. The only comfort the disciples have in face of this prospect is the promise of life and eternal fellowship with Jesus. (p. 211)

(Concerning Matthew 10)
The Messengers of Jesus will be hated to the end of time. They will be blamed for all the divisions, which rend cities and homes. Jesus and his disciples will be condemned on all sides for undermining family life, and for leading the nation astray, they will be called crazy fanatics and disturbers of the peace (p. 239)

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 20, 2016
• ISBN: 9781532004186

Lance E. Clippinger

Lance Clippinger is the author of The Offer: Examining the Role of the Nation of Israel in the First and Second Comings of Jesus Christ. He received his Masters of Divinity from Talbot School of Theology. He has pastored two churches for a total of 13 years. He currently resides with his wife in Mason, Ohio.

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Copyright © 2016 Lance E. Clippinger.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

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Piola, Domenico. Stoning of St Stephen. The State Heritage Museum, St. Petersburg.

Photograph © The State Heritage Museum /photo by Vladimir Terebenin

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ISBN: 978-1-5320-0417-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5320-0418-6 (e)

iUniverse rev. date: 10/10/2016

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1 Why It Took So Long

Chapter 2 Non-believers Love to Evangelize, Pray, Give Sacrificially

Chapter 3 The Christian and Truth

Chapter 4 Was Martin Luther a Christian? (How dare you ask)

Chapter 5 Pastors Who Deceive

Chapter 6 The Extreme Calvinists

Chapter 7 The Remnant & The Days of Noah

Chapter 8 The Matrix (Yes, the movie)

Chapter 9 So Many Christian Organizations - So Few Christians

Chapter 10 Only Two Kinds of People

Prologue

Imagine if a deity, who was perfect, holy, and infinite, revealed himself to a world of sick, twisted creatures, capable of the most perverse and horrific evil. These beings not only live in moral corruption, they are in active, willful rebellion against this perfect and righteous deity. How would these creatures respond as they heard the words of this supreme being? One would predict that these creatures would be shaken to the very core of their existence. It would be the most disturbing event they could imagine. They would be so repulsed they would cover their ears and try to kill this deity… if they could.

And all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things; and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff. (Luke 4:28-29)

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the quick, and they began gnashing their teeth at him… But they cried out with a loud voice, and covered their ears and rushed at him with one impulse. When they had driven him out of the city, they began stoning him; (Acts 7:54, 57-58)

The owner of the vineyard said, ‘What shall I do? I will send my beloved son; perhaps they will respect him.’ But when the vine-growers saw him, they reasoned with one another, saying, ‘This is the heir; let us kill him so that the inheritance will be ours.’ "So they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. (Luke 20:13-15)

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CHAPTER 1

Why It Took So Long

Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it. (Matt. 7:13-14)

If these words are in fact true (I am certain they are) they are the most disturbing words ever spoken in the history of the world. What is also disturbing is that these words didn’t trouble me deeply for much of my Christian life. It has only been in the last five or six years that I began to feel the full impact of Christ’s teaching. I must stress though, if the above words of Christ do not trouble you in the least, you need to face the trilemma. Either you are so brain damaged that you are incapable of understanding Jesus’ words. Or you are so self-centered and uncaring that you have no concern or compassion for your fellow man. Or you do not believe the words of Christ to be true. If the first two options do not apply to you then the third does.

Christ came to bring us life and not just life but abundant life. Christ came to bring us joy, and not just any joy, "These things I have spoken to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full." So why write about the disturbing nature of Christianity, why not the joy of the Lord? Many books have been written about the joy of being a Christian, so there is little need for another one. I have never been helped by these books; if you have, this book may not be for you. If you let the New Testament speak for itself (most don’t) you will admit that Jesus’ definition of joy has nothing to do with the typical understanding. Jesus does refer to a joy that is experienced in the midst of suffering, often terrible physical and emotional suffering. In the New Testament we see Christians forced to watch loved ones suffer and even die for the cause of Christ. Clearly the joy Christ promised them was of a totally different nature.

The joy Christians experience in the present is intimately connected with the future. Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.(Heb. 12:2) Our joy looks forward to that blessed day when all tears will be wiped away. For the present the tears will still flow, the pain does not go away until Christ comes back. So I am writing to help us understand the pain we are in, to help us understand the cost of taking up our cross (remember the cross was an instrument of torture leading to death). We follow the one who was, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, and like one from whom men hide their face, He was despised, and we did not esteem Him (Isaiah 53:3).

Typically when a person becomes a believer in Jesus Christ they begin to evangelize family and friends with great passion and optimism. This is only natural because the new believer rightfully understands that the gospel is not merely good news, it is the most wonderful news. But it does not take long for Christians to realize that the message of the Bible is not well received by those closest to them. The passion for Christ remains but the optimism that everyone will surely embrace the message of Christianity fades or at least it should. The message of the Bible is clear. The great majority of humanity (including that humanity we personally know) will be offended and reject the salvation offered by God the Father through His Son. Do you find that truth disturbing? If so you are experiencing a natural consequence of taking Jesus’ teaching seriously. Christianity reveals to us the world as it really is. In fact we can only understand what reality is because of Christianity. Most people who profess Christ are not willing to embrace the truth of the real world, of reality. The question is, will we choose to stay in the truth of the real world or run to the world of make believe, the world of delusion? I hope and pray often that I choose to stay in the truth, if I do God will certainly get the glory. But if I don’t the fault will be only with me, such is the truth and mystery of Christianity.

There is a plethora of ways to avoid the painful truth of the Bible and there are legions of Christians and Christian organizations that will help you find them. When I was 16 years old I heard about Christ through my sister who had become involved with Campus Crusade for Christ. When I attended college I too became heavily involved with CCC. Campus Crusade leaders talked about sharing Christ with the world, and thus changing the world. Campus Crusade had very attractive and talented people in leadership and it had the power of a huge corporation (filled with the Spirit). Campus Crusade had people with passion, talent, and it had above all optimism. I went on staff with CCC and gladly took in all the optimism it could dish out. But as I shared the gospel with people I continued to experience very poor results. Most were not interested, some were hostile, and only a very few showed interest. Among this very few time would often show their interest in Christ to be superficial and most likely unreal. But the contagious optimism of Campus Crusade leaders made me believe that this experience was of my own making. The strong impression (albeit false) was that everyone else was seeing great success in evangelism. The sheer size of Campus Crusade (with 16,000 full time staff in 1983) and thousands of college students at hundreds of rallies helped maintain this impression. If I just hung in there I too would learn the skills and gain the spiritual insight to help change the world for Christ. Sure there were signs that this optimism was an illusion and at odds with the clear teaching of the Bible. But these signs could be easily ignored. Easily, because this