One of my absolute least favorite parts of air travel is baggage. Baggage is the reason I have to be up at 4 to catch a 7:30 flight from an airport less than 30 minutes from home. Baggage is the reason I look and feel like an idiot at check-in when it’s a jacket overweight. Baggage is why I am late for lunch despite landing at 10. It’s baggage that gets crushed, lost or sent to the wrong airport. The baggage claim at the airport, especially a major hub, is an excellent place to witness human misery. But the baggage difficulties of travel are trivial compared to the baggage we walk around with in our lives.
The baggage I am thinking about today is that which comes when I use the word Christian to describe myself. You see, as soon as I say that I am a Christian people who don’t already know me make assumptions about me. Typically they are not the assumptions I wish people would make. Studies have shown that the public perception of Christians is that we are anti-science, homophobic, and exclusive. I can protest those assumptions and even provide evidence that I am none of those things, but the perception exists and one man’s protest isn’t going to change it.
To be fair, while those things may not be true of me, they are assumptions that, as a group, we’ve earned.
So the question arises, what can I do to distance myself from these perceptions? How can I let people know that I accept scientific evidence even though it contradicts a literal reading of Genesis. How can I let the LGBT community know that I love them, want to see them treated with respect and dignity and afforded unconditional legal equality? How can I make it clear to people of other faiths that I respect their views, believe that their understanding is valuable, and even hope to grow by learning more from their wisdom? I won’t lie to you, the thought that the simplest way to do that would be to ditch the label associated with those negative perceptions has tempted me more times than I care to count.
If I just stopped calling myself a Christian I wouldn’t have to carry the baggage.
But that doesn’t sit well with me. Because while everyone at the baggage claim may say that I have an ugly bag, what’s inside it is incredibly valuable to me. Just like I can’t take a trip without the things I’ve packed inside my suitcase – I can’t make the journey that is my life without my faith. You see, my relationship with Jesus means more to me than what the baggage of Christianity looks like at carousel 4. And what about all those ugly assumptions? The truth is that there is nothing I can do about what people assume when all they see is the bag – but I can make certain that those who see what is inside begin to see its value. That’s not to say that there isn’t work to be done within the Christian faith. We need to repent of the negative things we have done and start to make new impressions – but that’s not going to happen overnight.
In the meantime we still need our bags if we’re going on a journey.
So here I am, bags in hand. On the outside a casual observer can make a myriad of assumptions. But what have I packed? To me Christianity is about Jesus. Inside my bag is a heart for all God’s children, a compassion for the disadvantaged, a love for the outcast and a passion for the oppressed. Inside my bag is a desire to feed the hungry, heal the sick and visit the lonely. In my bag are words of forgiveness and mercy for sinners and words of pointed chastisement for oppressors. Inside my bag is a burden to go out into the world and live a life that reveals the character of an all-loving and ever-merciful God. Nowhere in my bag will you find a demand to ignore or twist the evidence in the world around us to read a text in only one way. Nowhere in my bag will you find a hatred for another human being. Nowhere in my bag will you find a notion that my bag is the only way to pack for a journey.
My hope is that when I meet someone who is put off by my baggage I will still have the opportunity to open it up and share what’s inside. It’ll take time to unpack everything and share that what’s inside is not as ugly as the bag. But I sincerely hope to have that time. I also do hope to one day be able to have the Christian faith seen from the outside the way I see it. But I understand that change will take even longer than the first. Despite this, it’s still my bag and I still need it for my journey.
My baggage may be ugly, but what’s inside is worth it. So I will claim it and head for the next leg of my journey – I hope you’re willing to join me.
Kingdom Dialogues 