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First of all, I know I am overdue for a belly picture. At a week shy of 7 months, my belly is present in a room before I am, and I know you all want to see my impression of a watermellon (don't you?) so I will get a picture up tomorrow. Would have been today, but the picture the Husband took of me last night in my nightie made me shriek and delete it instantly. (I'm not REALLY nine feet wide.)

And now, onto the blog post. I've been thinking about writing this post for a while, but was at a loss how to do it without sounding... snotty. So I thought I would begin with an illustration, so at least I won't feel like I'm being snotty alone. The incident I shall describe is a conglomeration of things that have actually happened to me, albeit fictionalized slightly to protect the well-intentioned.

Imagine, if you will, that you are in a group of people, mostly Christians, who are touring a natural history museum of some sort. There is a young tour guide employee of the museum who is reading off prepared cards, and it is clearly this guide's third day because he forgets where the bathrooms are and runs into the vending machine while trying to guide you to the Siberian tiger exhibit. In the course of your tour, you eventually end up in a presentation room where the guide must continue reading off his cards during a slide presentation. The cards are sprinkled with phrases like "adaptations" and "hundreds of millions of years ago" and "Darwin discovered". Halfway through the presentation, the guide asks if there are any questions.

A Member of your Group (who I shall describe in a moment) raises his or her hand and says something along the lines of: "Well, we think God created the world. We don't think it took hundreds of millions of years."

In the awkward silence following, while the guide turns magenta, do you think:

1) "I'm so glad he/she said something, the hundreds of millions of years was really bugging me."
2) "What a wonderful witness for Christianity."
3) *Cringe* "That poor tour guide kid."

I admit I thought #3. Especially since the kid had to go back to reading his cards for the rest of the presentation, and every time they said "hundreds of millions of years" he stuttered and turned beet red again, while a Member of the Group sat with folded arms, the words "tsk tsk" written all over his/her face. If you suggest later it might not have been appropriate, they will say "Are you ashamed of the Gospel?"

No, I'm ashamed of you.

These are the folks who speak up in your university class with the professor who is a notorious atheist, because...well, he says things that might be construed as hostile to religion! (Gasp!) Not that they say anything sensical, they just contradict the professor, who proceeds to politely destroy everything they said. These are the folks who have convictions about wearing t-shirts with logos or animated characters on them, because The Simpsons contains some "worldly themes." These are the folks who send you earnest email forwards about abortion and what happens during a late-term abortion and asking you to sign an email petition. (Because everyone knows email petitions work wonders on Capitol Hill.) You can't SAY anything to them, because they're so sincere, but they're terrible advertising for Christianity.

I don't say this just because they're dorks, although they are; they generally have convictions about which hairstyles are worldly or not and sometimes feel that one shouldn't watch sports because of the advertising, which means they're really difficult to engage in a conversation that isn't about the Left Behind series. Mainly they're terrible advertising because they give Christians a name for being harmless, not very coherent, eccentrics.

Now in one sense we're supposed to be severely weird to the world around us-- Christ warned that we'd be persecuted and frequently murdered for the faith-- but we're supposed to be weird by doing things like loving our enemies, staying faithful to our spouses, and giving our money away. Our belief system is supposed to be so disturbing the the world precisely because it is logical, coherent, and reasonable to accept. I'd like to suggest that it's not really loving unbelievers when we allow them to hold the notion that Christianity is a funny thing that eccentrics get passionate about, like glider-building or composting sewage.

So since no one can say it to their face, I'm going to talk to the Member of the Group via cyberspace and also to myself, when I'm guilty of this: just stop for a minute before you say anything, and check and see if the Holy Spirit is really telling you to talk. If you're talking mainly because you feel insulted or offended about something, that's probably not a good enough reason. If you don't have a cogent argument in mind but just "feel that you should say something" that's probably not good enough either. If you can't express love to the people you're talking to ("well I just think you're wrong"), then don't say anything. Stop and think a minute. God can convict them without you. Don't get extrabibilical convictions mixed up in things that the Bible is clear on. If you are going to say something about Creation, or abortion, don't mix in the general notion that society is going to pot these days. Don't frame your debate on emotion. Comb your hair. Don't act so dang afraid of the unsaved.

All of which doesn't mean that you get to mumble something noncommital if they ask you what your opinion is. But let's face it: how often do they have to ask?

Now that was harsh, I know. And I'm sure I fall into Dorkification more than I know, being as I don't watch much TV, find a lot of clothing trends repellent, and love to talk too much. But I always found it encouraging when I was at university and my fellow students would engage me after lectures to ask me questions, because they knew I was "religious" but also "smart". And realizing that what most of them knew about the Bible and Christianity could be fit into an eyedropper, one had to be very basic, understanding, and non-reactionary in conversation.

Dorks of the world, take heart. I know that your intentions are in the right place, that you really want to serve the Lord. You may just have to consider whether serving the Lord means watching a ball game or two with Larry from work.

Phew, enough serious posting already. We'll have cute posts the rest of the week.

Until later,

Breanna