We talk Christianity more than we live it …

“Doing life together.”

“Being the hands and feet of Jesus.”

“No one cares how much you know, until they know how much you care.”

These are just some of the phrases we throw around a lot pertaining to our Christian faith. We talk a lot about being Christian — we even argue a lot about what being Christian means — but when the rubber-meets-the-road, when we are really put on the spot to demonstrate our faith, we far too often find we talk too much and act too little.

This past week, myself and others who are “regulars” at a Starbucks concluded efforts of helping a 32-year-old man who is in a wheelchair and dying of Huntington’s disease, to permanently get off the streets after a long stretch of homelessness. A couple of us were not willing to let a dying man in a wheelchair die in the streets.

After exhausting efforts for help from both governmental and non-governmental agencies and organizations throughout the county, I sent an email to 14 churches asking if their congregations would be willing to do ANYTHING to help this man. I never heard from any of these churches.

No response at all.

Before you react too harshly to churches leaving a dying man in a wheelchair to die in the streets, ask yourself if you would do more than these churches did. If the only thing left to do would be to open your own home to get such a fellow off the streets, would you?

God showers every day with opportunities to truly live like Jesus; some are challenges as great as rescuing the perishing, others are much smaller opportunities. So often we’re blind to many of these chances to serve and love in Christ’s name, or we pick through them, looking for the easy and comfortable and ignoring the bigger challenges. Like the priest in the story of the Good Samaritan where a Jewish man was robbed, beaten, and left dying in the street, we walk on by just like the priest does in the story.

We think of that priest with disgust, failing to recognize too often we are the modern-day version of him!

For a very long time, “authenticity” was the hottest buzzword in church circles. The idea of being an authentic Christian, where our walk matches our talk, was supposed to be essential. Today, we talk a lot of Christianity, but our walk is falling far short. How can I say such a thing? There is nothing Christlike AT ALL about leaving a dying man in a wheelchair to die in the streets.

God is still serving up “Good Samaritan” challenges to us, and we’re failing many of them. We have become content to put on the face of a Christian, and talk like a Christian, we’re just not as willing to actually live like one.

This lack of authenticity can be described by the story Ken Crockett tells in his book, “Making Today Count for Eternity”:

Most of us cringe when we have to show others our driver’s license photograph. We look either washed out from too much light, or shadowy and suspicious from too little. Our eyes look either goofy and wide-eyed, or droopy and sleepy-eyed. Our hair is hopelessly out of place. And our smile? “Good grief,” we say to ourselves, “do I really smile like that?”

Then there’s the opposite extreme — the studio portrait. With the photographer’s magic, the right background highlights our colors. The most flattering angle emphasizes our strong points. The lighting softens our features. The air brush can blow away any wrinkles or imperfections.

Crockett concludes his story with this:

As radically different as they are, the driver’s license photo and the studio portrait have one thing in common: neither is realistic. But if we want to be authentic people who impact others, it’s important that the portrait others see is real.

No matter how we may want to talk the talk and cover over the lack in our walk, trying to present ourselves as something more than we are won’t last forever …

“The time is coming when everything that is covered up will be revealed, and all that is secret will be made known to all. Whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered behind closed doors will be shouted from the housetops for all to hear!” Luke 12:2-3.

It is NOT enough to just pray for a dying man but leave him in the streets.

It is not enough to just talk the talk, our walk must match our claims.

There is coming a day for every one of us when the reality of our talk will be made known to all, when what we’ve been trying to hide will be revealed. What will that day be like for you? Will it reveal that your walk matched your talk regardless of the cost? Or will it show that your talk was not authentic to walking as a disciple of Jesus Christ?

Scotty