“Easy living, please, come on and let me down”
Being a Christian can be (and sometimes is) viewed by people as a crutch, a way to make yourself feel good believing in a loving greater power somewhere out there. I can understand where that view comes from, but I think that not believing in something can be an even bigger crutch. To have a set of beliefs that you decided make sense mean that you can believe whatever you wish. Granted, the goal would be truth, but I don’t believe for a second that anyone can fully objectively figure out the meaning of life on their own (or with the help of other people’s ideas/beliefs/philosophies). Christianity on the other hand, while preaching a message of good news, also teaches some things that can be hard to swallow. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans something). Our society has this idea of being a good person. This idea varies from being a good person compared to the average person, being a good person compared to thieves and murderers, being a good person compared to your friends, etc. But the bible teaches that if you’ve looked at a woman lustfully, you’ve committed adultery in your heart. I’ve never had sex… and while I’d love to use that to say that I’m a good person because of it, I’ve looked lustfully at women far too many times for that to be true. This can apply to many different sins. Our nature is to fail at living up to God’s standards. Focusing too much on this aspect of Christianity can and will cause a negative view of yourself.
On the flip side, there’s the good news! Yay! In spite of all our failures and shortcomings, God made a way for justice and love to prevail. Though the punishment for sin is death (Romans something else) we may live through the resurrection of Christ. Focusing only on the fact that God loves us can produce a distorted image of God, one that would lead to a style of living that causes others to view such a faith as a crutch. But alas, there is a healthy balance, a beautiful letdown.
I believe that achieving a true (or true enough, assuming we’ll never fully understand God while here on earth) understanding of God is beautiful. I’ve seen the transition happen in a few people during my lifetime. The transition from knowing about God to knowing God, and beautiful it is!
I absolutely love this song. The music does a fantastic job (like always) of describing the mood/state of mind. The lyrics don’t follow a standard song structure, but they reuse a couple lines a lot. It changes enough to be interesting and different, but the message is the same throughout. There isn’t really a story or a progression, just a deep point to be made with just a few words. The lyrics really are cool, and I encourage you to look at them.
We can spend forever striving to find the finite differences between right and wrong, between viewing God as love and nothing else or as someone who has standards that we fall short of, but we will never perfectly find the balance. As we already know, we aren’t perfect and we can’t be. We may get really good at being humble or something, but we’ll never be perfect. So while this balance of how to view God is definitely important and worth considering and applying to your life, don’t get hung up on it. Getting hung up on little things is how bad things begin (like the “God hate’s gay’s” heresy)
Remember, “life is still worth living”
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