Several times I have heard the sentiment voiced by popular comedians that Christianity is "stupid."

They say this because they frame the proposition of the faith like this:

"Eternal suffering awaits anyone who questions God's infinite love... Believe or die!" -Bill Hicks

George Carlin has said almost the same thing.

People laugh, nod, and think,"Right. How stupid!"

But hold on a minute. Think this through logically with me, please.

Do people suffer eternally for "questioning God's eternal love"?

No.

Question God's love and look into it all you want.

Ask in what way God has shown that He loves the world.

He sent His Son.

So the unbelieving comedian has to lie in order to get a laugh while supposedly exposing what a stupid idea Christianity is.

Deception.

How could anyone question the love of a God who took on a human body to suffer the most intense pain for our wrongdoings, so He would not have to justly send us to Hell to be punished for our sins?

You may not believe in Jesus, but it surely is not true that that the God of the Christian faith is "unloving."

It is very inaccurate to say that God sets up a situation where a person is condemned to suffer forever because he does not happen to believe some irrelevant religious proposition.

People go to Hell because they are guilty sinners.

And because they have rejected God's forgiveness in Christ.

The Bible says that a Christian should be:

humbled by God,

aware of and confessing his ongoing sins,

faithful to Jesus,

unconditionally loving,

unconditionally forgiving,

sometimes confrontational about truth and morality,

living by the Spirit of God and by the Word of God and by the truth of God,

continually prayerful,

actively reading God's Word as if his or her life depended on it,

actively obeying God,

living in His Grace,

waiting for His return,

hard-working,

and open about the Gospel of Jesus.

(Hey, be patient, God is still working on me!)

Even though Christ is living inside of Christians, we never live up to sinless perfection.

A Christian, according to the Bible, is someone who "believes in Jesus."

Following God and being loving is an outgrowth of that belief.

Our spiritual relationship with Jesus is the result of faith, prayer, obedience, confession of sin and the yielded-to indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

Unfortunately, just because someone believes in Jesus, does not mean that any specific attitude or behavior will be theirs.

Rather, they might be growing spiritually inside, and they will later be led by God into the external Christ-like behaviors.

Or, having freewill, they might resist God, even as a saved believer, all of their lives.

One of the things that is often perceived as being "non-Christian" or "unloving" is telling people that God says that they are "sinners".

Or telling people that permanent separation from God (fear, pain, and endless despair, and physical burning await them one minute after they die), if they die without Christ.

No Christian filled with God's love would wish that on another human being, especially when Christ has paid the price for everyone's deliverance.

It's as if people think that we are hating them by telling them that God says they are "sinners."

Or that we are hating them because we tell them that God will justly punish their sins in Hell if they do not receive Jesus as their Savior.

On the contrary, we love people and want them to go to Heaven.

So, out of love, we warn them about Hell and tell them the Gospel so that they can take Jesus as their Savior and receive everlasting life.

If Heaven and Hell are real, as we believe they are, then telling someone the Gospel so that they can be saved from torment is the most loving thing you could possibly do for someone.

There is to be *no difference* between the "sacred" and the "secular" in the life of a believer in Jesus who has the Holy Spirit living inside of him.

His life is ~all~ spiritual.

He takes his "church," (his body), ~everywhere~.

Being a Christian is a 24-hour-a-day/365 day-a-year proposition. It was never intended to be a "quiet personal matter" that includes one isolated hour of singing and a sermon on Sunday.

This does not mean that you are going to be perfect, but that you are aiming for perfection.

Unbelievers are certainly not silent about their moral and spiritual beliefs--why should we be?

Jesus commanded believers to witness with their lives and with their words.

He commanded us believers to be salt in a rotting culture.

To be light in a dark world.

God, Jesus and the Bible are never to be "set aside" so we can deal with the "real" issues of life.

Like it or not, if you are a believer, you take Jesus into your sex life, and into your money life, and into your thought life--and into every other part of your life...

Growing up in the Lutheran church, I always wondered what they meant by, "As a Christian, you would think or do this..."--this never made any sense to me.

I am ~always~ a Christian, whether I am obeying God or not.

Whether I am living in unconditional love or not.

Whether I am sinning or not.

Whether I am walking in the Spirit of God or not.

Whether I am consciously living in the power of His grace or not.

Also, I have noticed that professed believers who seem to be making no effort to live for Jesus often say that those who are obeying God are being hypocrites, insincere and fake.
(Sometimes they are.)

On the other hand, maybe surprisingly, the fact is that disobeying believers often become the enemies of obeying believers.

Does the possibility exist, though, that some of them are real, and we just ~think~ that they are fake, because we do not want to face the fact that we do not live at that level of obedience to God ourselves?

That we are actually opposing God's people, and not realizing it?

Think of just one Christ-like believer in Jesus that you know personally: humbled by God, faithful to Jesus, unconditionally loving, unconditionally forgiving, living by the Spirit of God and by the Word of God, continually prayerful, actively obeying God, living in His Grace.

Again, on the other hand, maybe people don't really mistake the spirituality of people who are truly living close to God.

Maybe it is unmistakable.

Maybe there are just so few of them.

Is there even one person in your life that you would not call a "fake Christian"?

Someone who does not live by the sinfully prideful and often sinfully angry self-effort of the sinful flesh?

Would it be a good idea to follow that person's grace-filled example in trusting and obeying God?

Eternal ELECTION of the saved by God the Father, before the universe was created.

REGENERATION of the saved, by the Holy Spirit.

JUSTIFICATION of the saved BY FAITH in Christ.

Personal INDWELLING of the saved by the Holy Spirit.

The saved are SPIRIT-BAPTIZED into the body of Christ by the Holy Spirit. >>1st Corinthians 12:13.

SEALED by the Holy Spirit.

SANCTIFICATION and Chastening during our lives.

RESURRECTION of our physical bodies.

GLORIFICATION of our physical bodies.

ENTRANCE into the Eternal Kingdom of the New Sky ("Heavens") and the New Earth and the City of Heaven which came down from Heaven.

WITH the Lord Jesus in Heaven and on the New Earth, forever: endless love, joy, peace, perfection, and pleasure forever and ever.