Jamin Bradley

In the late 1700’s, a Quaker pastor named John Woolman had a vision of slaves referring to Jesus as a “cruel tyrant” as they worked in a mine. Because their oppressive masters were Christians, they assumed that Jesus must be the same.

Oh, the immeasurable sorrow of having your reputation destroyed and your character defamed by those who claim to know you, but do not have the slightest idea who you are.

This is perhaps God’s longest suffering. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, he has been dealing with followers who passionately commit to representing him in the most horrific ways imaginable. Even after coming down to earth to show us exactly what his radical love looks like, we still make him out to be a monster. We chase after his power, but not the suffering from where it flows. We long for the fame of the prophets, so we burn them to make more space for our own name to thrive. We deny Jesus’s teachings but take his name to gain authority as teachers. The world can’t help but see these great disconnects.

I was talking with a talented artist at a recent convention. Noticing some spiritual themes in his work, we began to talk about religion. I wasn’t shocked by his take on Christianity: “I like Jesus and his teachings, but all of the organized religion around him seems full of hypocrisy.” I told him I agreed.

The world has seen a cruel tyrant in Jesus because the church has shown it a cruel tyrant. The world is not willing to fall for the same trap. Ironically, those who reject Jesus because of the KKK or the nazis are closer to Jesus than the klansman or the nazis, for such rejecters see Jesus more clearly than these twisted radicals who claim to follow him. Strangely enough, these rejecters are actually denying a false Jesus and evangelizing followers toward the real one.

At this point in history, the church cannot quickly earn the world’s trust. Indeed, it continues to rapidly lose trust due to its political aims and its willingness to sacrifice Jesus all over again in order to gain power. If we ever want to see this dynamic change, we’re going to have to follow through on C.S. Lewis’s prompting.

“If ever the book which I am not going to write is written, it must be the full confession by Christendom of Christendom’s specific contribution to the sum of human cruelty and treachery. Large areas of “the World” will not hear us till we have publicly disowned much of our past. Why should they? We have shouted the name of Christ and enacted the service of Moloch.”