Slow I am, but here we are. In my devotions this morning I came across the following verses in Isaiah: Isaiah 28:9 Whom shall he teach knowledge? And whom shall he make to understand doctrine? Those who are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts. :10 For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little; This is not the only place where there is a difference made between "meat" and "milk" of spiritual truth in the Bible, but I was particularly drawn here to the progression of precept upon precept and line upon line - likewise in the epistles you'll find one spiritual gift stacked upon another in order.
It is my feeling that all who have their faces turned upon God and their dependence placed upon His Son's atonement are the recipients of grace. "Cheap grace"? No. Just children in the faith, no matter how old or young their bodies are. Must all children of our Lord be equally mature? Equally ready for personal sacrifice? It would be *nice*, but I don't see anything that indicates that in the Word. Our Lord is fairly good about arranging things so that we have opportunities to grow... though we don't generally ENJOY those opportunities! (I know I don't - but I do enjoy their fruits later on).
Thoughts?
Showing posts with label cheap grace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cheap grace. Show all posts
Monday, February 4, 2008
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Baptism etc, scattered thoughts
I have always taken Matthew 7:21-22 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? to be about those who think they're Christians because their parents were Christian and because they go to a Christian church, but have no personal relationship with Christ. Those who rely on "religion" and leave out Jesus. I maintain that you can walk away from Christ and still be saved - but I know that it hurts. How to tell if someone is really a Christian or not? You have to look for fruit. If there isn't any... the best guess is "non-Christian", but only our Lord can judge hearts.
...
Following Christ is hard. There's nothing anywhere in the Bible that says it will be easy. The prosperity preachers have been and always will be popular... but are they going to show up in heaven smelling smoky? People *want* to hear that if you do x, y, z you'll not only go to Heaven but have a great life down here on earth. You can always make money selling people dreams... but "God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Jim Bakker did jail time, God didn't let him off with leading astray the faithful! We live in a fallen culture - and that culture is insidious. I really do see the value in living apart, as some Mennonites/Amish do. Being called to live in the land of shiny people and not incorporate those values is incredibly difficult. Why be surprised that not only do we have preachers preaching "shiny" but that they get lots of press and popularity?
....
I like your thoughts on baptism as hope, but as a properly raised Baptist I've always thought of it as a symbol of commitment to the faith, much like the Mennonites do it. (There are differences, we are encouraged to be baptised soon after we are saved, it's a public declaration, and there aren't really age-limits. Myself, I was baptised at 6 after strenuous examination by my pastor making sure I knew what I was about with salvation and all).
Samson and dedication of children... I've been interested in how the Bible claims the first born for God - not as a human sacrifice, but as a "belonging to". I think we can dedicate things to Him, and children (to some extent) although that is indeed a "hope". I don't think that's like baptism though... except maybe for infant baptism. I'd NEVER dis someone for baptising their baby, even if I don't think it serves as anything but a hope... I have children of my own that are too young yet to choose, though the elder has begun to love Jesus. (For the audience if any, they're 7 and 3 - and yes, I did say I was saved at 5, but I remember the day I "got it" - that light hasn't clicked on for him yet).
....
I had some thoughts related primarily to my personal experience that dovetailed the forgiveness expected of Mennonites (which, btw, I think shows some of the finest Christian example that there is) and the cheap grace that we discussed a day or so ago. I think we have to be willing to feel the pain of the slap on the face in order to have the turning of the other cheek mean much. (It still means something - it shows the will to follow). How do you balance that in your life? How do you feel the hurt, the anger, etc etc... and not *live* there?
Apologies for such a scattered post. I keep trying to get it to mesh, but it's not happening, and I wanted to get it out there for response.
...
Following Christ is hard. There's nothing anywhere in the Bible that says it will be easy. The prosperity preachers have been and always will be popular... but are they going to show up in heaven smelling smoky? People *want* to hear that if you do x, y, z you'll not only go to Heaven but have a great life down here on earth. You can always make money selling people dreams... but "God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Jim Bakker did jail time, God didn't let him off with leading astray the faithful! We live in a fallen culture - and that culture is insidious. I really do see the value in living apart, as some Mennonites/Amish do. Being called to live in the land of shiny people and not incorporate those values is incredibly difficult. Why be surprised that not only do we have preachers preaching "shiny" but that they get lots of press and popularity?
....
I like your thoughts on baptism as hope, but as a properly raised Baptist I've always thought of it as a symbol of commitment to the faith, much like the Mennonites do it. (There are differences, we are encouraged to be baptised soon after we are saved, it's a public declaration, and there aren't really age-limits. Myself, I was baptised at 6 after strenuous examination by my pastor making sure I knew what I was about with salvation and all).
Samson and dedication of children... I've been interested in how the Bible claims the first born for God - not as a human sacrifice, but as a "belonging to". I think we can dedicate things to Him, and children (to some extent) although that is indeed a "hope". I don't think that's like baptism though... except maybe for infant baptism. I'd NEVER dis someone for baptising their baby, even if I don't think it serves as anything but a hope... I have children of my own that are too young yet to choose, though the elder has begun to love Jesus. (For the audience if any, they're 7 and 3 - and yes, I did say I was saved at 5, but I remember the day I "got it" - that light hasn't clicked on for him yet).
....
I had some thoughts related primarily to my personal experience that dovetailed the forgiveness expected of Mennonites (which, btw, I think shows some of the finest Christian example that there is) and the cheap grace that we discussed a day or so ago. I think we have to be willing to feel the pain of the slap on the face in order to have the turning of the other cheek mean much. (It still means something - it shows the will to follow). How do you balance that in your life? How do you feel the hurt, the anger, etc etc... and not *live* there?
Apologies for such a scattered post. I keep trying to get it to mesh, but it's not happening, and I wanted to get it out there for response.
Monday, November 5, 2007
A turn more serious
Well enough... I have been rightly corrected. It's true that I do consider my own brand of Christianity more "mainstream", but I ought to know better from our time on the public debate boards. Perhaps it might be said that my brand of Christianity is mainstream fundamentalism? (grin). At any rate, I think that A, B, C is a simple way to remember the road to salvation - but no, I'd never been specifically taught that. Yes, I do believe in salvation by faith, one acceptance, belief, and confession serving for all time... but I also believe that a true Christian is shown by the fruits of the spirit, "By their fruits shall ye know them". Mouthing the words, "I accept" is something entirely different from accepting with your whole heart and putting your entire hope of salvation on the blood of our Savior. That was all the thief on the cross did - put his entire hope on his belief that Jesus could and would save him from Hell. And should I be greeted at the gates of Heaven by the question, "By what right are you here?" my answer shall be, "Jesus died for me, I am here by His sacrifice, my name is written in the Lamb's book of life".
I am sadly aware (again, virtue of the old board) that the words "born-again" turn many people off. I wish it were otherwise. We cannot, however, control the actions of all our co-religionists, more's the pity. I would that all of us would shine out with Jesus' light... but such is not to be. We *are* fallen humans, and our Enemy is cheerfully willing to use every weapon to keep souls from grace. The seeds of self-righteousness live in most hearts - and I think that's why evangelicals spend a lot of time saying "Christians aren't perfect - just forgiven." If you've never had someone accuse you of thinking you're better than they are because of your faith, count yourself lucky. I have! And who wants to cut down their co-religionists? There are a few famous fundamentalists that *I* wish would keep their mouths shut, or shut their mouths on certain topics... but who am I to judge their hearts? And sometimes I agree with the core of their message, but NOT the delivery or any of the "outlying" bits. I was reading an article just the other day on the CWA site - great article, except for ONE sentence, but that one sentence would have turned anyone not totally "on their side" off. We are called to speak the truth with love - and that's hard.
Cheap grace - it sounds like an interesting book, and has gone on my Christmas list. :) As for the concept... yes. Our church today is RIFE with hypocrisy and apostasy. It is easy to be saved and then head right to the bar. Do I think it's possible... yes. But eh. A weak yes. Because your fruits show your faith. Can you fall and yet be Christian? Yes. But should you be expected to get back up... eventually? Also yes. 1 Corinthians 3: 11-15 For other foundation can no man lay than is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundsation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. I do like what Dr. McGee says... there'll be some folk in Heaven who smell a bit of smoke from that fire, but they'll still BE there.
I say that partially from personal experience. There were many years when I know that I was a Christian and saved, but I was living in deliberate sin. Do I think that I would have gone to Heaven if I'd died then? Yes. But I'd have had precious little treasure come through the fire with me. Even now, having been surrendered for years, I have to occasionally pull myself back from things that I know are wrong... don't you? That is one of the things I am MOST looking forward to in Heaven - a body without an "old nature", a self that isn't constantly tempted to sin. That is a part of my journey - learning each day to leave my "self" at the altar and obey Christ Jesus. And I become more sensitive to sin the closer I get to Him, the less I am able to tolerate evil in myself. (There is still plenty to go around - icky ew).
As for who you listen to and believe - yes, I am young in this. What I do is very carefully vet who I listen to by first reading their statements of faith and looking carefully at the way they comport themselves (is it Biblical? Are they out for money for themselves or for missions or not really at all?), and then I give them my attention. But I am very well immersed in the Bible, so something that rings false, or doesn't bother to base itself on the Word? No, not going in my brain! My "list" currently is Dr. Stanley, Dr. McGee, and Pastor Mike (my local pastor, and yes he's on the web if you want to give him a listen). Also I am reading through the Bible - four chapters a day plus whatever calls out to me. This is the third? time I've done that, and I expect to continue so long as I'm here. What do you feed yourself with?
All the time I have for now... it's time to kick my slothful self off of my computer chair and off to clean something. :)
I am sadly aware (again, virtue of the old board) that the words "born-again" turn many people off. I wish it were otherwise. We cannot, however, control the actions of all our co-religionists, more's the pity. I would that all of us would shine out with Jesus' light... but such is not to be. We *are* fallen humans, and our Enemy is cheerfully willing to use every weapon to keep souls from grace. The seeds of self-righteousness live in most hearts - and I think that's why evangelicals spend a lot of time saying "Christians aren't perfect - just forgiven." If you've never had someone accuse you of thinking you're better than they are because of your faith, count yourself lucky. I have! And who wants to cut down their co-religionists? There are a few famous fundamentalists that *I* wish would keep their mouths shut, or shut their mouths on certain topics... but who am I to judge their hearts? And sometimes I agree with the core of their message, but NOT the delivery or any of the "outlying" bits. I was reading an article just the other day on the CWA site - great article, except for ONE sentence, but that one sentence would have turned anyone not totally "on their side" off. We are called to speak the truth with love - and that's hard.
Cheap grace - it sounds like an interesting book, and has gone on my Christmas list. :) As for the concept... yes. Our church today is RIFE with hypocrisy and apostasy. It is easy to be saved and then head right to the bar. Do I think it's possible... yes. But eh. A weak yes. Because your fruits show your faith. Can you fall and yet be Christian? Yes. But should you be expected to get back up... eventually? Also yes. 1 Corinthians 3: 11-15 For other foundation can no man lay than is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundsation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. I do like what Dr. McGee says... there'll be some folk in Heaven who smell a bit of smoke from that fire, but they'll still BE there.
I say that partially from personal experience. There were many years when I know that I was a Christian and saved, but I was living in deliberate sin. Do I think that I would have gone to Heaven if I'd died then? Yes. But I'd have had precious little treasure come through the fire with me. Even now, having been surrendered for years, I have to occasionally pull myself back from things that I know are wrong... don't you? That is one of the things I am MOST looking forward to in Heaven - a body without an "old nature", a self that isn't constantly tempted to sin. That is a part of my journey - learning each day to leave my "self" at the altar and obey Christ Jesus. And I become more sensitive to sin the closer I get to Him, the less I am able to tolerate evil in myself. (There is still plenty to go around - icky ew).
As for who you listen to and believe - yes, I am young in this. What I do is very carefully vet who I listen to by first reading their statements of faith and looking carefully at the way they comport themselves (is it Biblical? Are they out for money for themselves or for missions or not really at all?), and then I give them my attention. But I am very well immersed in the Bible, so something that rings false, or doesn't bother to base itself on the Word? No, not going in my brain! My "list" currently is Dr. Stanley, Dr. McGee, and Pastor Mike (my local pastor, and yes he's on the web if you want to give him a listen). Also I am reading through the Bible - four chapters a day plus whatever calls out to me. This is the third? time I've done that, and I expect to continue so long as I'm here. What do you feed yourself with?
All the time I have for now... it's time to kick my slothful self off of my computer chair and off to clean something. :)
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Hair Coverings and Forms of Worship
With regards to hair coverings, I believe that people need rituals. It isn't so much what we do as the way that it orders and puts our emotions or beliefs and superstitions into a manageable place. God made us like that. Just as He says commands the ancient Israelites to rituals of Law, behaviour, cleanliness and sacrifice, but then goes on to completely contradict Himself in Micah, for just one example, when, via the prophet, He says in (NRSV) Chapter 6, v6-8:
With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for a transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?
If you feel that head covering does something for you on a spiritual level, that is okay. But it is not, as I know you know, the covered head that makes you more or less holy before the Lord. Sometimes humans need symbols, something concrete and visible to have faith in, or to follow. I haven't done this for quite a while now, but a few years ago when I was going through some painful personal experiences, although it is no part of a traditional Mennonite worship service, when I felt painfully in need to have some ritual, some visible manifestation of my reaching out for God, I would burn incense while I prayed, mimicking what we are told in Revelations 8, about incense containing the prayers of the saints.
Another angel with a golden censor came and stood at the altar; he was given a great quantity of incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar that is before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel.
I do not believe that God would not have heard my prayer without incense. I don't believe that God needs any form of worship at all - neither church nor temple, nor the bowing of one's head or one's knees. Can a temple or a church contain all that is God, the way a fenced pasture contains sheep? Of course not. When the thief who died on the cross said, Jesus, remember me, when You come into Your kingdom, he had no official form of worship or sanction by any earthly religious authority.
But humans are built to look for and understand patterns. If none is given to us, we invent our own. In order to prevent spiritual damage to ourselves, I believe that God gave us a blueprint or a pattern to follow in terms of worship via the Bible.
As far as your quest for a personal relationship with God, I think that the journey is the relationship. Like children, we come to God at first with a certain understanding of His nature and what we are supposed to do that is passed on by our parents. We haven't thought it through by ourselves or developed any critical facilities to the point where we believe some of the things we are told, and see other things that our parents told us as perhaps unimportant to our personal understanding of God.
Most people never step outside of that comfort zone of belief or at least the appearance of belief in what their parents told them. For each of us, how we were raised is the mainstream Christian position - all others are a bit off the mark, in our unspoken opinions, even if we don't go as far as to consign all those who don't believe exactly as we do to Hell in a hand basket.
It was your remark in your post about how you take a more mainstream position than I do that made me think of this. Your background is evangelical Baptist, with the theology (feel free to correct anything I may have misunderstood) of A,B,C - to accept Christ as your personal Saviour; to believe that He died for your sins; to confess this belief to other people. To most Christians in the world, this evangelical formula is not a mainstream belief.
I believe that Christ is the promised Saviour and that He died and rose again and will come again, and that I will know, as I am known. I believe this unequivocally and with my whole heart. But I will never use the words born-again to describe my relationship with the Eternal. Not because I do not believe, not because I do not know that Jesus said you must be born again, but because of the connotation and the set of other beliefs are assumed by now to go along with those words. What I would mean by born-again is not what any born-again Christian would understand me to mean and for me to say that would be misleading that person into thinking I share in his or her belief - which is that everyone who isn't born again is headed straight for Hell.
And quite unfairly perhaps, as I have my own prejudices, when someone tells me they are are born-again Christians, I am completely turned off. I associate those words with cheap grace, and the same sort of curious anticipation of a crowd who goes to see bull-riding at a rodeo, of the possibility of someone getting hurt. There is this notion many born-again Christians have, that everyone who hasn't said those A, B, and Cs exactly - is not a real Christian and is wrong and is headed for Hell.
I do not believe in any ritualized prayer such as many evangelicals talk about as the Sinner's Prayer - capital letters. As though it is a formula and once you have said that formula, you may in fact do as you please - you have a Get-Out-of-Hell Free card.
I am not saying that you or that even most of those who believe in the A,B,C thing immediately go, "Great, wow. I'm saved. Where's the nearest bar now that I have the freedom to sin." I am speaking in general terms about perceptions and faith and how often what people think is faith is custom or cultural.
But this is the perception many people have of American Christianity, and it is not without validity. It is as though Christianity is a form, not a belief that requires a certain standard of conduct. As though a professing Christian can do anything at all as long as he as "accepted Christ as his personal Saviour" and then is entitled to sit in judgment of Christians of other denominations, with a different understanding, and if their (the born-again Christian's) behaviour, is called into question, responds pithily with, "Christians aren't perfect - just forgiven."
Well, duh.
There are Christians who believe that to follow Christ, means to be born again, each day, without ever once saying words to that effect. Who make that commitment, each day, to do as Christ did, to love one's neighbours, to turn the other cheek, to love those who despitefully use you - not to sue them in a court of law, not to impose their faith on others in the form of public monuments or prayer in secular schools, but to live it - to live in such a way as Christ would have lived, a light that cannot be hidden.
Christ compels no man to come to Him against his will. And yet many evangelicals in the US would do just that - impose the tenets of their beliefs and faith on unbelievers in public areas like schools. I don't see this as much different from the way the Catholic church behaved through much of its early history, in terms of forcibly 'converting' whole populations, and which is something that the underpinnings of Protestant faith is completely against, emphasizing, as they do, the whole notion of the personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Far too often Christian discipline and discipleship is not taught along with those A,B, Cs. Far too many born-again Christians profess a theology that is completely irresponsible and absolutely fails people who are genuine in their faith and want to grow in their faith, but have issues in their lives, like drugs or alcohol. I can't now quite remember all the things that being born-again is instantly supposed to cure, but essentially, far too many born-again preachers preach that the minute you are saved, you are delivered from your craving for alcohol and beating your wife and all is supposed to be wonderful.
That is not true. God is not a star to be wished on, or a Santa Claus to send a wish list to, that we are, by virtue of belief in Jesus as the Christ, delivered from human temptations or from the need to develop self control and wisdom. For those who have some sort of terrible issue they are trying to overcome, it is the equivalent of giving him or her a Bible verse when he or she needs bread.
I would highly recommend that you read Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book, The Cost of Discipleship. I honestly think you would really get something out of it, since you are a fan of C.S. Lewis. The book addresses many of the questions you are asking yourself these days, including what it means to love Christ for Himself, alone.
Bonhoeffer was a true martyr for Christ, who opposed Hitler, and even returned to Germany after having escaped it.
Quoting briefly from his famous writing on Billige Gnade, or cheap grace, he wrote in part, ....That is what we mean by cheap grace, the grace which amounts to the justification of sin without the justification of the repentant sinner who departs from sin and from whom sins departs. Cheap grace is not the kind of forgiveness of sin which frees us from the toils of sin. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession.
If I may put it so bluntly, this to my mind, is the pervading sin of the evangelical churches in North America today.
Just as God charges that the his ancient Israelites allowed the form of worship, the rituals of animal sacrifice and cleanliness to become the mark of the "good" Jew, forgetting that the whole sum of the Law was to love the Lord thy God and thy neighbour as thyself, so in that way, too many evangelicals have their own version of cleaning the outside of the cup (Matthew 23, KJV) "but within they are full of extortion and excess."
Layla
With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for a transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?
If you feel that head covering does something for you on a spiritual level, that is okay. But it is not, as I know you know, the covered head that makes you more or less holy before the Lord. Sometimes humans need symbols, something concrete and visible to have faith in, or to follow. I haven't done this for quite a while now, but a few years ago when I was going through some painful personal experiences, although it is no part of a traditional Mennonite worship service, when I felt painfully in need to have some ritual, some visible manifestation of my reaching out for God, I would burn incense while I prayed, mimicking what we are told in Revelations 8, about incense containing the prayers of the saints.
Another angel with a golden censor came and stood at the altar; he was given a great quantity of incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar that is before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel.
I do not believe that God would not have heard my prayer without incense. I don't believe that God needs any form of worship at all - neither church nor temple, nor the bowing of one's head or one's knees. Can a temple or a church contain all that is God, the way a fenced pasture contains sheep? Of course not. When the thief who died on the cross said, Jesus, remember me, when You come into Your kingdom, he had no official form of worship or sanction by any earthly religious authority.
But humans are built to look for and understand patterns. If none is given to us, we invent our own. In order to prevent spiritual damage to ourselves, I believe that God gave us a blueprint or a pattern to follow in terms of worship via the Bible.
As far as your quest for a personal relationship with God, I think that the journey is the relationship. Like children, we come to God at first with a certain understanding of His nature and what we are supposed to do that is passed on by our parents. We haven't thought it through by ourselves or developed any critical facilities to the point where we believe some of the things we are told, and see other things that our parents told us as perhaps unimportant to our personal understanding of God.
Most people never step outside of that comfort zone of belief or at least the appearance of belief in what their parents told them. For each of us, how we were raised is the mainstream Christian position - all others are a bit off the mark, in our unspoken opinions, even if we don't go as far as to consign all those who don't believe exactly as we do to Hell in a hand basket.
It was your remark in your post about how you take a more mainstream position than I do that made me think of this. Your background is evangelical Baptist, with the theology (feel free to correct anything I may have misunderstood) of A,B,C - to accept Christ as your personal Saviour; to believe that He died for your sins; to confess this belief to other people. To most Christians in the world, this evangelical formula is not a mainstream belief.
I believe that Christ is the promised Saviour and that He died and rose again and will come again, and that I will know, as I am known. I believe this unequivocally and with my whole heart. But I will never use the words born-again to describe my relationship with the Eternal. Not because I do not believe, not because I do not know that Jesus said you must be born again, but because of the connotation and the set of other beliefs are assumed by now to go along with those words. What I would mean by born-again is not what any born-again Christian would understand me to mean and for me to say that would be misleading that person into thinking I share in his or her belief - which is that everyone who isn't born again is headed straight for Hell.
And quite unfairly perhaps, as I have my own prejudices, when someone tells me they are are born-again Christians, I am completely turned off. I associate those words with cheap grace, and the same sort of curious anticipation of a crowd who goes to see bull-riding at a rodeo, of the possibility of someone getting hurt. There is this notion many born-again Christians have, that everyone who hasn't said those A, B, and Cs exactly - is not a real Christian and is wrong and is headed for Hell.
I do not believe in any ritualized prayer such as many evangelicals talk about as the Sinner's Prayer - capital letters. As though it is a formula and once you have said that formula, you may in fact do as you please - you have a Get-Out-of-Hell Free card.
I am not saying that you or that even most of those who believe in the A,B,C thing immediately go, "Great, wow. I'm saved. Where's the nearest bar now that I have the freedom to sin." I am speaking in general terms about perceptions and faith and how often what people think is faith is custom or cultural.
But this is the perception many people have of American Christianity, and it is not without validity. It is as though Christianity is a form, not a belief that requires a certain standard of conduct. As though a professing Christian can do anything at all as long as he as "accepted Christ as his personal Saviour" and then is entitled to sit in judgment of Christians of other denominations, with a different understanding, and if their (the born-again Christian's) behaviour, is called into question, responds pithily with, "Christians aren't perfect - just forgiven."
Well, duh.
There are Christians who believe that to follow Christ, means to be born again, each day, without ever once saying words to that effect. Who make that commitment, each day, to do as Christ did, to love one's neighbours, to turn the other cheek, to love those who despitefully use you - not to sue them in a court of law, not to impose their faith on others in the form of public monuments or prayer in secular schools, but to live it - to live in such a way as Christ would have lived, a light that cannot be hidden.
Christ compels no man to come to Him against his will. And yet many evangelicals in the US would do just that - impose the tenets of their beliefs and faith on unbelievers in public areas like schools. I don't see this as much different from the way the Catholic church behaved through much of its early history, in terms of forcibly 'converting' whole populations, and which is something that the underpinnings of Protestant faith is completely against, emphasizing, as they do, the whole notion of the personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Far too often Christian discipline and discipleship is not taught along with those A,B, Cs. Far too many born-again Christians profess a theology that is completely irresponsible and absolutely fails people who are genuine in their faith and want to grow in their faith, but have issues in their lives, like drugs or alcohol. I can't now quite remember all the things that being born-again is instantly supposed to cure, but essentially, far too many born-again preachers preach that the minute you are saved, you are delivered from your craving for alcohol and beating your wife and all is supposed to be wonderful.
That is not true. God is not a star to be wished on, or a Santa Claus to send a wish list to, that we are, by virtue of belief in Jesus as the Christ, delivered from human temptations or from the need to develop self control and wisdom. For those who have some sort of terrible issue they are trying to overcome, it is the equivalent of giving him or her a Bible verse when he or she needs bread.
I would highly recommend that you read Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book, The Cost of Discipleship. I honestly think you would really get something out of it, since you are a fan of C.S. Lewis. The book addresses many of the questions you are asking yourself these days, including what it means to love Christ for Himself, alone.
Bonhoeffer was a true martyr for Christ, who opposed Hitler, and even returned to Germany after having escaped it.
Quoting briefly from his famous writing on Billige Gnade, or cheap grace, he wrote in part, ....That is what we mean by cheap grace, the grace which amounts to the justification of sin without the justification of the repentant sinner who departs from sin and from whom sins departs. Cheap grace is not the kind of forgiveness of sin which frees us from the toils of sin. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession.
If I may put it so bluntly, this to my mind, is the pervading sin of the evangelical churches in North America today.
Just as God charges that the his ancient Israelites allowed the form of worship, the rituals of animal sacrifice and cleanliness to become the mark of the "good" Jew, forgetting that the whole sum of the Law was to love the Lord thy God and thy neighbour as thyself, so in that way, too many evangelicals have their own version of cleaning the outside of the cup (Matthew 23, KJV) "but within they are full of extortion and excess."
Layla
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