Welcome back to you as well!

A few years back the author known as Allahpundit wrote an eponymous blog that covered War on Terror news in a very creative (if not particularly respectful) way: by presenting the news as Allah re-imagined as a foul-mouthed gangsta. He gained a substantial readership, but eventually closed his blog down in what I think was a combination of legal issues with CafePress and normal blogger fatigue. His reasons for using a pseudonym are obvious.

I never linked directly to him just because of the utter poverty of his strategy for engaging Muslims. (He did not suffer for the lack of links from me, pretty sure.) He is an excellent news gather, a good commentator, a gifted humorist, and pretty mean with Photoshop to boot, but probably open mockery of a religion is a bad idea. All my giggles in reading him were guilty ones. Fortunately he’s back now at HotAir with all his strengths and none of his weaknesses, save the name.

I’ll bite: Who is Allahpundit? Why the choice of name?

Craig

Like I said (way more long-windedly) before, it’s making the weaker brethren the enemy of the gospel that I find highly problematic — not just in a “can’t we be nicer” sense but really at a theological level as well.

pentamom:
Yes yes yes, but how are your suggested changes supposed to fit into the snarky aping of the popular Mac vs. PC commercials? What you’re saying would make for pretty lame TV. What are we supposed to do with our video projector at church? How are we supposed to reach the masses? I’m confused.

Paul:
I affirm and encourage you.

Paul.

Our pastor on Sunday really encouraged/admonished us to try to step our of our contemporary Christian culture for a moment and time warp to the year 2156 (though he did not use those exact words) and look back at 2006 and try to distinguish those cultural trappings and mindsets that do not follow from a Biblical worldview. This contest to be the hippest Christians may be one folly that needs to end sooner rather than later.

And maybe they’re right.

But what I want to know — yea, what I almost want to scream in fury, is, “How the heck does running down Christians who are less hip than you and portraying them as legalistic people who don’t get it, serve the cause of Christ?”

Doesn’t that dorky little book with the handles that the Christian guy was carrying around say something about bearing with the brethren?

Isn’t that what “trying to live your life in a way that follows Christ” (I don’t remember the cool guy’s exact words) is at least partly about?

I’m getting really sick of this running down other Christians in the name of being more authentically Christ like, and carping that the brethren are the real problem and the real barrier to reaching the lost. I see it a lot, including from some people that I think are entirely well-meaning — but it’s way off the mark. Is it true that a lot of Christians have various hangups, baggage, attitudes, sins, that weigh us down and cause us to be less than ideal representatives of Christ? OF COURSE IT IS!

Does that mean that it forwards the gospel for one group of Christians to try to portray themselves as better than their brethren? NONSENSE, NONSENSE!

This is insane. It’s one thing to look inside oneself and one’s church and say, “Are there pitfalls that Christians fall into that I should avoid? Are there things we really need to take a hard look at and ditch, even if they’re dear to us, because they don’t authentically reflect the gospel?” It’s quite another kettle of fish altogether to pit yourself against your brethren to score points in the eyes of the world as being the “real Christians! Look at us, don’t look at them!” Is that supposed to be some reasonable form of evangelistic endeavor? I THOUGHT it was supposed to be “look at Jesus.” And since WHEN is cutesy mockery (the “I’m a dork”) stuff supposed to be a way for Christians to relate? We’re not talking about two friends here who understand each other and kidding around, we’re talking about two brothers who are apparently somewhat in need of reconciliation, and the approach of the “really authentic” guy is make the other one look stupid. Not to use hard but loving words, just make the other guy look stupid. Wow, way to just follow Jesus.

“I’m not themism” is a disease that has plagued American evangelicalism for a long time. Maybe it’s justice that it’s coming back to bite some of us more traditionalist types. But that still doesn’t make it right.

God protect me from now going out and trying to advocate my approach to theology, worship, evangelism, and covenant life as more stable, reasonable, and charitable as those loosey-goosey hippie seeker sensitive types. It’s an error either way.

Maybe a short way of what I’m saying is, Let’s assume (against inclination) that the “Christ follower” people are 100% right in their underlying beef against the “Christian” types. A little meditation on how one deals with the weaker brother and how the “spiritual” are supposed to restore their brethren “caught in sin” might have improved the approach a WHOLE lot.

Sometimes I think it may be better to use new terminology if the old terminology has unfortunately connotations. If nothing else, it gets people thinking more about what the terms actually mean. I wouldn’t recommend such a course of action in most cases, but I certainly have a lot of sympathy for what such communities of faith are trying to accomplish.

I will stick with being called a Christian. But I think that, if I were in a context where this term did more harm than good, I would seriously consider abandoning it. After all, it is just another label (albeit an important one). And the label isn’t the reality.

Paul.