My Dad is Better Than Your Dad

When I was young, we boys would periodically have a bout of “My Dad is better than your Dad”.  We’d throw out some awesome feat...NEVER embellished or exaggerated.. that our Dads had done, that was obviously an achievement that clearly made him the “Dad over all”.  While that was fun (even if it was more than a little bit of perjury if we’d have done it in a court of law), what is cute as kids, often becomes ugly as adults...especially with Christians.

More and more on social media, I see other Christians rolling out some blog or scathing video about “nationally-know pastor” or “those type of churches”.  It always makes me cringe, because rarely is anyone ever pointing at themselves and their church in repentance.  Mostly, it’s a finger pointing exercise at the “really bad” Christians over there...that aren’t me.

A defining statement like John 13:35 gets thrown away.  Matthew 18, Galatians 6 and Proverbs 16:18 are ignored.  It’s like trying to find the next “sinner” to expose has become the national distraction for what Christians should be doing.  If that’s you, let me share something with you...you don’t have to search for sinners, because we all are and if someone says they aren’t, then they are lying...which is a sin.  

As a fellow believer in Boston told me recently, “no one ever says that the problem with the church is that we’ve got TOO many people telling others about Jesus.”  Like anything else, purpose gets lost in the wake of distraction.  What’s sad is this rash of stuff rarely produces solution, only division.  It is really just an indirect method of pointing to how YOU have it all together...leaving Jesus out of the equation.  That type of stuff between Christians really just ends up looking like two second graders, fighting about whose Dad is better. and then you come to find out that they are siblings and the “Dads” they are comparing is the same guy.

Don’t seek out the “angry ones” who live to create conflict as your influences.  If you see someone caught in a sin, resist the urge to run to Facebook, Twitter or Sunday School to nail them with your cool insult, no matter how famous or wrong they appear to be.  I want to do that too, sometimes, but even though it’s hard, try praying for them instead.  I really fail more than I’d like to admit, but it’s always better when I succeed.  Spend 1000 times as many words as you ever say about someone in criticism, either in loving restorative (sometimes difficult) words to them directly or in talking to the only One who can ever make a real difference (See Gal 6, Matthew 18, etc..).  You might find yourself more compassionate than contrary, or maybe even becoming more “Christlike”...and if that happens, maybe your Dad will, with lack of comparison, brag on you.