Jefferson Bethke
By Ashley Andrews, 700 Club Interactive
CBN.com –26 MILLION
Bethke's first poem released on YouTube in January 2012, "Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus," drew over 26 million viewers to date (well above his prediction of 9,000). The spoken word incited responses both for and against his message. Some accused him of being "anti-church," and others convicted him of being Biblically "unsound." Then there were others who applauded his piece saying it was "work of art" and "inspiring." In a matter of days, Bethke went from being some random guy on YouTube to the spoken word artist who had everybody in an uproar. Everyone knew his name, and everyone saw his video.
JESUS>RELIGION
After the initial excitement wore off, panic set in. Everywhere Bethke looked, he was there. His video had become the headline for almost every news outlet. He had even sparked a trend on Twitter, #jesushatesreligion. And then, he started receiving personal emails from viewers whose lives he had helped change. People who had lost hope were encouraged. People desperate for freedom were finding truth.
"E-mails…flooded in by the hundreds…To be honest, I was overwhelmed at first. I'm not a counselor. I'm not a pastor. I'm a messed-up twenty-three-year-old who just graduated from college. I was being messaged, e-mailed, and tweeted by thousands of people who were sharing their raw testimonies with me, a complete stranger. Many even stated that it was the first time they had shared their secrets with anyone. I was wondering, What did I say? What was it about the poem that was so different?
It was then that Bethke realized just how many people had bought into the same religion he had. The religion that says do this, don't do that. The religion that hurts, mistreats and even ostracizes others in the name of rules. The religion that insists that absolute obedience will save you. But that is not Jesus. And he recognized that these people were looking for the true Jesus – they were craving Him.
"We've lost the real Jesus—or at least exchanged him for a newer, safer, sanitized, ineffectual one. We've created a Christian subculture that comes with its own set of customs, rules, rituals, paradigms, and products that are nowhere near the rugged, revolutionary faith of biblical Christianity. In our subculture Jesus would have never been crucified—he's too nice. We claim Jesus is our homeboy, but sometimes we look more like the people Jesus railed against. The same scathing indictments Jesus brought against the religious leaders of his day—the scribes and Pharisees—he could bring down on many of America's Christian leaders. No wonder the world hates us. Most of the time we're persecuted not because we love Jesus, but because we're prideful, arrogant jerks who don't love the real Jesus. We're often judgmental, hypocritical, and legalistic while claiming to follow a Jesus who is forgiving, authentic, and loving…Sometimes people will hate us because we preach the same gospel Jesus preached, and sometimes people will hate us because we're jerks…If we honestly reflected on Scripture and the state of American Christianity today, we'd be hard pressed to say we haven't exchanged the real Jesus for one of our own invention."
DANGEROUS
According to Bethke, the Jesus in today's Church is unlike the Jesus in the Bible. These days, He is portrayed as safe, weak even. Scripture, however, defies that image. But why is that? Why does the Church dismiss the real Jesus? As Bethke shared, it's all about the sales.
"…We don't like a dangerous Jesus because a dangerous Jesus isn't a profitable Jesus. So, we've made a safe Jesus: We don't celebrate the gift of Jesus on Christmas. We celebrate the gifts we get. We don't celebrate his triumphant resurrection and victory over Satan, sin, and death on Easter. We talk about the brunch. We don't call Jesus God. We call him good. We don't tell people they're sinners in need of a savior, because they might stop coming—and giving—to church…In 2010 Americans spent a little over $135 billion on Christmas and another $13 billion on Easter…We have branded Jesus beyond recognition. Church has become a business. Jesus is our marketing scheme."
Now, this does not mean that you shouldn't ever pick up a Christian CD or book or t-shirt. But there is such a thing as too much. And the question that bothered Bethke was, "Are we really getting it?" Are we getting the truth? Despite the slew of items marketed for Christians by Christians, we have lost Jesus – our fulfillment. This is why, Bethke pointed out, we aren't satisfied with our version of Christianity. And no amount of products will fill that hunger.
"We have religion, but we don't have Jesus. We have a good role model, but we don't have God. We have theological debates, but we don't have the living Word. We have good works, but we don't have the source of good works. We have love, but not the God who is love. We have completely neutered grace (my good works save me, but we still call it grace), made God a math equation (God will like me if I'm good), and turned Jesus into Mr. Rogers. "Howdy, neighbor." But Jesus isn't rocking a cardigan, and he doesn't talk softly through his nose. He's a roaring lion…He isn't safe. His words, his life, and his cross completely destroy the notion of him being safe. His grace is dangerous, ferocious, violent, and uncontrollable. It can't be tamed."
BEING YOU & REAL CHRISTIANITY
During his senior year of college, Bethke served as an RA. He helped students who got locked out of their dorm rooms, he wrote up the few who broke the rules and he lent an ear to those who needed to talk. He heard heartbreak after heartbreak – stories of guys who struggled with anger and depression, girls who had been rejected and abused, daughters and sons who had lost all hope of finding love and acceptance. And as he sat there, he heard time after time, "I can't follow Jesus. I have tattoos…I don't want to give up drinking…I don't hate gays…" And Bethke started thinking about where he was before he was saved.
"Just two years ago, I had struggled with depression. I had struggled with suicidal thoughts. I had struggled with the guilt and shame that so often come with recreational dating. I had spent the first year of college shot-gunning beers, messing around with girls, acting like the world existed to cater my needs, and never taking a second to pull out the emotional, spiritual, and mental shrapnel that had been lodged in my soul by the 'me' lifestyle. Inside I was just a scared little boy who had been deeply insecure his whole life and lived in hope that others would tell me I was good enough."
Bethke's generation is "the most fatherless and insecure generation that has ever lived…" They are willing to do anything for the sake of hearing that they are loved. And he recognized this. But whenever he mentioned Jesus to those students, he would get the same responses.
"When on earth did 'hate gays, can't drink beer, and no tattoos' become the essence of Christianity? It hit me that my friends weren't the ones to blame for their confusion. They had gotten this idea from people they grew up with, churches they went to as kids, or preachers they saw on T.V. It was the church's fault that they thought this was what real Christianity was all about…My peers couldn't separate Jesus from religion because they weren't reading the Bible to learn about Jesus; they were looking to the Christian religion to understand him. What they were rebelling against was religion."
And upon that realization, Bethke started writing, "Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus." He had to share the "good news" – the good news that Jesus is our whole salvation. Real Christianity is not about what you can do and how well you can do it. Real Christianity is centered on Jesus and what He has already done for all of us.
"The Bible isn't a rule book. It's a love letter. I'm not an employee. I'm a child. It's not about my performance. It's about Jesus' performance for me. Grace isn't there for some future me but for the real me. The me who struggled. The me who was messy…He loves me in my mess; he was not waiting until I cleaned myself up…When I was trying to earn Jesus by being good, I missed the real Jesus who wants us to love him and serve him not for what he gives but for who he is—dangerous, unpredictable, radical, and amazing."
In the end, Real Christianity is for real people. Our example, Bethke described, is in the New Testament. The Church was seen as radical because it was a place for the rich and the poor, Gentiles and Jews, men and women. Every sinner was welcome, and that's how the Church should be today.
"We all come in with baggage. We all come in trying to find our way. We all come in with broken edges. In the same way a mosaic is made up of broken, ragged and dirty pieces of glass, so the Church is made up of broken, ragged, and dirty people. But when you zoom out and see the whole picture, you see something beautiful. Broken people living life together is a beautiful picture."