We look crazed, don’t we, we Christians? As if the picture of us is that one with the wild look in his eye, the Believer, who thinks that there is not but one absolute morality (his), everything being a sin if the Bible does not expressly permit it, who wants your children to learn that God created the world in six days (and ban the mere concept that evolution could possibly happen), and basically wants to convert the world according to the fundamental church doctrine. Oh, yes, and who thinks that the Harry Potter series of books promotes literal witchcraft. I know there’s more, but that’s the sketch of things, is it not? And yet, when one looks at the figures, one finds that he of us who holds himself so morally high is nothing but words — his divorce rate, his charitable giving, his potential for criminality is the same or worse than those who hold not that Christ is the Lord, who saith nothing of how one is to be if he would be saved.

Thus, the image of one crazed fits us to some degree, one who speaks as if he were riding on a cloud and sees not the mud it is in which he wallows. We forget that we are sinners, first and foremost, that any of us, all of us fall short of the glory. The best of us is no better than any of them. It is easy to forget that. For however many saints we have, there are just as many of ones just as holy in other faiths. Easy to overlook that one, too. We forget what it is that we truly have going for us, we Christians. It is not the quality of moral character. Nope. All we have is Christ Himself. Whereas the founders of the other faiths told us that they were not gods, Jesus said that before anything was, “I am”. That He did not fall short of the glory. Maybe it is that we need to remember that speaking much and doing little (and being little) is one of the main things He was against. We don’t want to be crazed. We want to be real.

It is not to say that we do not need to declare Him to the world, for He left us with that charge, but that we need to do it in vastly different terms than we have been. Perhaps we should remember the words of St. Francis of Assisi: “Preach the Gospel at all times. Use words when necessary.” Be and do, first. Show, don’t tell. Speak as if knowing we are sinners, who should be grateful for any opportunity. Because we are.