The Bar

Back in my late teens/early 20's I went every now and then on a Monday night to a non-denominational worship rally held at the Canadian Christian college where hundreds of Christian youth-adults would gather. I found it both a refreshing and challenging time, and it gave me a lot of strength during a couple of difficult years as well as teaching me new things as I became an 'adult' in my walk with God.

I'm pretty sure it's the first place I had heard people speaking in tongues, and seen people slain in the spirit, and without opening any sort of ethical or theological discussion on that fact, it was an interesting experience having grown up in the Salvos and never being apart of anything like that before. I had several amazing encounters with others and with God that still blow my mind to think about, but that isn't what has caused me to remember those Monday nights of my youth.

Aside from any of my thoughts on the 'worship' aspect of these nights, there were some amazing speakers. I didn't agree with all of them, and I'm sure they didn't all have it worked out, but nonetheless, each week I felt challenged and encouraged by the words spoken at these Monday night meetings.

There is one speaker on one night that has always stuck out to me, and it's a preach that I've often reflected on when challenged about something personally or by those around me in this particular area.

More or less...this is what he said...

There is bar we have as Christians. A bar that we use to measure up our life choices and decisions, what we use to determine right from wrong.

As we live out our lives as people of the church we start to forget who set that bar, and instead turn our eyes to one another.

We look over at Fred over there and say to ourselves, 'well...at least I'm not doing THAT like he is' and the bar gets lowered a little bit. We then look at Susan over there and say to ourselves, 'well... at least I only do it once a week, not every day like she does', and the bar gets lowered a little bit more. Then we see Tom over there and say to ourselves, 'well...at least I still go to church, unlike him' and the bar gets lowered a little bit more.

This continues, usually without us realizing it, as we justify and rationalize our actions according to how our fellow brothers and sisters are living our their own lives, feeling relief and satisfaction in the fact that at least we're doing it all just that little bit better.

Before you know it, the bar is no longer where it was...far from it. It's settled so far beneath where it should be that perhaps what was 'black and white' becomes grey, and what we always 'knew' to be 'right' now seems cloudy and uncertain.

The problem is that we're all fallen, weak, sinful human beings, and therefore it will only cause us harm and compromise to compare ourselves against one another. There is in fact only one that we can be justified against...only one who should be telling us where that bar needs to be, without allowing it to slowly get lower.

That about summarizes the preach, and of course, preaching to teens and young adults it held great impact, because temptation, justification and compromise comes with the territory of growing up and learning our way in the world.

Thinking about it now though, I think it's an even bigger danger for those who are 'adults'. Teenagers have the excuse of hormones, peer pressure, high school, the influence of the media, and so forth to fall back on...and usually, eventually, they learn from their mistakes.

When you're an adult and you've come to the conclusion that you've worked it all out, that you're solid in your walk with God, or that you're a great contributor to the church and Christian community....I think you're actually at a much bigger risk at letting that bar slowly slip from where God had set it to where it's just a little bit more comfortable to suit the lifestyle you've chosen or the choices you have made. The problem then becomes, that it's a whole lot harder to admit to yourself that perhaps the bar has slipped or even to get it back to where it should be, because at least with teenagers, they're in a time in their life to be molded and formed and are just extremely teachable. It's not always the case once we hit the point of deciding that we've got things pretty much figured out.

There's probably a multitude of directions you could take the analogy preached about so many years ago to a much younger version of myself, as well as ways to discuss the theology of it or how it practically plays out.

Regardless....it's a thought someone once had to preach about to a group of a couple hundred youth, and I've got to say, it's stuck.

Probably a good thing to pop back into my mind every now and then as I take a look at my own bar, the slippery sucker that it is, and ask God to help me get it back up to where we both know it's supposed to be.