Has Christianity become just another religion that manipulates our culture? Bryan Winchester distinguishes between being a Christian and being a Christ-follower.

Questions for Discussion and Personal Reflection

  1. Do you believe that we all have unique gifts and talents?
  2. Would you feel more fulfilled if you intentionally used your gifts to help others?

The process for me of understanding cultural Christianity in America was really interesting. Um, I really initially couldn't really distinguish it. Uh, I just thought of, like, "Oh all Christians are just Christians." I thought it was just kind of a universal thing. And I was sold a lot of things about America being a Christian nation, about a Republican being a Christian voter, from homeschooling to politics to morality. All these things that were used to define what a Christian is. "Oh, you need to homeschool your kids or you need to vote this way or you need to..." and as I started seeing that more and more, I did develop, I guess you would say, a distaste for it myself. Became, became annoying, made me sometimes not want to be perceived as being that. It really got to the core for me of, "Well then, why am I a Christian? What does that mean?" Because no— definitely not being ashamed of Christ, yet at the same time by being ashamed of certain associations, you become detached from why you're a Christian in the first place. And for me, seeing annoyances in other people, I had to start thinking about in which ways am I annoying? In which ways do I impose things on other people? In which ways do I assume that I'm better than someone else, uh, because of what I believe? When I think of religion, and I think of all the atrocious things which have been done in the name of religion, including things done in the name of Christianity— God's Word used to manipulate purposes, to manipulate people— religion has been a powerful tool that has, has been used in evil ways, but the world without Christianity is the world without Christ. It's— he is the answer to that wickedness. He is the answer to those manipulations, to the wickedness that is in our own hearts. And so I— when I think about the world without Christianity, I think of us completely left to our own. The wickedness of the human heart would continue to reveal itself.