Bumper Stickers; Christians; Tact; Picard

Recently, as I was rolling down the highway, doing a judicious 79 miles an hour on a road zoned for 75*, my sister pointed out a bumper sticker on an SUV we were passing. It read, "Stop, drop, and roll won't work in hell." Admittedly, my sense of humor can drift into the morbid now and again, so, a small part of me did find this passingly amusing. The rest of me did this:

While I typically dislike using "Christian" as an adjective to modify nouns, particularly pertaining to art or culture, this sticker could be labelled as nothing else, aside from "potentially offensive", "alienating", and "as devoid of tact as a Cyberman".** The saddest part may be that this sticker references concepts and occurrences that are of the utmost spiritual and metaphysical importance. In the background are salvation, the death and resurrection of Christ, justification, and sanctification. This particular representation of these ideas, however, is trite and offensive. It does no justice to these concepts to which anyone who knew the truth should cling; to the contrary, it drives many away with what smacks of a sense of superiority.

I am certainly not saying one should base one's concept of evangelism upon offending no one. Some will be offended or turned off. This does not mean we should be careless in what we say and how we say it. It is quite the opposite; when we speak of the greatest and truest things to exist, we should be very, very careful. These are not small things we claim to represent, nor are they casual or ordinary. Awe is a dying concept, and that is a frightening realization. Too often, we speak of great things off-handedly, and trivial matters reverentially. 

On some other day, I'm certain I'll attempt to expand on this, hopefully in a worthy and judicious manner. It is something that deserves a far better treatment than I can give it, but I will give it a go.***

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*Four over is almost always safe (and sometimes, very necessary), unless you are passing through a small town or school zone. If it's the latter, think of the children, and the massive fine you may incur.


**Doctor Who reference. In certain ways, many camps of Christian evangelism operate under mindsets not unlike that of the Cybermen: Convert and become exactly like us, or die. I could write an entire post centering upon this comparison, but I shall refrain.


***Three footnotes is quite more manageable than eight, or however many I got to last time. This may be a feasible system up to five or so footnotes; past that, just counting the bothersome things is annoying for all involved. I shall have to experiment in an attempt to find the optimal range for asterisk-flagged footnotes. Hooray for science!