Earlier today I came across a friend online that I haven’t had the chance to hang with in this decade. It is always interesting to see how a friend’s life has changed and even how much I have changed during this time. Back in the day we were all in youth group together. We saw each other every few days, went on trips, and everyone was really close. This is the same experience most kids have during their student years.

My friend had stumbled on some CVC posting via links in my facebook account. I’m sure by the looks of CVC I look like a wise cracking heathen far from God. The truth is that is I care passionately about the gospel; I care about the church, I want God’s people to rise up and do the right thing. Most people don’t realize that. They just know the sarcastic guy cracking wise. So I want to change that and let you in on what I have been working through during my years of ministry and during these last two years at Culture Versus Christian.

Everyone has a story of hurt in the church. Most think that they have had the worst experience. I thought the same thing for the longest time. Friends fail, Christians fail, Ministers fail. The details are not important and to this day could still cause pain to others. Let’s just say that bad things happen in churches. Horrifying things. Sad things.

My first lesson as a young adult was that I could put no faith in people, even those called Christian.

About this time in life I started playing drums in a Christian band. You know what I found out? Friends fail, Christians fail, Ministers fail. And I’m included in that number. You see, when you’re in a Christian band you think that you’re doing every bit of it for Jesus. It is not true. Some things I did for me; like get that one girl’s phone number. Signing autographs fed my ego. Being in a band points people to you. Sometimes it is hard to be pointing at Christ. Friends fail, Christians fail, Ministers fail, and I fail.

I was Christian cool. I had the WWJD bracelet; I could give you the run down of popular CCM bands and had a Christian T-Shirt for every day of the week. It probably would have been better if I read more scripture and learned more about the teachings of Jesus because I was turning into the same hurtful type of douche bag that I hated.

I started to see how judgmental Christians were. Myself included. I got angry. My church was falling apart, the band was gone, and all of this ministry we all talked about seemed pretty fruitless. I wasn’t leading anyone to Christ.

Then I started seeing the Christian industry for what it was. A whole business had been built around music, clothing, trendy books, etc. Christian television was a joke. Some say ministers excel because they are called by God. Some of these guys excel because of clever marketing. I noticed a trend. This Christian Industry was always asking me for money.

About age twenty I started working in youth ministry. By this time I had built up a lot of damage. I didn’t trust Christians and ministers, but I was among their ranks. I was determined to change things from the inside out. I don’t know what I was trying to accomplish. I wanted to see acceptance for those who were rejected. And I got angry whenever I saw someone being rejected.

Church started getting more and more ridiculous to me. We all gathered in a little building every week. The music would start, the tears would flow, the preacher would preach and the altar call was the payoff. But no lives would be changed. It was something we would do every week. To be fair, the people of the church were sincere, but we were missing something. Convincing people they are missing something is not very easy.

I eventually gave up trying.

Culture Versus Christian started in anger. I was pissed off at Christians; especially ministers. I had already learned as a musician that it is easy to get wrapped up in yourself. I met ministers and saw others on TV that were more concerned with a career than a ministry. I wanted to say things that I could not say in the church without being kicked out.

I’ve also got this really bad sarcastic bug and hooking up with James (Jones McAlister) made it even more fun. James and I both felt the same things about the church. We thought it was in trouble. Lots of my friends did. So we set out to create this thing online to create a voice for those who had no where else to say it. Culture Versus Christian became my outlet to vent my frustration with the church, with jokes.

At first we wanted to blast the church. It was venom. We lashed out on all of those who hurt us. It ruffled some feathers but more than anything else, people agreed.

At this point I no longer considered myself an evangelical as defined by religitards and the republican party. I believed in the gospel. I believed in preaching the gospel. I just could not live inside of the culture of church.

James and I started reading books about the Emergent Church. On the surface everything looked awesome. They understood the postmodern generation and relational ministry. I thought this was were I should be until I looked into their theology. Let’s just say we disagreed. Culture Versus Christian started talking about the emergent movement with the same venom as we talked the evangelical. They probably didn’t deserve everything we served them.

I know. There is a lot of anger here. But we talked it out over the past couple of years. When you listen to CVC from the first episode you see a progression of anger through movements. Then we were over it. After a while we weren’t angry anymore. We said what we needed to say. We’ve even made peace with some people. We’ve made a lot of jokes at other’s expense and we’ve had a lot of laughs.

In the end, I am not evangelical or emergent. However, I am more confident in my faith than ever. Instead of looking toward trends and new things, I began to look backwards to the apostles and the history of the early church. I’m trying to understand how it all start before it was perverted by history.

Now its time to put my ministry where my mouth is. I screamed about relational ministry for years. Now I have to continue to make relationships. Instead of talking about the stupidity of the church, I want to talk about Jesus.

But there will still be jokes..