8/20/2025

If you didn’t grow up in a church with a checklist, you really missed out. I went to a fundamentalist church as a child and a fundamentalist high school, and they both had lists of things we, as Christians, should not do (notice the word “not”).

But their lists weren't necessarily the same.

There were some things they both agreed on: movies, drinking, smoking, dancing (dancing was always a big no-no!). But while my school’s list included secular music of any kind, the fundamentalist church pastor would listen to anything! They both included dress codes (especially for women), but while my school had hair codes for men, my church had hair codes for men and women. 

And as long as you don’t violate the list . . . 

What an enormous waste of time! 

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are morality lists in the New Testament. Christ saved his people out of a pagan society, and these young believers had to understand how their lives in Christ were different from the lives of their pagan neighbors. 

And it wasn’t different just for the sake of difference! Many of the fundamentalists I have dealt with reveled in their difference, and whether it was big hair or handling snakes or not going to movies or not listening to rock ‘n’ roll or not listening to the right kind of gospel music, their identity, and their pride was and is in the difference.

My favorite of the morality lists comes from Colossians 3:

“Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry) . . .   But now you must get rid of all such things: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth.  Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices  and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator.” (Colossians 3:5-10)

This is Paul describing the old life – behaviors the believers were to shed like taking off old dirty rags. What do each of these “earthly” practices have in common? They all have to do with relationships that we have with one another. How do we relate to one another? In Greek society, a free man had great latitude when it came to whom he had sex with. “I love you,” often meant then as it means now, “I love me and I want to use you to make me feel good.” But Paul doesn’t stop with physical relations. He goes on writing of abusive practices and attitudes that have no place in the body of Christ (i.e. anger, wrath, malice, slender, and abusive language). Paul calls for honesty among believers, because dishonesty is part of that old self that we have stripped off. 

We don’t live like the pagans, but the real difference is seen in the way we relate to one another.

I can’t think of more than a couple of things that the moral codes I grew up shared with Paul’s list.  And I didn’t see anything about dancing or women’s hair on his list at all! (Now, Paul does talk about women’s dress, including hairstyles, in I Timothy, but that’s because Christian women shouldn’t dress like Artemis acolytes . . . but that’s for another Pastor’s Note). 

But wait! There’s more! If we’ve taken off something, Paul says that we should clothe ourselves with something else. So he gives us another list:

“Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.  Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.  Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” (Colossians 3:12-15)

I don’t have to tell you that none of these things were on any of the moral codes I was raised on. Why? Because it’s easy to keep a list AND keep a bad attitude or hold on to an unforgiving spirit. Yes, my hair meets the dress code . . . but does my heart? No, I might not dance, but am I crippled by anger or bitterness? 

I said at the top of this note that if you didn’t grow up in the church with a checklist that you really missed out. What did you miss out of? For some of us, it was guilt, impending doom or fear of being cut off from the group. For others, it was a self-righteous certainty that, as long as I keep the list, I’m OK. 

Christianity is not about a list. Christianity is about a relationship – first a relationship of love for God which, second, results in a relationship of love for others. Loving God . . . Loving Others. 

That’s a two-item list I can get behind!

Blessings,
Pastor Terry