Rebel with a Cause

Written by Dave Edwards

The best thing I ever did in the backseat of a car was connect with the life of Christ. I sat in the back one afternoon riding home from church and recalled the preacher’s closing story of a young man who had resisted God’s offer of eternal life. In the story, this young man was hit by a tractor while crossing the road and dragged into eternal separation from God.

Aside from the flaw in the story about not being able to outrun a tractor (Pavarotti could outrun most farm machinery), the story made its impact on my 9 year-old heart. As I rode home in the backseat, I realized that for the first time in my life I felt the urgency of faith. I had been introduced to Christianity with a cause, and it wanted me. The next Sunday I walked the isle and signed a card. I had my fire insurance that I would miss out on all that burning in the dark.

That knowledge of eternal salvation held me up to my teenage years. But adolescence brought a new Christian cause: discovering and managing my sexuality. All faith seemed to now rest in my ability to exercise abstinence.

Sermon story plots changed to include young men and women, some who chose abstinence and some who did not. The results were similar to the stories in which people were hit and dragged into eternity by a tractor.

Like many other teenagers, I was a kid struggling to find a balance between two worlds: my teen world and my church world. I faced my share of tempting relationships. But eventually, the things of God with which I had saturated my heart won out. I was convinced that true love waits and that the pure in heart still sees God, so I said yes to purity, both sexually and for my soul. I was overwhelmed with the desire to stay pure for God. I walked the aisle to the altar, signed a card, and placed a promise ring on my finger. The cause had me.

But it wouldn’t be the last cause to come my way. College brought me into contact with a more liberal-minded theology. I was a religion major studying in a department I felt was bent on de-Christianizing the ministry, removing anything sacred from the Bible and taking away the believer’s worship and witness of God – all for the sake of tolerance. They preached "Love God by accepting everything and everybody regardless of who they are or what they believe. Above all else, do not confront for any reason." This experience left my soul flat and feeling one-dimensional. I endured the years of liberal study and watched that cause parade by.

As an adult, the Christian cause took on many forms. I was told to be "a man of God." This movement said a godly man was faithful, consistent, and acceptable in all his ways. This cause established groups to monitor the behavior of such godly men. I was given a morality checklist to use as my daily behavior meter, along with a commitment card to solidify my decision to behave like a man of God – so I signed it.

We all have been pummeled by a never-ending succession of religious causes. Like waves of the ocean, they will continue to break against us. But causes stand or fall based on the soundness of their foundations.

The cause of Christ comes to live in a person and changes the dark soul into light. Like one candle igniting another, Christ’s life has lit us. The light has awakened us. We have heard the word of the Lord; Awake, O sleeper, rise from your sleep – God shines on you.

The dream of God is that people walking in communion with Him would bring His presence into this earth and bring His re-creating life into the dark world. No religious event or righteous cause can accomplish this. Regardless of our status in life, everything can be reduced to a state of singleness. Every one of us must choose the single thing or the single one we will follow. We must choose the single thing that will direct and give the meaning and purpose of life we crave. That’s why I have chosen only one cause for my life: Christ Himself living in me. 

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