Accidental Pharisees by Larry Osborne

Author:Larry Osborne [Osborne, Larry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780310494454
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2012-07-26T16:00:00+00:00

THE BLESSING AND CURSE OF IDEALISM

I’m not sure why this is true, but passionate faith is often coupled with a zealous idealism and a romanticized view of the past.

On the one hand, our idealism can be a blessing. A healthy dose of idealism drives us to change things. It refuses to fatalistically settle and accept the status quo. It powers the dogged pursuit of what could be and should be. Idealism provides the fuel that turns our crazy dreams into reality.

But on the other hand, idealism can also be a curse. If it flows out of an inaccurate and overly romanticized view of the past, it can lead to a desperate longing for what never was and a deep frustration with whatever is.

Perhaps you have some friends who never enjoy the present because they’re so sure everything used to be better. They’re like greyhounds on the racetrack, chasing a stuffed rabbit they’ll never catch. Their endless pursuit of the perfect marriage, the flawless family, the ideal career, or the perfect church leaves them perpetually unsatisfied.

Yet perpetual discontent is not the worst thing that idealism’s rose-colored memories produce. There is something far worse. It’s cynicism, the negative and harsh critique of everything and everyone. Cynicism is idealism on steroids. It has an eagle’s eye for what is wrong and a bat’s blindness for what’s praiseworthy. The religious leaders of Jesus’ day were classic cynics. They had a long history of killing the prophets and then later erecting monuments in their name.2

Today’s spiritual elite are no different. They too tend to be cynical. They don’t kill anyone, but they’re masters at finding fault, especially with their three favorite whipping boys — the church, its leaders, and current culture. If you read or hear any of their critiques, it’s hard not to become depressed or angry at the church and the world we live in.

But before you lose all hope for the future, you might want to remember two things that today’s negative pundits never seem to bring up. First, they fail to mention that the church, its leaders, and culture have been the target of scathing critiques for centuries. It’s nothing new. Second, they seem to forget that everything has been screwed up since Genesis 3.

So let’s take a brief look at the church, its leaders, and culture to see if things are really as bad as they’ve been made out to be and if yesterday was really as great as everyone says it was.

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