This article appears courtesy of Rev Magazine.

Ideological Jerks?
by Dan Kimball

I was reading the liner notes to the latest CD by the very popular musician Moby called “18”, and he wrote something interesting. He says:

“I used to be a rigid vegan, Christian, dance enthusiast, Marxist etc. and I was so locked into my beliefs that I genuinely believed that I was right and that anyone who disagreed with me was wrong. Luckily, time passed and I’ve hopefully become less of an ideological jerk. I’m still vegan and I love Christ…but I would never say that I was right in my beliefs and someone who disagreed with me was wrong.”

I know that Moby is touring this summer with David Bowie and the CD is currently #10 on the Billboard charts (when I am writing this) representing hundreds of thousands of people reading what he wrote. I have such an inner turmoil as I think of that and read his words, because part of me knows exactly what he is saying. So, often Christians come across as “ideological jerks”. I have seen Christians so arrogantly and most times unintelligently and without any compassion, fire away at other world faiths and other belief systems like they would in a carnival shooting gallery. I have seen Christians dismiss anything anyone else has to say that doesn’t line up with the conservative evangelical opinion. So, my heart resonates with the sadness of when Ambassadors for Jesus come across as “jerks”.

At the same time, my turmoil is knowing that Jesus does make certain claims which He fully makes certain that what He says is “right”. There will be times when Jesus says and teaches things that I know other people will disagree with. As a follower of Jesus, I need to disagree with those who say different and that Jesus is wrong. Yet, how we disagree is the key in this post-Christian culture. I don’t think Moby was thinking of Jesus as an ideological jerk, but probably was thinking of some of His followers today. More then ever, in our pluralistic culture, we need to be able to very, very lovingly and very intelligently defend and explain to the best we can, what we believe and why. If we only use shallow and uncaring blunt statements, people will only see us as “jerks” and rightfully so. We need to break the stereotypes that unfortunately are many times true. And as we do, people may walk away still disagreeing and think we are crazy, but I hope our attitudes will only show the love of Jesus and intelligence and we won’t be known as “jerks”.