Outrage de jour

I've been to restaurants and been offered the soupe de jour. According to Meriam-Webster, the term refers to the choice of soup offered that day by the chef. It could be the same today as yesterday, but I wouldn't know it since I almost never eat at any restaurant 2 days in a row. Often times you see the term on a pre-printed menu at the restaurant. It is a way for them to change what they are offering without reprinting menus.

I am beginning to think of much of the global church called "evangelicals" have pre-printed menus of a kind. Only it is not about food. I see it most often on Facebook. The template looks something like this:

Can you believe what (insert some famous person's name) said/did?
or
(Some well-known pastor) is now completely against the Bible.
or
(Some well-publicized event) actually goes completely against God.

Now, like I said, these are templates. Fill in the blank, tweak the wording a bit, and repost on social media to see how many people will fall for it. You want better examples? Ok.

-- Can you believe Obama wants to stifle churches who don't embrace homosexuality?
-- Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Community Church, approves of a heresy called Chrislam.
-- The new movie, Noah, destroys the Biblical account of the flood.

You can find each of the above pretty easily with Google. But the question I am asking is, so what? If they are 100% factual, so what? What does that have to do with the mission of the church of Jesus Christ? And, just in case you missed that mission, reread Matthew 28:18-20.

But back to the point of this post. The chef changes the soup and has a place-holder so he can do so. I submit that our enemy, the devil, has a place-holder of outrage and just changes it at some interval to keep us off-balance, unfocused and unengaged. Folks, if Rick Warren wants to promote a weird blending of Christianity and Islam (and, for the record, he doesn't), our mission as Biblical Christians doesn't change. If a film-maker in Hollywood (who has made absolutely no profession of belief in Jesus) wants to use a Bible story to make a film, what does it matter if he gets the details wrong? His mission is not our mission. His job is to produce entertainment as he sees fit. And, if President Obama (please use his title, the Apostle Paul told us to give honor to whom honor is due) wants to go after churches to advance a political agenda, American churches would simply join the historic church in being targeted by government leaders. And the mission given by Jesus remains the same.

Instead of being upset by the next outrage de jour, tell someone about Jesus. Before you dash off that angry rant about whatever someone has said should upset Christians today, befriend someone who doesn't know Jesus. I can not find a place in the New Testament where the mission of the church was to be angry or upset or outraged by the events in a fallen sinful world. My understanding of Scripture is that we are to be witnesses of God's saving grace. No outrage. Just one sinner humbly telling another sinner about how Jesus came to take the just and full payment for our sin on His own body.