You Won’t Build a Solid Foundation for Christianity by Depending on People Like “Chreasters”

Mark A. Kellner, the religion reporter for the Washington Times, offers a very timely observation for Christians who may be complacent regarding their beliefs and the Great Commission, which obligates Christians to spread that belief.

He writes, “The Resurrection of Jesus is the foundation of the Christian faith, but a significant portion of those who celebrate it on Easter do not believe it to be true.”

Kellner goes on to cite the results of two surveys, “Last year, Lifeway Research reported that 23% of American adults said the Bible’s account of Jesus’ rising from the dead is not accurate, and a Whitestone Insight survey of people in Britain showed 25% of self-identified Christians saying the Resurrection is ‘a myth.’”

It’s our belief that these “Christians” are mostly believers in Easter’s three-day holiday and Easter egg hunts.

Regular church attendees refer to these folks as “Chreasters,” or CEO’s, who only attend church on Christmas and Easter only. Attendance then is only by force of habit, to keep the grandparents happy and children in the will.

You can’t build a solid foundation for Christianity by depending on people like that.

They know the story of Christ, but they reject his divinity and instead embrace the secular holiday.

What’s concerning is the people who are entrusted with attracting new believers and nourishing the faithful, who are also going wobbly on the Resurrection, to borrow a phrase from Margaret Thatcher.

Kellner found “a copywriter for a North Carolina megachurch last month said she would tailor the church’s Easter messages for nonbelievers by omitting words like ‘resurrection’ that could ‘make someone feel like an outsider.’”

That’s what happens when the marketing department seizes control of the pulpit.

We’re assuming the copywriter in this instance isn’t familiar with the New Testament.

Her variety of watered-down religion and her watered-down church was specifically addressed by Jesus in Revelation 3:14-21 and the ruling wasn’t positive.

At the time of the early church crucifixion was regarded as a shameful fate reserved for criminals and failed revolutionaries. That’s why it was a truly transgressive act for the believers then to embrace the symbol of the cross and all it entailed.

Paul summed it up in only four words: “We preach Christ crucified!“

Modern “Christians” who are embarrassed by their faith and want to blend in with the secular culture, want to sidestep the Resurrection and any hint of Christ’s divinity.

Kellner found (although we would substitute the more accurate weak and untrustworthy for “well-intentioned”) “Well-intentioned Christians and well-intentioned Christian intellectuals and academics have tried to explain it away,” Father Guilbeau, vice president of ministry and mission at the Catholic University of America said.

“That it’s a symbol for something else that there either was no Resurrection [or] is no Resurrection, and there’s a reduction of the Christian mystery or the benefit of being a Christian or following Christ, reducing Christ to that of a philosopher or a teacher, a moral leader.”

That’s a diluted, worldly option that Christ himself denies us.

As C. S. Lewis wrote, “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him [that is, Christ]: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say.

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg-or else he would be the Devil of Hell.

“You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.  . . . You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.

“But let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

As our readers finish this column the day before Easter, we want to remind believers that the phrase Christians have been saying for centuries is just as true today as it was in 32 AD, “He is risen, He is risen indeed!” 

(A related article may be found here.)

Michael Reagan, the eldest son of President Reagan, is a Newsmax TV analyst. A syndicated columnist and author, he chairs The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Michael is an in-demand speaker with Premiere speaker’s bureau. Read Michael Reagan’s Reports — More Here.

Michael R. Shannon is a commentator, researcher for the League of American Voters, and an award-winning political and advertising consultant with nationwide and international experience. He is author of “Conservative Christian’s Guidebook for Living in Secular Times (Now With Added Humor!)” Read Michael Shannon’s Reports — More Here.

© Mike Reagan