Jason In Real Life

Here is a great story on me and my book. It starts off hilarious:

[Here’s an interview I just did. Enjoy!]

***
Jason T. Berggren has written a book entitled 10 Things I Hate About Christianity (X-Media). Before you reach for the pitchfork, hear the young man out. 

Faith,
prayer, the Bible, church, Christians and even love are all problematic
for Mr. Berggren, but he writes as a committed Christian—his book is
subtitled Working Through the Frustration of Faith. 

A member of the nondenominational North Point Community Church in Atlanta, Mr. Berggren spoke recently with staff writer Mary Jacobs.
So what do you hate the most about Christianity?
I
think that the most difficult aspect of my faith is love. Ever since I
can remember, I’ve been thinking about myself. To put others first is a
challenge, to be honest. 

I’d like to qualify that these are 10
things I hate about Christianity. I don’t hate Christianity. That word
“about” is there for a reason and it’s an important distinction.

Why should Methodists listen to what you hate about Christianity?
The
average church has 80 percent turnover every two years, so I just wrote
this book for that 80 percent. I put a lot of real life in here. I am
trying to drill down on what it means to have an authentic faith. Like
a lot of people, I get tired of pretense and seemingly hidden agendas
and formulaic type things. I’m talking about everything that we
followers talk about behind closed doors. I just throw it out in the
open. It’s a great way to get people to talk about Jesus in a diverse
audience.

Have you done that?
Yeah. I got on ABC News. That’s pretty diverse.

One of the questions you’re getting a lot: Why’d you use the word hate?
I
wrestled with using the word and I batted the idea around with a few
friends. They were always on both sides of this. It’s like a lightning
rod. Some were saying, “Can’t you use ‘really, really don’t like’?”
Others said, “You can only think of 10 things? I can think of about
30.” 

It’s a passionate and an honest word. I use it for that
deep sense of dissatisfaction that can propel you to move forward. Like
the feeling I get on New Year’s Day when I look in the mirror at myself
and say, “I hate the way you look, Jason. You’ve gotta change
something.” It’s that angst-ridden frustration that can move you
forward. On the back of the book, the definition I have is, “a feeling
of dislike so strong that it demands action.” 

Hate, of course, is used throughout the Bible, and I thought the context in which I used it worked and was appropriate.

If you hate all this stuff, why are you still a Christian?
Because
I know it’s true. What I’m doing in this book is what the Apostle Paul
says in the book of Philippians: to work out your salvation. This book
is just me working it out and working it through.

But if there’s all this negative stuff around Christianity, what still holds you?
God
is real and Jesus rose from the dead. There is nothing more hopeful and
positive and real to me than being reconciled with our Creator, no
matter how messy or difficult or confusing it can be. It’s the only
reason I have any peace and hope and sanity in my life. My faith gives
me the ability to navigate the unknown. I know there’s purpose to my
life and there’s value in each experience, or there can be.

Does your book offer any prescriptions for how we can be better Christians?
I
just don’t present problems. I come to personal resolutions. They may
not be the resolutions that everyone will come to out of their
experience. But the point is, there is a way to work through your faith
and a process to come to resolution. 

I have a chapter about
Christians and about church. I have what I deem to be some of my own
solutions gathered through my own experiences.

Such as?
One thing Christians can do is just talk normal.

Well, hallejujah and amen to that, brother.
Exactly!
Say you’re at work, and someone asks, “How was your weekend?” and the
Christian says, “Blessed.” What the heck does that mean? Drop the
“hallelujah” and “in the spirit” and “quickening” and all these phrases
that alienate people. I think we need to be careful when we’re around
people who aren’t Christians. The biggest challenge Jesus gives us is
to make disciples. When we alienate people, we get in the way of that.

You write that you hate the Bible, in part, because it’s boring.
I get a lot of hate mail on that.

But
that implies that the Bible should be entertaining. Which, one could
argue, could spring out of a very 21st-century American sense of
entitlement.
Portions of the Bible are boring. That’s just
the reality. I’m not trying to make excuses for it; it’s just the
truth. The flip side of that is when I began my journey of faith
someone gave me a King James Version, and they were fairly dogmatic
that I really needed to study that version. For a 16- or 17-year-old, a
King James Version has enough thees, thous, thines and hithertos—it’s
just going to be a barrier. We don’t talk like that. The King’s English
just isn’t very helpful. So I moved onto a more modern translation of
the Bible. That really helped me as I read through the Scriptures.

But you must still find something compelling about the Bible, if you’re still a Christian. What is that?
I
get a history of God’s interactions with humanity and his reconciling
us to himself. From the very beginning with the first sin, and the
prophecy that the Messiah would come, and God saying that he would
bruise a serpent’s head, to the very end when Jesus comes back—you’re
making me get all theological here!—to the very end in Revelation with
the white throne judgments!

And would there be anything else?
(Laughs.)
Really, that’s a story of God reuniting us with him until the very end.
It’s a messy history. And in fact, that’s what gives it validity to me.
If the Bible were manipulated by powerful people to control others,
they wouldn’t leave in all the gruesome details.

Or the boring ones.
Yes. They would make people more perfect, and they would frame God in a different light.

Did you take mainline Protestant churches to task in your book?
I
do deal with “high church” ceremony, ritual, repetition—being really
stuck in a way of doing something that doesn’t appeal to the culture.
I’m not saying change the message; I’m saying maybe adjust the strategy
to integrate into culture. 

I visited a very traditional church
that wasn’t Methodist with a friend and my wife, who had been there for
many years. We were there 3-1/2 hours—between the service and the
coffee and donuts—but no one said “hi” to us. They said “hi” to my
wife, who is drop-dead gorgeous, but no one said “hi” to us. I know I’m
a big, bald, mean-looking guy, but not one person said “hi” to us.
There was this real insider focus and that’s not right. 

I think
we’ve really got to not compromise our doctrine or our theology, but
maybe our style needs to morph a little bit. I just think the essential
goal is we’ve got to represent that Jesus is alive and God is real with
excellence and passion in how we do things. What we do has to represent
that reality. 

I love John Wesley. He’s a great church
father—don’t get me wrong. But I didn’t grow up in church, so I’m not
drawn to that. Organ music and pews, to some people, are very relevant,
and I’m not going to deny that. To the average person who didn’t grow
up in church, that’s probably not going to appeal. But I could be
wrong.

(Source for the article: http://www.umportal.org/article.asp?id=5444)