Starting Simple

My daughter Angela got a ukelele for her sixth birthday. She was so excited to learn how to play it! I looked at the lesson book that came with it and discovered a song that used only one chord--C. And that C chord used only one finger! So I tuned the ukelele, showed her the C chord and played her that one song. She took off from there. She even made up a song using that C chord.

"What chord do you want me to learn next, Daddy?"
"I don't know. What looks easy?"
She gave me a list of three. I picked one, and she was off again.

I wonder sometimes if we don't make Christianity too difficult for people. We've had some new people come to our church lately. When they've asked whether we have classes for them to take, I've given them a six-session DVD that teaches the Christian faith from a Lutheran perspective. I let people watch that on their own. Then I have them come together for a session to summarize the lessons and to learn some things about Our Savior's congregation specifically. I think that's pretty simple.

But what if someone came and said, " I want to learn about being a Christian. I don't know anything."? Would I give them that six-session video? Would I drop the Bible in their lap and tell them to start reading? Would that make them want to come back for more? I'm not so sure.

The Jews of Jesus time had 613 commandments and a host of rituals that people were supposed to learn and do. Jesus took those 613 commandments and boiled them down to two: "Love God with your whole being, and love your neighbor at least as much as you love yourself" (Matthew 22:37-39, my translation). And in case that should be a burden, one of Jesus' followers wrote this: "We love because God first loved us" (1 John 4:19). You can learn quite a bit about God and the Christian faith just from those two verses. What's more, they might result in more qustions.

"How can I love God?"
"How do I know God loves me?"
"Who is my neighbor?" There's a great story that goes with that one!

There's even a children's song to go with the verse from 1 John. I wonder if you can play it with just a C chord.

Blessings to you.
John