Every day, something reminds me why I hate living in the Bible Belt.

Church signs are usually the culprit.

Classics include:
“Jesus always answers his knee-mail”.
“Fight truth decay- read your Bible!”
“The best vitamin for a Christian is B1”
“Thanksgiving? Come in and let’s talk Turkey. ~God” (Since when does God speak Poultry to people?)
or my personal favorite:
“No dropped calls on the GloryLine Express” (Yep, this is one I really saw with my own eyes. I have no idea what it means.)

Or sometimes my hatred will spring forth at Bible Belt usage of the phrase “I’m praying for you”. It isn’t a bad thing to tell someone you are praying for them if you are actually doing it. If, however, you are using it as code for “This conversation is boring me and I really don’t care about your problems so I am going to get out of it without looking like a troll” then you are wrong.

Rebekah: Hi, Sally! I haven’t seen you in a while. How have you been?
Sally: Well, I’m homeless, I haven’t eaten in three days, and some punk kid just kicked me in the stomach so I may have internal bleeding.
Rebekah: Well, sister, I am praying for you! Oops! Gotta go! The potluck supper at church won’t prepare itself without me! God bless!

Or how about youth group T shirts? I am not really sure why someone hasn’t sued the people who make these for copyright infringement. There should be some legal ramifications for the people who think it is cool to take a corporate logo or slogan and Jesusify it. American Christians seem to be addicted to taking a secular something that was respectably creative and bastardizing it into something lame. These T shirt companies (these are real designs you can purchase) are to these types of Christians like an all-you-can-eat-buffet to the cast of Biggest Loser. They just can’t help themselves.

Not to mention how Bible Belt Christians (in particular) pick and choose which sins are bad and which ones can be ignored. Like why is it wrong to drink a glass of wine (although Jesus himself made wine as his first miracle) but it is totally fine (funny even) if you eat 2 dozen Krispy Kreme donuts by yourself between Sunday School and church? So alcohol consumption is out, but gluttony is okay.

I am sick of Christians. And yet I am one. I guess you could say (to borrow from the great theologian Ice-T) I don’t hate the playa, I hate the game. I hate that fellow believers feel like the gospel by itself isn’t cool enough, so they have to come up with some crazy marketing scheme to make it a product people will want to buy in to. It isn’t a product, or a self-help five step program. Real, saving faith in God can’t be put into a cute little box with one of those Icthus fish on the top of it. If someone tells you otherwise, they are trying too hard to market a product that isn’t theirs to sell.

Please hear me when I say that I am guilty of doing all of these cheesy things at some point in my life too. Mainly when I was in high school, but even now, there are times when I try to market the “Jesus product” too. If I have done this to you, please know that I am truly sorry, but chances are I will do it again someday. It is so entrenched in my upbringing that I don’t even know when I am doing it. I love Jesus. It is his followers (myself included) who make me cringe.

The Jesus I love was completely misunderstood. His followers have tried to oversimplify everything. The Jesus I love was born in a barn, and lived as a carpenter in a hick town in the Middle East. His followers build mega-churches and multimedia explosion shows and TV channels “for his glory”. The Jesus I love’s best friends were the sketchy people of the day (prostitutes, fishermen, tax collectors, etc.). His followers retreat into Christian schools, gated communities, and Upwards basketball leagues so they can keep their perfect children away from the riff raff of the real world. The Jesus I love said stuff like, “if you want to be the greatest make yourself the least” and “It is easeir for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God” and “Those who humble themselves will be exalted and those who exalt themselves will be humbled”.  His followers have bastardized that into “If you want to be the greatest, make lots of money, give it to the church’s building fund, and wear Jesus around your neck like your favorite bling” and “It is harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a democrat to enter the kingdom of God and “Those who humble themselves will be given nursery duty and those who exalt themselves will be given a chance to tell everybody about it during “testimony time” on Sunday.

You see, Christians (ESPECIALLY Bible Belt Christians) have made a big business of taking Jesus and making him look like the rest of the world. Back in the day, Jesus was totally avant-garde. No one had seen anything like him. I imagine him to be unruly looking with a long scraggly beard and poofy hair, uncool robes and junky old sandals. He hung out with the folks that nobody else seemed to like- hookers, tax collectors, firshermen (imagine like Cajun swamp fishermen) women and children (both groups were second rate back then). He said things that no one had ever heard before and did miracles that no one had ever seen before. He didn’t have a home. He ate whatever he could find. He washed people’s feet, which is modern day equivalent to wiping their butts for them. If you came in contact with him, you had to form an opinion about him- he was either a psychopath or really God on earth like he said he was. That’s the guy I can get behind. That’s the kind of guy who is worthy of my worship. Modern day Christians have taken that awesomeness and turned him into something like a Disney prince. All those Disney princes are just the same (same face, same voice, same cheesy lines to the princesses) but with different hair color. Jesus’s followers have taken him and made him into a Dinsey prince of religion- just like all the other Buddhas, Mohammeds, and Oprahs out there.

I love analogies, so here is one for this situation. I guess this is more of a parable really…

Imagine the USA has been waiting in turmoil for generations for a new president. There has been much speculation about where this president would come from and when he would rise to power. There has been prophecy about what he would be like. Some think he would be from New York, others from Silicon Valley. Some think he would be a powerful businessman, others a wise judge. So one day a man from Mexico crosses the border and claims that he is the new president of the USA that we have been waiting for. He is about 4 feet tall, has tattoo sleeves, crazy long hair and beard (which looks especially interesting on his small stature), owns only one tattered shirt from the ACDC  tour of ’76 and has spent his life until now being a lawnmower mechanic in Juarez. His name is Juan.”Guess what, homies,” Juan says in his thick Mexican accent. “I am the new president of the USA. I have come to save the USA from all of its troubles. In fact, I am come not only be president the USA, but president of the whole world.”

Naturally people think this mess is bananas. The president comes from Yale or Wall Street- not a small motors shop in Juarez. Most people ignore him. The only people who pay attention to him are crazies like truckers, meth-addict hookers, and Fantasy Island fans (because Juan looks like a goth version of Tattoo from the show). He doesn’t have a place to live so he travels from city to city with his growing entourage of meth heads and Fantasy Island lovers. Slowly, reports start to surface about some amazing stuff that Juan has done. In LA, he got the Bloods and Crypts to form a union and pick up trash off of the highways. In Harlem, he raised seventy million dollars for the school system and got every single student to graduate from high school. In Texas, he assembled a team of Oil company Executives to develop and launch a fleet of all-electric cars that cost $50 each. In DC, Republicans and Democrats decided to abandon the party system all together and spend their time volunteering at hospitals to create affordable health care for those in need. He did things that no one believed could ever happen. More people started to listen to him. His love for people was undeniable. He spent all of his waking moments talking to people about their problems and helping them. If someone was sick, he’d heal them. If a family needed a place to live, he find them one. If someone was hurting from a loss, he’d spend hours talking to them about it. He would say things like “If you really want to be happy, you should sell everything you have and serve others”. Or “Our friends in the Middle East need help. We should all move into a tent city and let them come over and live in our houses. We don’t need them anyway”. Or “The people who have the most money should be the ones who clean the toilets and the ones who have nothing get to play golf all day.” Juan was so amazing and loving and giving that he made people see how selfish and horrible their own hearts were.

You couldn’t listen to him without loving  or hating him. He made you take a side. Pretty soon, the lines were drawn. Those who hated him wanted to assassinate him so he could never be president. The time came when he was going to announce his campaign at a big rally. Everyone was expecting a huge arena with video screens and confetti canons. The media had rumored that Lady Gaga was to perform after his announcement in a lawnmower costume. All eyes were on Juan. Instead of pulling up in a limo, he rode a purple segway a friend let him borrow. Instead of announcing his run for election, he said, “Some of yous is going to assassinate me on Friday. Three days after that, I will come back alive and be president of the whole world. Gracias”. Lady Gaga didn’t perform. People knew Juan was weird, but this was a whole new level of weird.

Sure enough, that Friday he was hanging out at the neighborhood basketball court with his best friends. Juan noticed a black Crown Vic parked around the corner and he put the basketball down and walked over to it. He knocked on the window of the car and said, “Go ahead and do what you have to do” and stepped back, waiting. Three men got out of the car and bludgeoned him to almost death right there in front of everyone. As he lay on the ground bleeding, they spit on him and called him “wetback” and “midget” and “freak”. Then they  stripped him naked and fake saluted him, saying “yes, sir Mr. President”. Juan simply looked at the men and said, “I love you and your families and I want you all to have a wonderful life here in the USA. I am giving  you everything I have- even my own life so that the USA can know true peace and leadership”. And with that, they slit Juan’s throat and he died. The men from the Crown Vic high fived each other and drove off. His friends didn’t even know what to do. Juan was supposed to be president and now he was dead. How was he going to help them now?

Three days later, everyone was gathering for Juan’s funeral. Two of his hooker friends went to the funeral home to make sure his ACDC shirt looked presentable. When they got there, his casket was empty. “Where’s Juan?” they asked. Suddenly a man appeared out of nowhere and said, “Why are you looking for an alive person in this funeral home? He’s not here- he rose from the dead”. The hookers freaked and ran off to tell the truckers and meth-heads (who had quit using at this point), thinking that some trickster had stolen the body. As they were running in their high heels and mini-skirts, one of them tripped over something in the road. They realized that it was a very short man. “Oh snap!!” They said. “We didn’t see you- we were in a hurry to get back to our friend Ray Ray’s crib- some crackhead stole our friend’s dead body!” As they were explaining the story to this short man, he began to look familiar, until one of the hookers recognized him.

“Juan??? Is that you?? You were dead!! How is you alive now??” To which Juan replied, “I told you in the press conference that I would raise up from los muertos three days later. Now go tell the others.” And they did. A few minutes later Juan showed up at Ray Ray’s crib. “Que pasa?!?” he casually said to their disbelief. Ray Ray and the crew just stood there with their mouths open. “We all saw you get your throat slit,” they said. “Si. My throat was slit. But I told yous guys that I would raise from los muertos three days later. Yous heard the words that were coming out of my mouth and you didn’t believe me. So here I am.”  Some of them thought it was a trick; that someone had dressed up in an elaborate 4 foot tall Mexican body suit complete with tattoo sleeves. When they tried to unzip the suit Juan said, “What are you doing man? There’s no suit! Check it out- no zippers or nothing!” It was really him. He was alive.

Juan stayed in the USA for a few months and spent time with his friends. He told them “Now I have to go to Washington and be president, but don’t worry, I will send something to help you out while I am not with you and soon you can come live in the White House with me. When you get there, just tell them you are a friend of Juan, and they will let you in. You need to remember the stuff we talked about while I was here, and keep an eye on the Bloods and Crypts and make sure they are still working together and cleaning the streets. Tell other people what you have learned from me, and together we will make the USA a perfect place to be. Adios amigos.” And just like that, he hopped on a Segway and headed for DC.

A month later, his friends we getting discouraged. They hadn’t heard from Juan since he left and they were beginning to wonder if he had forgotten about them. They had gathered at RayRay’s crib to shoot the bull and tell stories of the good times they had with Juan. Just then, a UPS truck pulled up. The delivery man opened the back and the inside of the truck was filled with walkie-talkies. He handed a walkie-talkie to everybody there. When they talked into it, it was Juan on the other end! He was carrying on a personal conversation with all of them. RayRay and the crew go so excited that they passed out walkie-talkies to everyone they could find! Now anybody could talk directly to Juan and get his advice on whatever issue they had. If you were bored, you could tell jokes with Juan. If you were scared, you could tell Juan about it and he would talk you through the fear. Because so many people had a direct line to Juan, they all started acting like him. The USA became a better place. People were risking their lives to help others and giving everything they had to those who needed it and enjoying their lives like they never knew was possible. All because of Juan. All because of the Juan.

Centuries passed. People all over the world were sharing their Juan walkie-talkies with one another and the USA and the whole planet had become a better place because of Juan. But over time the story of Juan had changed. People began to make him sound like someone he wasn’t. The amazing president Juan couldn’t have been only four feet tall- he must have been six feet. And he didn’t have long hair because no president has long hair. He must have had a short man- cut. He didn’t have any tattoo sleeves because that wasn’t a professional look for a president, nor was he Mexican because only good-looking white guys can be commander and chief. So they begin to make posters of a new and improved Juan and passed them out to the people. Juan 2.0 smiled creepily down on them in a business suit, looking like a cross between David Beckham and Aladdin. He was handsome, charming, and so very sweet and inoffensive. Old ladies loved Juan 2.0- he reminded them of their high school sweethearts.

Then people started turning off their walkie-talkies. Instead of asking Juan for help over the walkie-talkie, they would make up what they think Juan 2.0 would have said and write a books with titles like  How to Get Close to Juan and The Juan Factor. People would read The Juan Factor to try to be happy instead of just asking Juan what to do on the wlkie-talkie. Other people decided that Juan 2.0 wanted them to be successful and make lots of money and build big churches so everybody could come together and feel like had done something good for the week. Juan 2.0 was the ultimate CEO- a savvy, attractive leader for a dark age. But when people tried to talk to Juan 2.0 on their walkie-talkies, all they got was a series of automated responses. If they needed help, Juan 2.0 would direct them to a menu of ministries they could go to and ask for help from, in a voice that sounded a lot like William Shatner. If they were bored, Juan 2.0 only had one joke and it wasn’t even funny. If they were scared, Juan 2.0 would just say over again, “Fear not. Fear not. Fear not”. People hated Juan 2.0 and decided that they could do better by themselves than asking Juan 2.0 for help. Nobody likes automated responses. So Juan 2.0 followers decided to figure out ways to make Juan 2.0 more attractive to more people. They came up with videos about Juan 2.0, conferences about Juan, put on rock shows and light shows and websites about Juan 2.0. A huge PR campaign was launched to make Juan 2.0 appeal to the masses- the campaign that the original Juan never wanted. Lady Gaga performed in her lawnmower costume. Confetti cannons were launched. Merchandise was sold in the back table with Juan 2.0’s face on them. People checked their walkie-talkies at the door and lost themselves in an audio/visual opiate.

But after the show was over, they forgot to pick up their walkie-talkies from the coat room. Their hearts didn’t change. They were still selfish. They didn’t do what original Juan said and think of others as more than themselves. They just wanted to know when the next show was. People didn’t like Juan 2.0 because he was just a skeezy politician like all of the other presidents. The Bloods and Crypts weren’t the least bit interested in taking advice from someone who was as far away from them as Juan 2.0 was. In an effort to take the original, wild, wonderful Juan and make him more “user-friendly”, his followers took away everything that made him who he was. They had turned him into a plastic model of something besides himself. Not many people fell for it and became synical at the mention of Juan 2.0. And those people who did fall for it were left coasting from one audio/visual event to the next. The didn’t have a walkie-talkie to talk with original Juan anymore. They didn’t even know they needed it.

People were claiming left and right to follow Juan like someone follows their favorite football team, and not ever knowing the Juan 2.0 that they were following was a marketing scheme instead of a real person who loved them- a 4 foot tall Mexican with tattoo sleeves and good jokes, who ripped people’s defenses down with love and who died and came back to life to make the USA and the whole world a better place. The Original Juan. And all they have to do is get out their walkie-talkie and talk to him, to find out what he is really like – nothing like Juan 2.0.

So you knew this was coming, but here it is- Jesus is The Juan. The Original Juan.

And the Bible Belt is Juan 2.0 headquarters. That is why I hate it. I fully recognize that this analogy is not water-tight, so don’t get all crazy and write me about how I neglected to mention how Juan had to go on trial and was pierced in his side or how his sinlessness was attributed to us and all of that and that it is blasphemous to compare the Holy Spirit to a walkie-talkie. I am just trying to make the point that we have taken Jesus and tried so hard to clean him up and make him into something that is cleaner, nicer and shinier, that we have robbed him of the miraculous goodness of his original message. And nobody is buying it.We don’t need another Dr. Phil or Barack Obama or Aladdin Beckham. We need the opposite of everything we know to be powerful – humility, love, grace – to really make a difference in people’s lives. That is the Jesus I can get behind. The Jesus. The Original Jesus. The weird one. The one that doesn’t fit into a cutesy church sign, or a copyright infringed T shirt, or a string of automated technobabble. The one that I can talk to whenever I want and get answers and help and tell jokes with. That’s my Jesus. He’s the Juan.