“Oh no! Easter is a pagan holiday!”

Whenever Easter approaches, you might run into Evangelicals who pointedly refer to the day as “Resurrection Sunday.” If not, don’t be surprised when you bump into ’em. And don’t be surprised when they comment, “Resurrection Sunday—not ‘Easter.’ I don’t do Easter. Easter is a pagan holiday.”

It is? According to these guys, it is. About a decade ago there was a meme claiming Easter was named for the Babylonian goddess Ishtar. (The name sounds so similar!) But more often you’re gonna hear the story of some northern European goddess of the spring named Eostre, and during the spring equinox, ancient pagans would worship her with symbols which represent fertility, like rabbits and eggs. And that’s where our secular Easter traditions came from: From pagans.

Okay. Those of us who know Christian history, know Jesus died the day before Passover in the year 33. The first Passover took place at some point in the 15th century BC, on 14 Nisan of whatever year that was. Nisan is the first month of spring, and Hebrew months begin at the new moon, so on the 14th the moon will be full. Christians swiped that holiday. Most of us still call it Passover! (Or some variant of Πάσχα/Páscha, the Greek word for Passover; only northern European languages call it something like Easter.)

So no, we didn’t adopt some pagan European equinox celebration. We swiped a Hebrew holiday which happens to take place the same time of year. And when European paganism was wiped out once European kings turned to Jesus, and ordered their subjects to turn to him too, the Europeans were left with all these unattached customs… with no god to connect ’em to anymore, because all they knew was Jesus.

Is that a problem? Only if people are still worshiping Eostre. But no one’s worshiping Eostre. When Europeans ditched that religion, they stopped worshiping her so hard, today’s historians know next to nothing about her! Europeans abandoned the Eostre legends, the Eostre worship practices, everything. It didn’t even go underground, or get collected in books about bygone mythology, like the stories we still have about Wotan and Thor and Baldr. Eostre’s gone. So gone, some historians doubt she even existed.

It’s exactly the sort of victory over pagan idolatry Christians should be sharing, celebrating, and rejoicing over. Instead we have paranoid Christians who wanna bring Eostre back, solely for the purpose of telling one another we need to hate and fear her. You realize there are real evils in the world we oughta fight, not ridiculous distractions. But nope, we have people trying to play connect-the-dots with other pagan gods, hoping to find some kind of devilish conspiracy theory. Hoping to find something to fear. Hoping to find something with which they can spread fear. Which says all kinds of devilish things about them.

Hence their dire warnings: “Watch out for these secular Easter traditions! If you do ’em, you might unintentionally worship Eostre. And God will be very, very angry.” And smite you somehow. Or smite the whole country. Supposedly he’s petty like that.

Okay. Any depiction of God which doesn’t describe him as gracious, which claims he’s eagerly planning to punish his kids for our unwitting errors, clearly hasn’t been paying any attention to the way Jesus describes his loving Father. ’Cause God does grace. Whereas these fearful Christians, and the churches where they get or spread their ridiculous rubbish, do not. It’s why they’re so fearful.

Don’t mimic such godless, fruitless people. Follow the Spirit. And use your head!

Christians and the fear of public speaking.

Every Christian is meant to preach the gospel. (And use words.) We gotta tell others about Jesus; we gotta encourage our fellow Christians to have healthy relationships with him.

But not every Christian can handle getting up in front of a large audience on a weekly basis, to give talks.

Poll after poll shows the number one fear of many Americans is public speaking. They’re more afraid of public speaking than death. They’re more afraid of it than high-voltage electricity, than a bear attack, than swinging on a rope off the side of a cliff, than snakes crawling up your plumbing while you’re on the toilet. It’s the last thing they ever wanna do.

I don’t share that fear. At all. Yeah I’ve had nerves on opening nights of school plays, but that was about blowing my lines, not standing in front of a crowd. Audiences are fun. But that’s me, and other people can’t comprehend how I can be so casual about public speaking; why hasn’t my fight-or-flight instinct kicked in? Theirs is going off like a fire alarm.

My advice to them used to be, “Oh, just get over it.” I didn’t realize why they found public speaking so terrifying; I’ve done it a bunch, and there’s nothing to fear! Yeah, it wasn’t sympathetic of me at all. But that’s because I didn’t share their fear, and didn’t get it. Sometimes I still don’t get it, unwittingly drag people into a public-speaking situation with me, and only notice their deer-in-the-headlights facial expression at the last second: “Oh nuts; I just freaked ’em out.” If you’re one of those people, sorry! I wasn’t trying to induce a panic attack, honest.

I still think people need to get over it, but I realize it’s gonna take them some time and effort. You gotta get used to the idea. You gotta make small efforts with small crowds and work your way up to bigger crowds. You gotta get confident with your material. You gotta realize audiences, most of the time, are rooting for you—they want you to do well! They’re usually on your side. Especially when there are loved ones in the crowd.

And yes, the Holy Spirit can help. He can make you bold when he really needs you to be. But I find he provides a lot more opportunities to people who are already bold. A lot more.

“Nobody wants to talk about hell anymore.”

There’s this church in town whose members really love to leave gospel tracts in my local Walmart. They especially like the really bitter, bilious tracts; the ones which inform people IN ALL CAPS that they’re totally going to hell unless they give up all their favorite things, reject the pope and all his works, and turn to Jesus. You know, typical dark Christian tracts. Especially the ones full of half-truths and conspiracy theories, ’cause they’re those kinds of wackjobs.

I typically find them sitting on top of the urinals. I wonder whether the tract-passers realize how easy it is to bump ’em into the urinals and whiz all over ’em. And how often it probably happens—both by antichrists who wanna show their petty contempt for Christians, and by fellow Christians who are irritated when people turn the good news into bad. Only Walmart’s janitors know for sure.

This particular tract caught my attention because it began with the line, “Nobody wants to talk about hell anymore.” In my experience this always means the person definitely wants to talk about hell.

And in fact loves to talk about hell. Won’t shut up about hell. Usually such people talk about hell more than they talk Jesus. They’re sick ’n tired of Christians like me who want them to stop exalting it: Hell’s a big deal. If people don’t turn to Jesus, and shun rock music and socialized medicine and the New World Order, they’re going to hell! Shouldn’t people be warned about this? Shouldn’t we tell them this?

So the tract wrote plenty about hell. Not in a lot of detail, ’cause the bible doesn’t actually provide details. Mostly to emphasize what the bible does have in it—that hell’s all weeping, wailing, teeth-gnashing, and suffering. Contrary to the movies, it’s not a fun place where you can party with pornstars and your favorite heavy metal bands and all your sinful friends, and snort all the “marihuana” you want with no worries about overdose. You actually don’t wanna go to hell.

And I agree; you don’t! But you know why I don’t care to talk about hell when I’m sharing Jesus? Because I’m trying to help ’em believe in Jesus. They kinda don’t. Not really; not enough. I’m nudging them towards more faith.

When people don’t believe in Jesus, they definitely don’t believe in hell. They think it’s imaginary. Either they think everybody without exception goes to heaven, or otherwise advances to another plane of existence; or we entirely cease to exist, and go nowhere. So hell is the fiction of horror movies and comic books and gothic literature and Bugs Bunny cartoons. If I imagine I’m gonna terrify them with it, I’m gonna be greatly disappointed.

So those of us Christians who don’t talk about hell, don’t do so for no reason, nor because we don’t believe in hell. We don’t talk about it because it doesn’t work. People might turn to Jesus out of fear… but either they won’t stay Christian, or they’ll use Christianity to justify all their other paranoid fears, and really be more Christianist than Christian. They’ll fear their neighbors, not love them.

Plus all this hell-talk has the unfortunate side effect of corrupting those who preach hell. Like I said, our gospel becomes bad news, not good. We stop being heavenly-minded. We grow as fearful as our message. We’re constantly watching out for devils instead of listening to the Holy Spirit.

The Fear.

You likely know the main reason Christians don’t act in faith.

It’s why we won’t share Jesus with our neighbors and coworkers. Why we don’t pray for people to be cured of illnesses, freed from addictions, or rescued from troubles. Why we never even think to ask God for miracles. Why we won’t prophesy, even though we’re sure God is speaking to us right this instant. Why we won’t start ministries, won’t offer help, won’t encourage, won’t anything.

It’s the Fear.

I capitalize it because it’s not just any ol’ fear, like overcaution in case anything goes wrong, or concerns we might be doing too much, or hard experiences which inform our hesitancy. It’s the Fear. I’ll explain.

You’ve likely met Christians who’re the most friendly, outgoing, outspoken, extroverted people you’ve ever seen. Got no trouble with public speaking. No trouble sharing their opinions. (Even when you’d rather they didn’t.) No trouble talking about their favorite movies, teams, products, politics. Maybe a little initial stage fright when they’re in front of a crowd, but they shake it off quickly. But when it comes to talking about Jesus or acting in faith, these very same Christians suddenly seize up and never snap out of it. It’s like someone flipped a switch. Someone cut the power. Someone crimped the hose. The meds wore off. Pick your favorite simile.

Because their minds immediately went to the darkest possible scenario: “If I act, they’ll…” followed by the most awful thing we can picture. Or can’t picture; they won’t even allow their minds to go there; it’ll be that bad.

In real life? Rarely happens that way. Rarely. In the United States, four out of five of us consider ourselves Christian, and even if these self-described Christians don’t believe in miracles, they’re not gonna say no to prayer. Not gonna dismiss Jesus outright. Might hesitantly respond, “Um… okay.” Even hardcore antichrists will just smile and say “No thank you.” We’ve gotta find someone with serious anger issues before we’d ever encounter a worst-case scenario.

But that’s who these Christians immediately picture. Usually it sounds like this: Say we ask a man whether we can share Jesus with him. He immediately reacts with a demoniac’s strength—with the rage of a thousand angry nerds who were just told Jar Jar Binks is gonna star in the next Star Wars movie—and shouts, “How dare you tell me about Jesus. How dare you talk religion. I hate Christians. You’ve made an enemy for life!” Out of nowhere a medieval mace appears, and he beats us like that one devil-possessed guy beat the clothes off the sons of Sceva. Ac 19.11-20 Out of nowhere a lynch mob swarms us, screaming for our blood, and once they’re done with us, they run amok, burning down all the churches, hanging Christians from every lamppost.

Maybe your worst-case scenario doesn’t look this way at all. But in many a Christian’s deepest, darkest parts, we kinda worry something just as bad could happen. At the very least no one will like us anymore. They’ll think we’re the office bible-thumper. Or the holier-than-thou legalist. Or the insufferable hipster Christian who tries to redirect every conversation into a religious one. The Jesus freak. Whatever threatens to make us friendless and alone.

That’s the Fear. It’s when we presume the instant we step out in faith, we’ll get overwhelming backlash, and things’ll be awful.

So we just don’t.

Fear-based evangelism: Carrot and stick. Mostly stick.

Four years ago I got to talking with a regular at my church about evangelism. She wanted to know how I shared Jesus. Not to pick up any pointers or anything; this was an orthodoxy test. She wanted to make sure I wasn’t steering people wrong. Some people love to appoint themselves as heresy hunters, and she’s one of ’em. (She’s also not entirely sure anyone’s doing Christianity right but her.)

So I talked about how I usually tell people about Jesus: First I find out what they believe, if anything. Most of the time I find out they’re already Christian, or believe themselves to be. If they’re not churchgoers, I encourage ’em to go: I try to plug them into a church. Doesn’t need to be mine, but it does need to be a fruitful church. ’Cause they’re more likely to experience Jesus for themselves when the people of their church know him personally.

SHE. “And what do you tell them about hell?”

ME. “Not much. They don’t usually ask.”

SHE. “You don’t warn them about hell?”

Me. “I don’t need to. I’ve already got ’em interested in going to church.”

SHE. “But you’ve gotta warn ’em about hell!”

ME. “Why?”

SHE. [gonna burst a blood vessel over my perceived stupidity] “Because that’s where they’re headed!”

ME. “Oh, they know that. That’s the one thing they definitely know about us Christians: We think they’re all going to hell. I don’t need to repeat that. Not that they always believe in hell anyway.”

SHE. “They have to believe in hell. The bible says…”

ME. “Well yeah, the bible says. But half the time they don’t believe what the bible says. You know how people think nowadays: The bible’s an ancient book, written by old dead white guys…” [brown guys, but few people realize that] “…and seeing is believing. That’s why I’m trying to get ’em into a church: I want ’em to see stuff. Not that they will, but I don’t just want ’em to take my word for it. Even if I quote buttloads of bible at ’em.”

SHE. “If they don’t believe the bible, they can’t be saved.”

ME. “Well, lucky for them neither I nor God believe that.”

Pretty sure I didn’t convince her I’m not going about it totally wrong.

But the reason I share Jesus this way is ’cause I used to do it her way. And I didn’t get anywhere.

The type of evangelism she prefers is old-timey hellfire and brimstone. Warn people they’re going to hell—the final hell, gé’enna, with the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and its angels—and make it clear hell sucks, and they don’t wanna go there. Terrify them with the idea that God is filled with wrath towards sinners, and wants to send every last one of them into fiery hell, and he’s never ever letting ’em out; they’ll burn forever. And once they’re nice and scared, offer the solution to the problem: Jesus. God may wanna burn you like a little boy frying ants with a magnifying lens, but Jesus just wants to give you a great big hug and let you into heaven.

I call it carrot-and-stick evangelism: Heaven’s the carrot; hell’s the stick. But be sure you preach about 75 percent stick, lest they think there are no dire consequences for rejecting heaven. It’s a common dark Christian practice.

It also has the undesired effect of creating plenty more dark Christians.

Fearful churches.

We Christians are meant to be holy, and consider ourselves separate from the rest of the world.

No, this isn’t because we’re better than them. We’re so not.

No, this doesn’t mean we’re to move into little gated communities where nobody but Christians live, isolate ourselves from everybody else, and drive out anyone we might consider sinners. This is how cults start—assuming the cult hasn’t already started, and the compound is just another creepy symptom of how we’ve gone astray.

We’re distinct from the rest of the world because God calls us to follow Jesus. Not other people. Not one another. Not even popular Christian culture—especially its political or Mammonist variants. As the rest of the world does its thing, we’re to ask ourselves, “What would the Father rather I do?” or “What does Jesus do?” Then do that.

Believe it or don’t, sometimes this means we do as the rest of the world does. If the culture suddenly realizes society is institutionally unjust—that violence and discrimination and sexism are wrong, that evil needs to stop—we need to cheer them on, participate, and see whether the Holy Spirit uses these moments to bring people to Jesus. ’Cause he will, and does.

But of course we need to bear in mind pagans have entirely different motives than we do. They don’t do grace; on their better days they do karma. They want things to be fair and equitable, not because it’s inherently good that they’re so, but because fairness ultimately benefits them. And when it doesn’t, they don’t try to make things fair. The status quo and current social order is fine. Why discomfort themselves when reform does absolutely nothing for them, or even costs them, or makes ’em give up power? Nah.

Our motives have to be like God’s: Way higher. Wheenever we find ourselves on the same side as the world, we oughta see this for what it is: It’s a chance to draw a few pagans to Christ Jesus and God’s kingdom. But not every church realizes this, and figures we’re to stay away from the world, lest “bad company ruin good character.” 1Co 15.33 Best to stay away from pagans, turn the kingdom into a fortress, and isolate ourselves from them with both spiritual and rule-based hedges of protection.

When you visit such churches, that’s the mindset you’re gonna find among ’em. A whole lot of anti-world rhetoric. Everything inside the church is good, pure, and holy; everything “out there” is wicked, corrupt, destructive. Dabble in it just a little, even unintentionally, and it’ll ruin you. Stay away. Touch not the unclean thing.

Ostensibly the goal is holiness. The real result? Fear and dark Christianity.

The fear of God.

Humanity discovered pretty quickly that if you want to rule over others, you either have to get ’em to love you so much they’ll trust you and do as you say… or be worried about what you might do to ’em if they don’t obey you.

Love takes time and patience on the ruler’s part… and even then, the people might be too stupid to obey the ruler anyway, much like a two-year-old ignoring the warning, “Don’t touch the stove!” Or of course projecting their own corrupt impulses onto the ruler’s motives, and presuming the ruler’s selfish instead of benevolent. (Much like every president’s opposition party typically does.) Love ain’t easy. But speaking from experience, it works really well.

Most rulers don’t have that kind of time or patience, so they just go with fear.

Still do. Politicians warn of all the terrors that’ll take place if the people vote for the other guy; that you have to vote for them, and if you don’t it’ll probably trigger the great tribulation. Dictators take their enemies out and shoot them, or otherwise kill them in nasty ways, and while their fans might cheer, they also recognize they’d better never become the dictator’s enemy. And as dictators go mad with fear about what might be coming due to their bad karma, they get more and more murdery. Friends and fans regularly get killed too.

Because we humans like to justify our evil, ancient rulers grew to believe the people’s fear of them was a good thing. Their subjects should fear their ruler. After all, he was mighty, and could casually destroy them, so it was always best to stay on his good side.

Proverbs 16.14-15 NRSV

14 A king’s wrath is a messenger of death,

and whoever is wise will appease it.

15 In the light of a king’s face there is life,

and his favor is like the clouds that bring the spring rain.

 

Proverbs 19.12 NRSV

A king’s anger is like the growling of a lion,

but his favor is like dew on the grass.

 

Proverbs 20.2 NRSV

The dread anger of a king is like the growling of a lion;

anyone who provokes him to anger forfeits life itself.

 

Proverbs 24.21-22 NRSV

21 My child, fear the LORD and the king,

and do not disobey either of them;

22 for disaster comes from them suddenly,

and who knows the ruin that both can bring?

Since YHWH, the LORD, is Israel’s king 1Sa 12.12, Is 33.22 —regardless of the human kings who sat on the thrones in Jerusalem and Samaria, who supposedly worked for him, but didn’t always—the LORD’s various prophets used ancient kingly language to describe him. That includes statements to fear the king: Now it was to fear the LORD. It’s even in the commandments.

Deuteronomy 10.20 NRSV

“You shall fear the LORD your God; him alone you shall worship; to him you shall hold fast, and by his name you shall swear.”

 

Deuteronomy 6.24 NRSV

“Then the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our lasting good, so as to keep us alive, as is now the case.”

 

Deuteronomy 10.12-13 NRSV

12 “So now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you? Only to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to keep the commandments of the LORD your God and his decrees that I am commanding you today, for your own well-being.”

Lest you think all this fear-talk was only found in Deuteronomy, where Moses was explaining the Law to a new generation not wholly familiar with it, it’s not; we see it in Leviticus as well. “Fear your God” Lv 19.14, 23; 25.17, 26, 43 is a reminder that we’re to love our neighbors and not cheat or dishonor or disrespect ’em, because God disapproves of such behavior—and you’d better fear God.

But this fear-talk regularly bugs Christians. Because we were taught fear is a bad thing, and we ought not do it.

Matthew 10.31 NRSV

“So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.”

 

Luke 12.32 NRSV

“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

 

Mark 4.40 NRSV

He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?”

 

Matthew 14.27 NRSV

But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.”

 

John 14.27 NRSV

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”

 

Revelation 1.17-18 NRSV

17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he placed his right hand on me, saying, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I was dead, and see, I am alive forever and ever; and I have the keys of Death and of Hades.”

If we’re not to be afraid; if fear is a liar, and makes us irrational, and God doesn’t give us a spirit of fear, 2Ti 1.7 for there’s no fear in love and perfect love drives out fear, 1Jn 4.18 what business do we who love God, have in fearing God? How is fear an appropriate response to God?

And yet even in the New Testament we’re instructed to fear God. 1Pe 2.17, Rv 14.7

So yeah, it feels like a contradiction. A big ol’ discrepancy. A paradox: We’re to fear God, yet at the same time we’re not to be afraid of him. Feels a little like the writers of the bible weren’t in sync on this one. And it certainly makes our preachers sound inconsistent when they talk about fearing God… then talk about how God is nothing to fear. Plus too many of ’em have the bad habit on going overboard in one direction or the other, depending on their own biases. We have the dark Christians who want us, and everybody else, to be absolutely terrified of God’s wrath. And on the other extreme we have Christians who refuse to even talk about the scriptures which say we oughta fear God, lest people get what they think is “the wrong idea.”

All right, so which is it?

Generational curses and fearful Christians.

In the middle of the Ten Commandments, as he warned the Hebrews away from idolatry, the LORD mentioned a little something about how children suffer consequences for their parents.

Exodus 20.5-6 NIV

5 “You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.”

Further down in Exodus, when the LORD revealed his glory to Moses, he repeated this idea of forgiving a thousand generations, yet afflicting three or four generations.

Exodus 34.6-7 NIV

6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.”

And in Deuteronomy Moses also forbade certain people from joining the qehal YHWH, “the LORD’s assembly.” That’d include

• a mamzér, “mongrel,” the child of a Hebrew and a gentile, “till the 10th generation.” Dt 23.2
• Ammonites and Moabites; 10th generation. Dt 23.3
• Edomites; third generation. Dt 23.7

And of course there’s total depravity, the idea that humanity is innately messed up because Adam and Eve’s original sin was passed down to the rest of us, spoiling us from the moment of our birth.

In general, these ideas are the basis of the popular Christian idea there are generational curses, a problem that’s passed down from parent to child in a family for centuries. Like alcoholism, or the tendency to have heart attacks in one’s forties. Like bad genes. Only this time it’s a particular form of sin problem.

Fr’instance say your grandfather was involved in conjuring up the spirits of the dead. And whattaya know; mine was. According to generational-curse theory, that’s gonna affect me. Even though I’m Christian; even though I was Christian before Grandpa got involved in necromancy; even though Grandpa later repented and became Christian. Simply by virtue of his being my grandfather, evil spirits have been called upon to plague my grandmother’s life, my parents’ lives, my aunts’ and uncles’ lives, my siblings and their kids, my cousins and their kids. And of course me.

Gee, thanks Grandpa.