The Christian apologizer

I watched a show recently where a Christian guy set up a "confessional booth" at a gay pride day event. He invited people in, and he would apologize to them for what he saw as the failures of the Christian community towards gays, and also for his own actions and prejudices. Some of the people he talked to were very skeptical and rude, and some were genuinely moved.

I read on his blog where he talked about it, and the comments were equally fascinating. Almost half of them were people criticizing him for "making a spectacle", and the other half were criticizing him for "teaching tolerance and acceptance of sin".

What would you expect to find a Christian doing at a gay pride festival? I would probably expect to see people marching with picket signs, or yelling through a megaphone. Aren't we as Christians guilty of the most terrible sins of all? Knowing God's grace shown to us, though sinful and broken, are we then unwilling to show love and compassion to others, if we consider them too sinful? Do we fail to see that the undeserved grace, freely given to us, is not ONLY for us, but for whoever believes on the name of Jesus Christ? Some of the people there that day left knowing, perhaps for the first time, that there was a Christian out there that didn't hate them. Would they look at the Gospel differently if they saw Christians differently?

I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life. --John 6:47

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news! --Romans 10:14-15