"Good. Now where was I…. Oh yes, the Sabbath. So for us, the Sabbath is about focusing on our relationships, not about what we should abstain from. So what exactly should we do on the Sabbath? There is the obvious activity, like engaging in fellowship at church, but there other activities that are about relationships such as singing and dancing, and of course sports.
"If I were to come up with a secondary definition of our kingdom beyond a kingdom of relationships, I would say this is a kingdom of sports. The benefits derived from the physical development, and social interaction that occurs when we engage in sporting activities, cannot be overstated.
"There is still much more to cover about our Sabbath activities, but we'll do that some other day." To her husband Lady Jennifer said, "I know picking on liberals is one of your favorite things to do. Would you care to continue from here?"
"I would be delighted," replied Lord Jacob. Then to the girls, "Yes, we have been picking on the liberals today. Not just because they make such an obvious target, but also because it is much easier to see the faults in others than it is to see the faults in us. Yet once we understand those faults in others, it is then easier to see them inside us as well.
"There is an old saying that rings true for many that goes 'If by twenty you're not a liberal, then you have no heart, but if by thirty you're not a conservative, then you have no brain.'
"The reason this saying rings true is that liberalism is an immature thought process. The hallmark of all immature thinking is that you make decisions that that are intended to make you feel good, instead of making decisions to do good, which will in turn make you feel good. The distinction here is that you should actually accomplish something, so that you have a valid reason to feel good about yourself.
"Consider what we were discussing earlier about the difference between adult and childish decisions. Pulling out a tub of ice cream and parking yourself in front of the TV may make you feel good, but showing the discipline to exercise and practice so that you can hit the game winning homerun will bring you far more joy to your life than that ice cream and TV decision ever will.
"How liberalism shows that it is an immature thought process is in its preference for treating the symptoms problems rather than actually solving problems, and for its preference for demonstrating how much they care about something rather than getting results.
"Take what we were talking earlier about how a large percentage of certain minorities lack the qualifications to get into college on their own merits. Instead of actually addressing why this is, the liberal members of these college admission boards would rather give the under performing people a pass into it. In other words, they would rather treat the symptom than solve the problem.
"These college admission board members can now pat themselves on the back as if they had accomplished something great, but have they? What about the other members of that race who now have to live with a poor education that never bothered to apply to college? As for the very small percentage of people who benefited from this 'gift,' unless the college plans to lower the standards of their curriculum, they are only setting them up for failure.
"And let's not even get into the fresh crop of racists now being generated who look at all minorities in college as if they got there by the color of their skin, rather than by the merits of their accomplishments. No self-respecting liberal would ever consider looking at themselves as breeding and perpetuating negative stereotypes. After all, their intentions are clear, and their lack of any substantive positive results is meaningless, because they have obviously shown how much they care."
Lord Jacob paused here for a moment to give the girls some time to think about what he just said, and then continued, "Again, I'm not just picking on liberals because they make such easy targets of themselves. You need to understand the problem they have with their immature thinking in order to understand what I am about to get into.
"What my wife and I have covered so far about our religious beliefs is what we consider to be the real distinctions in our faith, so what we are about to get into now are what others believe are the real distinctions. We don't. We believe we are inline with the majority of Christians on these things, and it is the self-proclaimed leaders within Christianity that are out of touch.
"With the first two things we talked about, the initial statement sounded like any other Christian, but it was in the description that we showed the difference. We are now going to turn that around. The initial statement we'll say will sound out of line with Christianity, but in the description you will see we are not.
"Marcia?" Lord Jacob was now looking her way. "What does it mean to be a Christian?"
Marcia had a feeling that she was being asked a trick question, yet she decided to answer it straight up. "It means that you believe that Christ died for our sins so that we may live in heaven with God when we die."
Lord Jacob then replied with something that shook Marcia to the core. "How would you feel if I told that we don't value that? I'm not saying we don't believe it. I'm just saying we don't value it."
Of all of the things that Marcia had experienced today, none of them had dealt a blow to her like this did. Not the spankings, or the sex with women, or the other examples that had lead her to believe that she had been duped while growing up, had left her feeling so shaken. Was she in the process of joining some cult? She was so stunned by this she did not know how to answer.
Lady Jennifer could see the trouble in Marcia's eyes, and in the eyes of several of the other girls. Yet she wanted to wait a while, as she had always done in the situation, to give the girls some time to really consider what was said. Finally she said, "There are probably better ways of introducing this line of thinking than the way my husband just did, but we wanted to give your intellect a chance to exercise itself in order to reason through the words he used.
"Now, did he say that Christ did not die for our sins?" Lady Jennifer looked around at the girls to get some confirmation that they understood the question. "Of course not. When we say we don't value this, we mean that it does not drive our day-to-day lives. It plays no motivational part in what we do. It even becomes something like 'Sure, why not believe Christ died for our sins.'
"I know this sounds pretty drastic to you, but give us a chance to explain, and I am sure you will see that we are just putting into words something you already feel.
"If you were to ask any Christian if they were one in order to avoid going to hell, or because of the wonderful things being a Christian does for them in this life, most of them would go with the latter rather than the former. We are no different than the majority; we just acknowledge it, at least within our kingdom.
"And there are good reasons to avoid valuing the part about going to hell if you're not a Christian. When you do, you become some form or variety of the wild-eyed street preacher. The most extreme examples can be found in places like New Orleans around Mardi Gras. There you will see signs like 'Let me explain to you why you deserve to burn in hell.'
"All such people display forms of immature thought processes no different than the variety inflicting liberals. Just as liberals will point to the occasional minority that made a success of themselves all due to the fact that they were admitted into college when their merit didn't warrant it, these street preachers will point to the occasional convert they get on these 'missions' to proclaim their efforts all worth while.
"Yet, just as the liberals will ignore the harm their actions cause, so will these street preachers. For every one they convert, there are at least a hundred more that see how Christianity is populated with insane people who want to fill their lives with hatred for those who believe differently. These street preachers are able to ignore the harm they do for the exact same reason as liberals. They place a great deal of value on demonstrating how much they care about something, but in this case it is to God, and not their fellow man.
"They proclaim to the heavens 'Look oh Lord, Look. Look at how hard I am trying to save your children. Look at this one convert who will be able to join you in heaven because of the work I have done today.' Their actions are in fact selfish and immature, because they refuse to look at everything they are responsible for. Keep in mind that a chief characteristic of immaturity is avoiding responsibility.
"Now we are not saying that all people who go out into the public, and witness their faith to others are engaged in harmful actions. Some of them do focus on the beauty that Christ brings to their life, but they are the minority, and for good reason.
"Most people know that proper conversions to Christianity occur when non-believers see the wonderful life they would live if they became one. On the other hand, when you point at someone, and proclaim they are going to burn in hell for what they believe, they are naturally going to raise their defenses, and never be receptive to what you have to say.
"So if you really care about helping people to Christ you must stop focusing on what evil will befall after your death, and start focusing on the joy and wonder that will surround you right now when you accept Christ into your life."
Source: reddit.com/r/eroticliterature/comments/2pxsxi/next_generation_christian_kingdom_ch03_marcia