My State

Coloradoans are definitely a different breed of people. When I think about the attributes of a typical Colorado person, the picture that comes to mind is a person who is successful, adventurous, active, intelligent, and "open minded". No other place in the county will you find a group of people that are as concerned about health and fitness, enjoying the outdoors, and just living the good life in general. Spiritually speaking, the people of this state also have a very distinct perspective compared to what I've seen and heard of other places. Words like skeptical, distrust, and even resentfulness and contempt are terms that come to mind when I think of the typical perception of Christianity. This is not a new revelation to me, its something that I have observed and kind of gotten used to in my time here. However, it has been reiterated to me several times lately as I have seen somewhat disappointing results with ministry attempts. The church I go to had about 25 students from Texas up in the Fort Collins area to help out with some things going on at the church and in the community. On monday they spent the evening in my neighborhood attempting to do work projects at houses throughout the neighborhood. On Sunday I spent awhile going door to door trying to get people signed up to have any type of work done at their house. After about 20 houses, and 20 polite "no thank you"s, I thought maybe just having the kids go door to door with specific jobs might be a better tactic. The jobs were simple things like window cleaning, garage cleaning, power washing, and yard work, and it was all free. We were just trying to show God's love in a really practical way as well as letting people in the neighborhood know that myself and my roommates were hear and available to help people out in any capacity they needed. After an hour and a half and probably about 100 homes, the team had washed windows at two homes, mowed two lawns, and power washed two houses. That’s just crazy to me! If someone came to my door wanting to clean my garage for me, I would be on that in a heartbeat! Talking with Scott, the youth leader of the team, he mentioned a house that they mowed for where the guy just couldn’t' wrap his mind around the fact that they were doing this with no strings attached. Why is it that people are so mistrusting of Christians? I always like to blame the televangelists and the wackos from Jonesboro who destroy peoples trust in Christians and get plenty of TV time to do it. However, while its easy to blame the problems on the people who are doing all the wrong things, the real problem is the lack of people doing the right things. I strongly believe that if the people of the Church were impacting those in their sphere of influence, not through door-to-door evangelism or letters to the editor, but by living a changed life that cannot help but cause those around them to see God's love, attitudes and hearts would be changed. I'll be the first to admit that I am guilty of being complacent. Before monday, most of my neighbors probably didn’t even know I went to church. I just know that something is going to have to change in order for us to earn the trust of and reach those around us.