I grew up surrounded by Christians. One thing that always, always, always made me uncomfortable was the lingo. It rolled off their tongues so comfortably yet seemed so meaningless. As both a student and as a teacher I've thought that I could evaluate the level of understanding of a topic based on the ability to explain it in multiple ways. As a teacher, I believe you have to be able to put things into words the student understands. As a student, the ability to take a concept and put it into your own words without altering the meaning indicates true understanding. Yet I didn't see this in Christians. They would stick to their lingo and be both amazed and speechless when asked to explain. So, now that I'm one of "them", one of my goals is to try my best to avoid lingo. To try and use my own words to explain key concepts. So when I was hit with one of these words yesterday, it didn't sit right.
The word is conversion. Someone I was talking to was talking about converting people to Christianity. But I don't agree with that word. Conversion implies equality. We convert inches to feet, feet to yards, yards to meters, and then back to inches. We can convert our money from dollars to yen and back again. If we convert someone to Christianity, to me it implies that they can easily be converted back to whatever they were before. But this underestimates how Christ works in us.
The gospel message that is the foundation of Christianity is one of salvation, transformation, and restoration. I once was lost but now I'm found. I was condemned and He set me free. I was dead (in sin), but He gave me new life. I have been renewed from the inside out. I am saved. When we acknowledge His power, supremacy, mercy, and grace, and we chose to follow Him, we are new. And we can't help but spread the message about the new life we have found.
It's not about a favorable exchange rate, it's about new life.
