I stopped by Dolce this morning on the way to the office. I was there to do some reading. There is a big comfy chair that faces out towards the sidewalk with a great view of Walnut St. here in Milford. It’s a great chair to read from, but also to people watch. Dolce @ 8 a.m. in the morning is a pretty busy time for people watching.

At about 8:20, a soccer mom in her early 30’s got out of her vehicle. She was wearing an Orioles ballcap and a T-shirt that said “Green is the new Black….Save the Trees.” Going Green is certainly all the rage and Andrea and I are doing our part by recycling, using energy effecient light bulbs, turning down our hot water tempurature, etc., etc., etc. What I found interesting (ironic?) is that the woman was driving a Nissan Xterra. According to my 30 seconds of research on the internet, a 2008 Nissan Xterra has a city/highway rating of 16/20 mpg. I have to admit, after seeing her t-shirt, I thought she would be driving a Saturn Vue Hybrid (25/32) or a Prius (48/45) or something in between.

Maybe I am being a little hard on green soccer mom. But it is important that what we communicate matches how we live. This is especially so as Christians. We may communicate one thing with our lives in regards to our faith and beliefs and communicate something else with how we live it out. I’m reading a book called unChristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons from the Barna Group. It speaks of the major perceptions of young people of Christianity. One of those perceptions is that Christians are hypocritical. “85 percent of young outsiders have had sufficient exposure to Christians and churches that they conclude present-day Christianity is hypocritical.” Here is a statement from the same book that is really hard to swallow. “Among young outsiders, 84% say they personally know at least one committed Christ. Yet just 15% thought the liefstyles of those Christ followers were significantly different from the norm. This gap speaks volumes.” (emphasis mine).

So what now? The authors of unChristian uncover a lot of useful information when it comes to reaching out to young adults who may be outsiders to the faith. In order to overcome some of these perceptions, we (Christians) have got to get back to follow Jesus. Love one another, feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, carrying our cross. An outsider should see that Christ has made a difference in our lives.