". . . little shall I grace my cause

In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience,

I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver . . ."

(William Shakespeare's Othello, I.iii.88-90)

Sunday, October 7, 2007

Silly Church Signs

I think I need to start keeping a list of silly church signs. I saw another one yesterday with the following message:

"Faith is a journey, not a destination."

Where do these things come from? "Vapid Church Slogans Unlimited"?

Sorry, I guess I'm being snarky. But if you don't mind my saying, faith is neither a journey nor a destination. It is a gift, the starting point from which the Christian life flows. To describe it as either a goal or a process is to essentially misunderstand it.

Maybe what this church is trying to say is that the Christian life is a journey. I could accept that. And as an English teacher, I sympathize with the challenge of putting words together effectively, especially when you are working within very tight parameters.

But maybe instead of trying to come up with pithy statements, it would make more sense to quote a line of scripture. Our God does have a way with words.

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast." (Eph. 2: 8-9)

2 comments:

Chris said...

One of my favorites was a sign near me which had the words so close together it looked like, "God is nowhere."

Elephantschild said...

Ooooo... you've hit upon one of my pet peeves. There's a church in town here that is a terrible church-sign offender. A few choice selections:

"God does not propose to judge a man before he's dead, so why should you?" (Eh??)

And, "A man wrapped up in himself is a small package."

"Do unto others and if you were the others."

We've taken to calling the church "Ourtown Church of Best Friends." (They're supposedly a "Church of Christ." Whatever.)