Un-organized Religion

I have a patch on my motorcycle jacket that says, "Sure I love Jesus. It's his fan club that bothers me."

I'm often surprised at the comments it generates. There were several toll booth operators that commented about it when I was on my trip -- all believers, btw.
Just recently, a young man at a fast food restaurant asked me about it. I think he was a young believer and was ready to defend his belief. I included myself in my answer saying something like -- I think that we, as believers, often give Jesus a bad name by the way we behave. He just nodded his head as he walked away and said, "Yeah, I get that."

Lately, I have become more and more concerned with the way that Evangelical Christians have become more of a cultural (or anti-cultural) organization with a political agenda than a group of people dedicated to sharing the Gospel of salvation by the grace of God.

I often feel like an outsider when with other Christians. I differ from many of them on politics and on many cultural issues. I despise that we have allowed religion to become a political tool.
Understand that I have nothing against Christians being politically active (I'm actually in favor of that), but to leverage religion as a tool or to wave it about like a club and then to back someone that stands in direct opposition to those beliefs is a detriment to those beliefs and to Jesus, himself.

It is my personal opinion that the church (little c intentional) in the US is nothing like the Church that Jesus leads. In my years as an evangelist, I can't begin to recount the number of times that I've been told that someone believes in God but is opposed to organized religion.
I believe I have mentioned that I'm a slow learner. I am beginning to understand their perspective.

I know that the readers of this blog come from a variety of religious beliefs and backgrounds. At one time there were a few atheists. I'm not sure if that's still true or not. I do know that many have stopped following me for a wide variety of reasons. If I haven't ye offended you, consider yourself fortunate. If I have and you're still here, thanks.

I'm thinking about adding a weekly post that shares something of my personal beliefs -- a sermon like message about what I believe and why.
I'm not looking at starting an online church or anything like that.
I'm not looking for debate about my beliefs (although, I do expect some).
I'm not sure that I'm even looking to make converts to my way of thinking or to my beliefs.
I'm just thinking of sharing my faith on a regular basis through this forum -- a kind of un-organized religion.
It might help me to keep what remains of my sanity.

John <><