Thursday Theology

Today's text is from Mark 6:30-34, 53-56. 
When I read these today, the cynical part of me wonders if the Christian nationalists or evangelicals of today would follow this same Jesus, or if they would stand back and criticize him for enabling the poor and healing the sick. 

I know that my own biases of today's church are a part of my thinking, but far too many people I personally know have been victims of the outright hatred that is portrayed as hard love by the self-righteous conservative Christians.

I suppose that if today's churches were the places where the poor and sick went to for help and if they were met with compassion and service, it would be overwhelming and unsustainable for most churches to help them. The simple reality is -- most churches ignore the people that need help and live nearby. 
I mentioned in a post last winter that of the 600+ churches in Springfield MO, only a dozen participated in sheltering the community's homeless population during the coldest of nights. 
That whole Matthew 25 and "whatever you do to the least of these" kind of gets glossed over or simply ignored by most churches. And if the churches as organizations won't help, why would any of the people that attend there feel like they need to help?

I honestly feel like my Thursday Theology posts have become too negative and think that if I can't somehow turn that around I need to end this weekly post. I wish I could say that my distrust of people is fading and I always see the good in others, but that simply isn't the case.

Maybe it would help if you shared something good that somebody did for you or for somebody else. I am in need of a people-don't-really-suck kind of story.

John