Well-Rounded.

We worship and serve a well-rounded Jesus. I don’t want to OVER emphasize the parts of the Bible where Jesus throws down. But I don’t want to ignore them. I want them to be included in the profile of Jesus’ character.

Ever since the Power Team came to my church, broke bricks and tore phone books in half Christians have been trying to inject masculinity into their side of the culture war. People say that Christian men have been emasculated and are not allowed to be tough or bad-ass and manliness is a standard defined by the world. Yes, it’s pretty obvious church has been  uncooled but emasculated? You mean we’ve had our balls cut off? Mine are still here so let me share some  Jesus with you.

In Matthew 21 Jesus enters the temple to find it filled with crooked money changers and dove vendors. He then demonstrates table-flipping ability honed in his many years of carpentry and drives them all away out of zeal for God’s House. This same Jesus, when passing through Jericho in Luke 19, comes across the tax collector Zacchaeus; people like him were despised for cheating and extorting money people. In contrast his time at the temple, Jesus doesn’t break bricks on Zacchaeus, he breaks bread with him over dinner at his house that evening.

In John 8.1, the religious people (called Pharisees, a sect of conservative and pious Judaism) bring to Jesus a woman who was caught cheating and say she deserves to be stoned. Jesus shows her some real practical forgiveness. This same Jesus, while teaching on a hill (Mark 9.41) says that someone who causes a child to sin would better himself by tying a boulder around his neck and jumping in the lake. This sounds like a warning that God’s anger against child abuse is scarier than getting lynched and drowned by an angry mob. It’s a threat.

Jesus demonstrates judgment and appropriate action in different situations with the same sorts of people. We here at FightPastor mean to do the same with our lives. Not only does Jesus throw-down, He kneels down and washes the dirty feet of His disciples. He teaches of the poison that sin is in our lives, then He dies for our sins, bloody and beaten, on a cross.

There are lots of immature dudes out there with knock-out power. There are men with no chin but rock-solid families. In the short time that Jesus traveled and taught, He showed us a well-rounded masculinity that isn’t about being a tough, mohawked, and bad-ass. That stuff is included inside manhood along with the ability to provide and care for people, helping and serving others, responsibility, patience, good judgment, and maturity.

So be slow to anger and quick to love. May your heart be quicker than your hands. Fight Geek Out.

I’ve become a fan of the UFC. So much so, I’m thinking about joining a gym or at least some taking family kickboxing classes. Now, I’m too handsome to compete, and I would get worked despite my orange belt in karate and 7^th grade wrestling pedigree. I just want to train again. But oh no! How can I justify my Christian faith with the “violence” of combat sports (MMA, Boxing, Wrestling, Etc)?

No Christians question Olympic boxing, fencing, or judo, but yet they criticize MMA for it’s violence (check out the comments on Fight Pastor’s Article). But still, to be a Christian MMA fan, we here at fightpastor.com have discovered, is to deal with the criticism of uber-conservative Christians who abstain from “the world’s” things (not including Amish or Mennonites, I wouldn’t want to spar with anyone who wrestles cattle or drives a plow for a living), and leftist liberal hippies who resent Christians with an appearance of anything hip, cool, fun, modern, or smart. So I will humor these “unreasonables” and give you the Fight Geek’s Christian-with-judgment answer.

Face it, we’re all going to watch the fights any way, watching a guy get knocked out is to cool to look away from. But I’m not supposed to be a Christian brawler nor a violent citizen. I’m supposed to be a pacifist like Jesus right? Just lie down and get crucified? Let me tell you a story.

I used to have this roommate in L.A. He was cocky. He thought he knew everything about film, food, women, or whatever. It seemed he would argue not because of an important issue but because it gave him a chance to be dominant. You probably know someone just like him. He had zero humility and an odd spirit about him and it bugged me. I would find myself arguing with him trying let him know that he wasn’t always right. I’m not opposed to smart people or the debate team. I’m opposed to pride gone awry and people picking on the values of weaker minded people because they can. So the day eventually came when I conquered his rhetoric. My debating was out of love for him, but he didn’t want to know the value of humility. I was right and he knew it. So he threatened settle the discussion with his fists. I knew at this point there was no helping him so I gave up. Looking back, I wonder if he would have responded different had he known that I could fight. If I had taken him down and choked him out, would he have yielded? What if I knocked him out? What if he knocked ME out?

But Fight Geek, Jesus says “turn the other cheek” in Jesus’ sermon on the mount:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ ³⁹But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. ⁴⁰And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. ⁴¹If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. ⁴²Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. (Matthew 5.38)

An eye for an eye, in short means that the punishment should fit the crime. If you lose a tooth, you don’t get to sue for somebody’s whole grill. Also, in ye ole bible times, to strike someone on the right cheek, probably with your poop-wipin’ left hand, was a legally punishable insult. This passage is about justice and legality not violence.

Combat sports require many of the same values we share in our faith. These sports do more than teach self-defense, they teach discipline. Like all athletes, it takes hard work and perseverance to triumph. On top of that, the maturity developed in combat sports is unique. It’s an environment where you test yourself against another person. You learn what it means to get knocked down and get up. You learn you’re not made of glass. Don’t think that Jesus never threw down. In his recorded life, Jesus went berserk one time: when he find’s the temple filled with crooks and lowlifes he chased them off—they were scared of Him. The Bible’s meta-narrative—the big picture of our creation, fall, redemption, and destiny—is an epic good-destroys-evil saga. Jesus pacifism hanging on the cross is the beginning of the annihilation of evil in the world. I think our natural response to evil in the world reflects our creator. It’s part of the intrinsic morality first designed by God and then programmed into our DNA. There is evil in the world and it we sometimes have no choice but to fight.

Now let’s talk about evil and our response to it, which I will call Vigilance. Your love for your family should at least make you want fight, stop, or prevent any of the following: home invaders, muggers, rapists, school shooters, bullies, A-holes, abusive parents, crooked politicians, or your drunken relative ruining your Christmas party. What if there was a drug dealer hanging around your kid’s bus stop? What if your daughter’s prom date gave her a black eye? Robbers, rapists, and murderers—all these people have evil motivations and must to be stopped. You should call the cops of your kid’s drug dealer, and press charges against your daughter’s abusive boyfriend, let your dog’s bark and bite ward off your home invaders. This force we use and these steps we take to prevent violence and stop evil.

For me, vigilance is to recognize and call-out evil. It seems like we live in a nation of pacified masses who have no stomach for peace keeping. We don’t stand up to evil; we ignore it as long as it doesn’t affect us. I think of the 20 odd school shootings from the last two decades. 1998, Springfield Oregon, Kip Kinkel opened fire in his high school. He was taken down and subdued by wrestler Jake Ryker, who took a bullet for his heroism. Ryker most likely knew what he was made of inside, I’m positive he tested his mettle wrestling and it came out that fateful day.  Ryker lived, but one of the heroes of Virginia Tech was not so lucky. Liviu Librescu, a Holocaust survivor and professor, barred his classroom’s door shut to enable his students’ escape. The scary thing about that shooting is the amount of people who were shot dead execution style. The Gunman had to reload several times to continue his killing spree, which stretched over 2 hours total. Most of the heroes of that shooting were killed or injured that day. It’s hard to believe there was no Jake Ryker to subdue the shooter. I don’t know if anyone tried. I don’t know what I would have done. What about you?

We as Christians and Citizens and MMA fans, have the responsibility to protect our SpongeBob fans and our so-you-think-you-can-dance fans from evil. I want to learn fight not because I want to buy leather chaps, change my name to Lorenzo, and become a bounty hunter vigilante. But when I encounter somebody with evil behind his eyes, I’ve tested myself and am not afraid to stay standing. They will strike my cheek, I will slowly turn my head back and offer the other cheek. Because you can’t hurt me, my life is in heaven not my cheeks.

In closing, I think Christians associate combat sports with violence and bullies before sport, discipline, or hard work. Imagine a generation of Christians who lived in peace not because they were afraid of persecution, but because nobody would mess with them. What people do you know who would more likely listen to what you had to say if they respected your ground and pound. What if you had knockout power but used your hands to serve and love people instead? I think you could love them more.