on taking offense.
Today I was reading about a favourite art piece of mine called 'Piss Christ'. The piece is pretty simple, it's a photo of crucifix in a bottle of the artists' urine. It caused a major controversy in 1989 when it was first exhibited. It got me thinking...

It's a joke hobby of many of my friends to try to offend me. Particularly concerning the fact that I believe in Jesus, and by and large they don't. So, much laughter is had over the fact that I don't have sex, and that I read the bible, pray, and believe in impossible things.
Jesus can be the butt-end of a lot of jokes around me. All of it I think, to feel out whether I am going to be offended. To see where the elusive last straw is where I'm just going to lose it and start chucking bibles at people.

I have news! It's not going to happen.

I think Christians waste a lot of precious energy being offended. Forgive me, I'm sure that I'll get disagreement from this, but I don't think Christ needs me to rush to his side to defend him from having his feelings hurt.

Once in a long while, my feelings get hurt. This is because at the end of the day, I really do love Jesus and I livefor him. It gets lonely, being constantly misunderstood in something so central to who I am. I get my heart broke sometimes because I love my friends, and sometimes I feel helpless to truly make them understand what they're missing out on.

Do I get worked up over a rendition of Jesus in a bottle of piss? Not really, no.

Do I wish that the artist really knew the guy he was pissing on? Yeah, more than anything.