The other night I was talking with some friends and RUF (one of my favorite debatable topics) came up. Someone mentioned '..the people that go to RUF are negative." And it was all I could do not to immediately diverge into a dissertation over the various reasons why such a statement is false. This, in and of itself, surprised me because I believed that very statement for quite a while... and sometimes I still do.
When I first went to RUF, I hated it. I went once and never planned on going back. I thought it was boring, pretentious, and a little too fixated on traditionalism. A year or so later, after having become friends with several RUFers, I decided to give it another shot.
I should preface all this by saying that I suppose the church had been leaving a bitter taste in my mouth for a while, and I was constantly struggling with being fed the Joel Osteen spirituality that said "pray for good things and good things will happen." Not that there isn't some truth to that at times, but I don't think it's a commendable (or true) view of the Gospel. So when I came to RUF and met people who were interested in putting their faith into practice by learing what the Bible really had to say, eploring who Jesus really was, working on behalf of the poor, fighting aginst injustice, questioning poor theology, working towards building true communities,and really striving to understand and act out love; I was immediately attracted.
Now I won't lie. I still had (and sometimes still have) issues with some of the elitist overtones and cynial attitudes that I found floating around RUF. And I knew a lot of people on campus had a negative opinion of RUF, so I always made it a point to stay open-minded and understanding as much as possible, because really, it bothered me when I would hear an RUF person start bashing some christian artist or their work or some other denomination. After all, God uses all kinds of things and all kinds of people, why beat your brother down with the plank coming out of your face when you'll only be rejoicing in heaven later? For the love of all that is holy, can't we all just get along?!? But the longer I stayed with RUF and the more people that I got to know on a deeper level, the more I began to realize that a lot of the cynicism and negativity that I found at RUF had more to do with people's personal issues than it did with RUF. Sorta like causation versus coincidence... just because the highest number of deaths and the highest number of ice cream cones sold occur on the same day in the same city, does not mean that one caused the other... it may just mean that it was hot that day, which made some people irritable and some people crave ice cream. I find this to be true of some RUF folks.
It seems that a lot of people find their way to RUF at a time when they are tired of church. They are tired of being fed watered-down half truths about christianity and they are tired of feeling that they are being sold some sort of emotional religious experience in their journey toward learning about God. It may sound stupid, but I was blown away at RUF when I heard that I wasn't a sinner because I sinned, but that I sin because I'm a sinner. I mean, it made so much sense, it all seemed so simple. I wasn't a sinner because I just couldn't seem to make the right decisions at all the right moments, I was a sinner because I was helplessly flawed from the beginning! It wasn't a matter of my failed efforts as much as it was a matter of my flawed character. And who else is capable of redeeming flawed character, but Jesus? Such good news! Now that is the gospel, not: "positive thinking breeds positive results." Not "the more you work on it, the better you'll be."
I think the reason most RUFers are so "hard core" and sometimes viewed as "negative"(toward other denominations especially) is because they have finally found a truth that they feel is worth holding onto, and anything that says otherwise feels like heresay. Do I think that sometimes some people get carried away? absolutely. Just like republicans, and democrats and southern bnaptists and catholics, we are all capable of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. But that doesn't make all RUFers "elitists" or "cynical" or "negative."
Cynical people don't offer Jesus or hope to people in despair. Elitists aren't willing to sit with you and listen to you talk out your spiritual questions without any form of disdain or haughtiness. Negative people don't drive halfway across the country bawling their eyes out with a friend who is grieving. Negative people don't reach out and offer hope and prayer and kind words toward someone who has sinned against a fellow brother or sister in christ. Negative people don't bother with calling friends out on their idols and holding them accountable.
I'd say it's far more likely to find negative, cynical people standing at a distance judging things that they themselves haven't fully seen, or running away from something they never took the time to truly explore.
...and who hasn't done that at one point or another?
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