Sunday, January 23, 2011



Growing up in a very strict Baptist background, I was thoroughly indoctrinated into being a Baptist. Baptist was our identity. We weren't just any kind of Baptist; we were a certain kind of Baptist. We were more rigid in our set of rules than most of the Baptists and we were proud of it. We took a definite stand against a list of sins and sinners to be our kind of Baptist.

I never chose to be a Baptist, but grew up in a home where my parents were Baptists and they had me in some sort of Church experience several times per week. We went to Sunday School, then the main Sunday morning worship service, Sunday night service, Wednesday night prayer meeting and quite a few potluck dinners that were attached to some fellowship group within the Church. Thursday night was Visitation, where a few people went out door to door to invite people to come to Church on Sunday. And, if you were in one of the choirs or youth groups, you were required to be at more meetings at the Church.

It was clear to me as I grew older that the strategy was to keep you in as many Church meetings as possible, so you had no time to misbehave. That was exactly the strategy! Welcome to the strategy of indoctrination. Indoctrination is directing people into a system of programs. The idea is to get each person to follow the program and fit into the mold. It's all about molding a person's behavior so that he or she is a good Baptist or whatever religious persuasion. This, then, is presented to the world. In my small hometown we had made it clear that we Baptists didn't go to movies. So, whenever a Baptist was seen in line at the movies, he was criticized for not being a good Baptist. These non-Baptists weren't criticizing Baptists for doing something wrong; they were criticizing them for violating their own Baptist standards. These weren't biblical standards; these were Baptist standards. These weren't God's rules; they were man's rules. This is the essence of being indoctrinated by the man-made traditions and Baptist way of life looked like.

Indoctrination is strong. When I went to Dallas to attend a graduate seminary, I encountered all sorts of groups that were doing very good work for God. Whenever I shared what I was doing, my mother would pose the same question every time. It was, "Is this group Baptist?" Instead of trying to explain it or argue with her, I would say, "It's not strictly Baptist, but it is Baptistic!" I don't know why, but my mother was comforted by my answer.

A few years ago I accompanied a Muslim friend of mine to speak before a group of staff and volunteers at a mega-Church. He shared his story of how he had come to know, love and follow Jesus. He explained how he was a follower of Jesus within his Muslim cultural background. His love for Jesus was presented so passionately that this Baptist group was obviously impressed. Then, one of the pastoral leaders asked this question: "When you share Jesus with others, do you baptize others as Jesus commanded?" My friend was shocked by this question and looked at me. He said, "Did Jesus command us to baptize people?"

I turned around and faced the pastor saying, "You know Jesus never commanded us to baptize anyone. He commanded us to make disciples of all nations. Then he offered three participles with this command-by going, by baptizing and by teaching. Our problem is that we don't make disciples of Jesus very well, so we tend to go, baptize and teach really well, instead." The pastor got the point, but it was a bit uncomfortable in the room. Then, my Muslim friend shared with them that he had been baptized in the Jordan just a few months earlier. When he made it clear that he asked to be baptized and was baptized while on a trip to Jordan, the room nearly broke into applause! At first my friend didn't quite fit into their box-their indoctrinated mold, so there was some hesitancy and tension in the room. But when they discovered this Muslim follower of Jesus had been baptized, he finally fit into their mold as a Baptist.

Indoctrination has little to do with Jesus; it has a lot to do with shaping people to conform to a certain standard of living. This occurs when the well-meaning faithful spend more time cussing and discussing more about the Scriptures than they do seeking the One to Whom the Scriptures refer. Jesus speaks to this when He says, "You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you possess eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life." (John 5:39-40)

When Jesus commanded His followers to make disciples, He was speaking of making disciples or followers of Jesus, Himself. He was referring to making disciples who were just like Jesus in every way possible-to walk, talk, think and love like Jesus. He was not into indoctrinating anyone in order to fit a person into a mold or box. Jesus was all about incarnation. Incarnation is fleshing out Jesus in your life. It's being Jesus to others. Hearing what Jesus says and watching what He does and do the same!

You don't want to be indoctrinated-to be like some man-made system of do's and don'ts. You want to make it your focus to be into incarnation-to be like Jesus Himself.