Jesus is My Boyfriend.

Yeah. No.

The "Jesus is my boyfriend" mentality is springing up all over the place in 'Christian' pop culture. Teens are facebooking on their 'relationship' with Jesus. Not as a spiritual, Savior of my Soul and Lord of my life kind of relationship, but as a gushing of emotion over quite honestly inconsequential nothings.

As soon as we get over the initial weirdness of the idea that people are 'dating' a guy who ascended into heaven almost two thousand years ago, and the fact that thousands of teens all claim to be dating the same guy, we can get to the theological issues at heart.

The proliferation of songs like Hold Me, for instance, demonstrate this mentality. While it could be argued the song has a deeper meaning than what is immediately apparent, the fact that it sounds like a song Rascal Flatts would record is a problem. When I turn to a radio station claiming to be presenting music glorifying to Christ, I don't want to hear something that, with the changing of two or three words, could be applied to a romantic relationship. It's shallow.

This goes beyond the explicit Jesus is my boyfriend idea, but on a much more common level, devaluing our relationship with Jesus as something less than what He actually is.

Jesus is Lord. I've been reading a book by John MacArthur called The Gospel according to Jesus. In it, he makes the point that the way we interpret Lord is not sufficient, as the literal translation of 'servant' in much of the New Testament is actually 'slave.' We are to be completely "sold out" to Christ. In every sense of the phrase. He has bought us with His blood, we are his servants. By elevating ourselves to "significant other" status, we lose a very important facet of salvation.

Jesus is our savior. Jesus laid down his life in one of the most terrible ways possible. We cheapen the value of such a sacrifice by elevating ourselves. If we are on such a level we can call Jesus "buddy," Then we are his equals. We wouldn't need a savior, and He most definitely would not be our Lord.

Regardless how you couch it, the "Jesus is my BF" mentality can take many forms. Even the way in which we pray can reflect an offhanded and irreverence for the saving and purchasing work He did on the cross.

Leaping Lizard