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   I love snakes. I have enjoyed them since my early years. I have always loved animals in general and reptiles in particular. In my middle and high school years I caught and kept all sorts of lizards, snakes and turtles, from king snakes and box turtles, to skinks and a really big snapping turtle.

Most of my time at Southeastern I have kept a snake or two in my office. I do not know too many professors at Evangelical seminaries who do such a thing. I just installed my newest, a six foot, beautifully marked red tailed boa, tentatively named Rosy. 

Why do i keep a snake in my office? I have had more than a few remind me of the role of the serpent in Genesis. I remind them of the bronze serpent that spared lives as well :-). I have had a few pansy students, er, I meant nervous students–no, I meant pansy students, who would not come in my office because of the snake. Bold and fearless ambassadors of the gospel for sure….Ok, I did put this one back behind my desk so the fearful would have a safe distance from her when they come to see me. I do love my students, phobias and all.

This is why I keep a snake. There actually is a reason beyond my fascination with reptiles. We have a culture in the church that overly obsesses with conformity. Coat and tie, political views, program-driven ministry, on and on. We stand boldly in our efforts to copy everyone else. Make no mistake: we should have conformity in key theological tenets. We should have conformity in our conviction about the Word and the Lord. And we should have a clue about common cultural mores regarding that which is appropriate. But in so many other areas we can have diversity.

Jesus Christ did not call us to make clones, but to make disciples. I am pretty confident that we need not follow Mormons in their conformity in dress (missionaries and their fashionable ties) or in their doctrine. It seems obvious to me that Jesus went out of His way to call 12 disciples that hardly looked exactly alike–fishermen, tax collector, zealot, etc. So my obsession with a snake in my office actually serves as an object lesson to be who you are, to be passionate for Jesus and convictional about truth, but to be a follower of Jesus rather than a clone of contemporary church practice. God made you a unique person, so learn who you are, like who you are, and to the glory of God, be who you are. Of course, certain standards matter–dressing like a frat boy to preach on Sunday might be a little over the top, for instance. But when a widely recognized, faithful expositor gets worked over because he had the audacity to preach in the pulpit in a golf shirt, when so many fat preachers strut around in their nice suits while hardly grazing the Bible in their message, that is a level of conformity I personally cannot take. I would love to see a preacher of the Word known more for his ability to preach and to live the Scriptures, for his personal witness and his love for his family, than his ability to find the nicest suit and cuff links. Ok, I will not even go on my rant about cuff links….

Here is what I am trying to say albeit badly. We should understand basic cultural norms. We should not be a rebel for the sake of being a rebel. There is a time to dress up. I have two suits I wear at weddings and funerals (not both at the same time). I understand some young ministers have lost the ability to understand appropriateness and civility. On the other hand, we should not feel the need to dress like a game show host (they wear suits) to be a man of God. Just saying. 

Let the Mormons be known for their ties. I want to be known for the integrity of my heart and the words of my mouth. And, of course, for my snake :-).

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008 at 5:50 am and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.