Poles And People

 You may have heard of “See you at the pole.” It is basically a day for people to meet at their local High School flag pole and publicly pray. You would think that this would be a good thing yeah? Christians getting together out in the open professing their faith, it seems the perfect way to make a faith statement. Yet, is it really something so great?

“See you at the pole” looks great on paper, but in practice it does have some problems. I view it similarly to Youth Group in this manner. People do not go to the flag pole because they want to glorify God. People do not go there because of their faith. People go there so they can say “Look at me world! Look at what a great Christian I am!” They will stand and pray and be “good” Christians for the duration of the meet, and then go home and go on with their lives. There are people there who will proclaim their deep devotion and then live as if they didn't believe in God. They are too much like the Pharisees who pray and fast in public. They want the recognition and admiration of the viewer. That is why they choose to pray so strongly publicly, but not privately. It is not about God it is about them. Another thing they consider is if a friend is going to be there. It then becomes less of a worship demonstration and becomes a social gathering. A place to have fun with your friends and not really have to do anything much. That is why you can see groups of people who are clearly together there. It is not one big group of Christians, it is a bunch of little groups pushed together and yet still separated somehow. The focus very quickly becomes lost. I am sure there are people there who really do believe in God and want to worship him, but I also know that many people there are thinking of other things than just God at that meet. 

“See you at the pole” is not about having fun with friends. It is not about bragging rights. Or at the very least, it is not supposed to (nor should it) be about these things. The purpose of the event is to glorify God and to focus on him. Not about how great a Christian you are, but how great a God we serve. Not about who is gonna be there or what you are going to talk about, because quite frankly you should not go just because Cindy will be there and “Oh my gawd she just HAS to tell you about her new church!” But sadly it does end up being about these things. And it takes away from the congregational feel. It takes away from the purpose of worshiping God. And in the end, it just ends up sounding vapid and empty. I am a Christian myself, and have no problems sharing my views and faith. But when I heard the advertisement for this event it just sounded ridiculous. It sounded to me like a bunch of people going out there just to say they went. I even remember hoping people did not get the impression that we were all fake like that. A random listener would probably consider it to be some group thing that does not really mean anything. And obviously it is a lot more for some people, I am not saying everyone feels and acts this way. But sadly the above mentioned are the majority.

I do want to stress here that I am not bashing everyone who goes to this. There are some people that do go for the right reasons and more power to them. But they should be aware that this image is something they will have to deal with. “See you at the pole” could be a great thing. It could be meaningful and admirable and honestly encouraging. But as is, it is still an empty group of people standing there to build up themselves instead of God. So it stands and so it remains.

-BlackFox

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