Are you a flashbang?

Just heard about a book entitled Flashbang. A flashbang, as the author (Mark Steele) puts it in a side column in the July/August edition of Relevant Magazine, is "a weapon used by our nation's military that is, in fact, not a weapon. It is a grenade that makes the sound of an explosion and creates a blast of light, but does not actually cause any destruction: the flashbang. It looks and sounds like a grenade, but leaves nothing behind."

He goes on to say, "Unfortunately, I used to live a flashbang life. Making a lot of noise and putting on quite a show without leaving any real permanent mark. [My book] is the story of how God changed me so that my faith leaves a stain."

What Kind of Bomb Are You?
I immediately had to make Mark's thought personal (and since you are reading this, I'll include you as well). Are we living "flashbang" lives? We say the right words and do the right things to complete the image we want people to see (mine being a good little Christian boy), but do we have the type of faith and character that when people come into contact with us, we will "leave a stain?"

I don't know about you, but I don't want to be a flashbang Christian. I want this faith that I have been given by God to be authentic, to be real, to be deep, to be genuine. I want to be a person of true character.

But how do we get there? How do we become the kind of follower of Jesus I am talking about? I have some ideas on what the journey should look like, but I don't want to spoil all your exploration fun by giving you a preprinted map warped with my opinions. I'm sure I'll leave a scattered cookie crumb trail throughout my blog, but for now, let me leave it here - "what should the path ahead towards deep faith and Christlike character look like so that we aren't just flashbangs?"

(P.S. The book Uprising I mentioned in my last post is a great place to search for answers to that question. ;o)