My Facebook newsfeed is filled with little boutiques that are marketing to moms like me, basic church-going women with 2.5 kids and a dog and the proverbial white picket fence who want to look cute when they’re running errands. I’ve noticed a huge rise in tshirts with little saying for moms: #momlife, Running on Coffee and Dry Shampoo, Mama Bear, Messy Bun and Getting Stuff Done, Mommin’ Ain’t Easy.
You get the picture.
The stuff is cute and harmless and lets moms show a sense of humor about our day-to-day struggles in parenting. But, as this trend has caught on, it’s also produced a different kind of tshirt that is a symptom of some things that we really need to consider as Christians. There is another breed of mom shirt that goes more like this: I love Jesus (but I cuss a little), All I Need is Jesus with a side of Gangsta Rap, We pray on them Sundays, and we cuss on them Mondays.
These tshirts are adorably printed and at first glance may seem like a harmless way to point out that none of us is perfect. After all, admitting that we are sinners is an essential part of salvation and sanctification. We have to continually be mindful of our tendency to do what we shouldn’t–how else will we maintain a proper (humble) view of ourselves when compared to the perfection of Christ? But, I believe there is more to these shirts than a striving to stay humble.
Some years ago, a couple of buzzwords started cropping up in Christian circles. Transparency. Being real. No perfect people allowed. We were reacting against a stuffy church culture where Christians felt like they could never admit that they had failings and sin issues. We didn’t want a church life filled with a bunch of people who were pretending to be perfect. We wanted to feel free to open up to each other about our struggles, to lay our sin bare in order to better kill it. At least, I hope that’s what we were trying to do.
But, somewhere along the way, worldly wisdom crept in, as it often does, and we began to see our shortcomings as some kind of badge of honor. We actually began to take pride in our openness and in the very sins that are killing us. We laughed about our vices and joked about the things that were separating us from God. And, here we are, years later, and we don’t even realize that we are buying tshirts that advertise nothing more than a nominal Christian life. That is, Christian in name only. Not in true repentance or in heartbreak over our sin or in power or in truth. When we don’t even see the folly in wearing a shirt that speaks the precious name of Jesus in the same breath as a love for gangster rap.
I don’t know much about gangster rap, but according to the internet, here are a few things the genre promotes: crime, serial killing, murder, violence, profanity, sex addiction, homophobia, racism, promiscuity, misogyny, rape, street gangs, disorderly conduct, drive-by shootings, vandalism, thievery, driving under the influence, drug dealing, alcohol abuse, substance abuse, disregarding law enforcement, materialism, and narcissism.
I don’t see anything in there that should even remotely be linked to the Christian life, unless we’re talking about Jesus’ ability to rescue us from all of those things and more. Yet, sweet little mamas are buying these tshirts, not even understanding what they are saying about the Christian faith, about what it means to be a follower of Christ, about the true Christian’s serious call to holiness and godliness.
How can this be? Because we have allowed our faith to remain so intertwined with the world. We have said, Sure, I’ll take a little bit of Jesus, but I also want a little bit of cussing and a little bit of entertainment that is directly opposed to His word and a little bit of being okay with the sins that stand in the way of my growth and hurt my witness. After all, I don’t want to get too radical about this stuff. I’m not a weirdo.
And, slowly, slowly, with every little wordly decision that we make, we teach our kids and our mom friends and the lady at the grocery store that Christianity is just a little bit of a life change. Jesus only expects a little bit out of us. And, His power is only a little bit relevant to our day-to-day lives.
You may have one of these tshirts in your closet. I’m not condemning you for ordering a tshirt. It’s really not about the tshirt, you see? It’s so much deeper than that. It’s the fact that we have become so numb to the sick way that our world operates that we don’t even mind opening our hearts and minds to the sins that are destroying us this very minute. We are all infected with it–with a love for the things of this depraved world. But, the second we decide that killing the sin in our lives isn’t a priority, that’s the instant that we turn Christianity into a powerless, not-much-of-anything religion that is a little bit useful only when a crisis arises. This is not the abundant life Jesus promised. We are trading in the abundance of Christ for a cheap, faulty, wicked world.
And then we buy the tshirt.
And the words of John Owen reverberate in my brain: “Be killing sin or it will be killing you.”
Melissa, I wrote a post on this a long while back too…and I so appreciate hearing it from your young mom self. Mine was a grandma who had that shirt on … I love Jesus and I cuss a little. It hit me hard. You have expressed well the root of my concern. Thank you for looking at the culture we live in with a biblical view and having the courage to continue to point us to Christ <3
Speak truth, girl!!!! ❤️
Another one that bothers me is a
“All I need is coffee and Jesus”, as if they were comparable in value and worth. Its borders on blasphemy to group the matchless worth of Christ with a cup of coffee ( this is coming from someone who LOVES coffee).
Yeah, I could never appreciate those, either. They are adult versions of attitude shirts, and God doesn’t call us to have that kind of attitude.
I love this so much!! I always appreciate your posts so much. Thanks for faithfully speaking truth to us young mamas! ❤️
This article is right on the money!!! Keep fighting the good fight!❤️
Thank you for speaking up! I share your concern and can’t seem to bring myself to get on board with the trend (I couldn’t put my finger on why, exactly, until now. This resonates with me!). To add to it, I also have a hard time with a lot of the words on kids’ t-shirts, too. I don’t have a problem with ones that say things like “Kindness matters” or “make a difference everyday” or you know, life-giving sayings that echo and reinforce the things our family values. But when the t-shirts say things like “sassy little thing” or “here comes trouble” or things that literally put not-so-great labels my kids, there’s something amis. Words matter. Labels matter. They say more than we think they do. Thank you for raising this topic and for gracefully encouraging us to think about it a little more.
Nope. Nope. Nope. It is definitely just a shirt lady. To make the shirt anything more than a shirt is to descredit the power of Christ on earth to transcend the shirt. That is the whole point. It is just a shirt. Your bubble needs a break…step outside of it for a month or two and breathe some fresh air. The carbon monoxide of faith based ethnocentrism is going to suffocate your actual faith. Get out here and listen to some gangsta rap with new friends you make at the store, a park, or a bar over some coffee or wine. Go out….meet some new people…the ones surrounding you and supporting this are toxic.
My wife just forwarded this to me today, and as a pastor, I just can’t let Andrea have the last negative word. I am grateful for this article bringing discernment of the pervasive threat we face in subtle ways of being conformed to the world, and that we must be continually transformed by the renewing of our minds. We may not readily see the connection of things in our life to our hearts, but make no mistake, there is always a connection (Proverbs 4:23). Thank you, Melissa.