That's How They Look at Me

I've been a fan of the family-friendly sketch comedy show, Studio C, for a while now. But what? you say. Family-friendly sketch comedy? While it may sound downright doubtful at first, I assure you that there is such a thing, and Studio C is it. But whose idea was it to make wholesome comedy? The answer to that is probably not going to surprise you.

It's a group of Mormons. Born out of ideas from veterans of Brigham Young University's drama club, it plays on BYU TV and stars a cast of BYU students and graduates. Yet the only reflections of their faith in Studio C are a staunch morality and a glaring lack of any off-colour comedy. I can dig that.

One of the actors on Studio C is a particularly funny individual, especially on his social media pages. So funny, in fact, I started following him on Twitter. And true to his apparently hilarious self, he posts funny memes and Vines and Instagram quotes. But on this more personal platform I also see his faith come out. He retweets LDS.net and posts verses from the Book of Mormon.

And I just find it kind of weird and sad. Here he is, pouring hours of effort and years of faith into a fictitious deity. He's championing a false cause, preaching a fake gospel. As an individual, he appears friendly, down-to-earth, and just your average guy. I think we'd get along pretty well. Yet I can't help but pity him that he's wasting years in an empty faith and feel sympathy at his ignorance.

Then I realized that that's how non-Christians look at me.

They probably think it's nice that I have a faith to lean on, a crutch to assist me through this tumultuous life. But they don't think it's real. They think my faith in the God of the Bible as revealed in Jesus Christ is as faulty as I consider the Book of Mormon to be. They probably find it awkward.

I am different than them. Just like I feel a rift in my identification with this Mormon comedian, I feel a similar disconnect from non-Christians. We are not the same. We can be friends, but our friendship can only go so far. We don't share the only thing that matters in light of eternity - a unity because of Christ. We are not brothers and sisters. We are different.

And non-Christians will continue to look at me like I'm different, like I'm strange and awkward, like I'm wasting my life on a false cause. But that's okay. Because we are different. And that's something we shouldn't be ashamed of. Rather, it's something to embrace. It's something to use as a witness.

It's something to showcase our light to a dark world that is staring at us.