do i offend?

i love tony campolo and mike yaconelli. it was a very sad day when yaconelli died. part of the reason i love what they have said is because they constantly challenge me. they force me to rethink things and i appreciate that greatly. of course, during the process of looking at things from a different prospective and considering why we as CHRISTians do and/or believe things they often end of ticking people of (sometimes i'm one of those people who are ticked off). i'm okay with this because i understand it's part of what they do and i believe i know their hearts and the care and concern they have for followers of CHRIST. they're goal is never to just make people mad - instead they point out something wrong and then have options for making it right. they offer answers rather than just causing controversy. they have earned the right to "tick" people off because they have and do care so much for those who follow CHRIST. they don't say things just to tick people off. instead, their controversial statements are always a part of brokenness and sincere desire to follow CHRIST better.

so here's the point i have been leading up to - recently i've been running into more and more youth ministers who seem to enjoy being at the center of a controversy. sometimes it seems that they make statements just to tick people off. there doesn't seem to be a real purpose to the statements other than causing an argument that the speaker than can the respond by saying how "sometimes it's hard to hear the truth." they get to be a "rebel" and feel like their standing against something but their actually just "rebels without a cause." they want to be campolo and yaconelli but they never have answers. they have the ability to tick off people but nothing to offer past that. oh this makes me furious.

of course, the worse part of all this is that i find myself doing the very thing i hate.