On Crazy People, by Casting Crowns
When I heard the song, I liked it. It’s funny. I’m not sure it’s woke, though. If you know what I mean?
Woke means ‘being alert to racial discrimination and other kinds of prejudice’. And some people feel that the word crazy is unwoke because it stigmatizes mental health issues.
According to woke people, calling someone crazy seems to imply that he or she isn’t living in the real world and can’t make rational decisions, that they’re mentally deranged.
I looked up the politically correct alternatives to crazy. A woke dictionary suggested, ‘irrational, ridiculous, silly and absurd’. If you think it actually is absurd to suggest that the word crazy can be replaced by the word absurd then I guess you’re unwoke.
But crazy does have wider meanings that have nothing to do with mental health. It can mean ‘to be infatuated with someone’ or ‘to be passionately excited or very enthusiastic about something’.
I guess the song writers want to have it both ways. They say that it’s only crazy people who believe in Jesus. On the one hand they mean people who are passionate about him and the Gospel. There’s nothing unwoke about that. But on the other hand they imply that only a fool, someone dangerously detached from reality, would challenge a giant with a sling and a few pebbles, or build an ark in the middle of a drought, or go willingly into a lion’s den.
I suppose what I like about the song is that it pokes fun at people who go to Church. You might think that’s pretty unkind, pretty unwoke, except that the singer says, ‘I’m one of those crazy people.’
Every month we go to an ecumenical service at the ancient parish church in Meriden. It has a stone tower and tombs with knights in armour on either side of the nave. It’s very beautiful, positively a picture postcard. But at a barbecue in the churchyard last summer someone who lives opposite the church admitted that she’d never been inside.
Here’s the church, here’s the steeple. But who actually does go into church these days? The stereotype of a churchgoer is someone elderly, and someone who's no longer living in the real world but clings instead to a past that faded into insignificance long ago, or someone who's willing to believe irrational, unbelievable things.
And yet the song says that’s always been the meaning of church. It’s a gathering of people who are prepared to walk through fire if necessary for what they believe in, or rather who they believe in.
Churchgoers are by definition a bunch of kingdom seekers and walk-by-faith believers, who trust in Jesus. Or at least, that’s who we’re meant to be. And that’s certainly out of step with most people today.
Who sees the world as a mission field? Only religious people. Who talks to Jesus like he’s real? Only spiritual people. Who believes the words in red? (That’s a reference to red letter Bibles where the words attributed to Jesus are printed in red rather than black type.) Well only people who trust in Jesus do that. And who says that Jesus is coming back at the end of time? Again, it’s only Christians who dare to think that way. Everyone else thinks it’s only crazy people who trust in Jesus.
The song doesn’t allow us to be smug. It challenges us to consider whether we’re crazy enough, foolish enough perhaps we should say instead, to really follow Jesus.
Would we dare to take a Bible into school today if we were one of our grandchildren or great grandchildren? And, of course, when the song talks about a public school it means an ordinary high school, not Eton or Winchester. And you might not even want to take a Bible into one of those either.
Which of us dares to share the Gospel with our family or friends, let alone our neighbours and the people at the gardening club? Wouldn't we risk being called a fool if we did that? And are we really not afraid to go against the flow, or do we keep our heads safely below the parapet?
The Gospel story for today picks up the same challenge. The disciples were supposed to trust in Jesus but only Peter was crazy enough to get out of the boat. When Jesus tried to reassure them, the rest of the disciples were terrified. The boat was being battered by the waves and far from seeing him as their rescuer they feared he was a ghost. And when you think about it, that was the most rational response. Living people don’t walk on water, or so they thought.
And even Peter soon started to think rationally too. When he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened. Who wouldn’t? His rational fears got the better of him and he began to sink. ‘You of little faith,’ Jesus told them all as he and Peter climbed aboard, ‘Why did you doubt?’ They weren’t crazy enough to trust him fully.
Many years ago, when I was a church and community worker in Salford a man from Liverpool got a job in Salford. He asked for a transfer from his council house in Liverpool to one in Salford and the Council offered him an empty apartment in the notorious Ordsall Flats.
This was a big mistake. What they hadn't reckoned with was that he’d been a leading light in the tenants and residents’ association on the estate where he’d lived in Liverpool. He was appalled at the state of the flats. They were damp inside and water constantly ran down the outside walls too from the broken gutters. So he got the residents together and organised a protest. They put up huge banners on the side of the Flats, facing the motorway that runs into the centre of Salford. The funniest one read, ‘Jesus walked on water. He must have trained in Ordsall Flats.’
We’re living in a broken world. We’re living in broken church. The waves are threatening to overwhelm us. Are we training with Jesus to walk on water, to make a difference, to speak up? Or are we too frightened by the prevailing wind to overcome our doubts?
If you’ve heard of being woke or unwoke, you’ll have heard of ‘cancel culture’ too. That’s where people are ostracised and shunned for stepping out of line and being unwoke. ‘Well cancel me,’ says the singer, ‘Because I’m one of those crazy people who really does believe in Jesus.’
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