Relevant.  What, or who, is?  What, or who, isn’t?  How do you know?  Who determines that?  Is it dependent on you?  . . . or someone else?  Does it change?  . . . or is relevance a fixed commodity, able to be defined once and for all?

Last night I had the privilege of preaching at Deer Run for our Chapel Service and in preparation, God kept drawing me to this question of relevance.  In a spiritual reality, what makes a person’s life relevant?  What makes an individual Christian, a church program, or an entire church itself, relevant and what keeps any of these from being relevant?  Is it really based on me and my particular likes, desires, and needs?  That would seem a rather selfish definition of relevant, but one that we commonly use – it’s applicable to me, so it is relevant. . . . or, it is not applicable to me, so it is not relevant.  Sound familiar?  Oh, we often go to such lengths not to sound selfish.  We wouldn’t say it’s about me and what I connect with.  No, we find someone just like us and use them to help define relevance according to what suits me, eh, I mean them.

This morning as I was reflecting on last night’s message, I began thinking about chameleons and how their nature relates to relevance.  (I know, some of you are saying, “What!  Where did that come from?”)  Please hear me out.  A chameleon becomes relevant to its surroundings by taking something neutral, skin color, and changing it to fit into a variety of settings.  There are a couple of very important things to note here:

1. It is not a matter of choosing one color that works well in one setting and sticking with it because that is the one the chameleon likes best.  There really is no relevance in that.
2. The changes are all superficial and do nothing to diminish the fact that the chameleon is still just that – a chameleon.  The relevance is not in changing what it is, but in changing how it is seen.

 Too often, the idea of being relevant and a “chameleon” Christian gets a bad rap because we tend to hold on to the “neutral” elements of life and compromise on the core qualities of being Christ-like – all in the name of relevance.  True relevance and “chameleon” Christianity reflects great flexibility in the non-essentials while holding fast to the very things that make a Christian Christ-like.

True relevance is found when others are brought further along in their relationship with Christ because of their encounter with you and me.  If we are living a relevant Christian life, people will be bragging about Jesus Christ and not about the things we have done or said.