Christians are disciples.
Disciples follow Jesus, learn from him, and are charged with the mission of continuing to do so, and to draw others to the same kind of life ("go and make disciples").
The original disciples were called by Jesus and in answer to that call they followed Jesus. But when Jesus departed, he charged them with the mission of making other followers and learners like them, so somehow the ability to follow Jesus and learn from him did not come to an end with his departure. It continued through the disciples. They continued to be disciples (followers of Jesus) and in so doing they made new disciples.
The church is the coming together of such disciples. When they come together they might be expected to sing the praises of the one to whom they have dedicated their lives, or to discuss their mission (the ups and downs, the troubles and triumphs), or to pray for one another as disciples (or you might say, to pray one another into their missions). Jesus said he would be with them when they came together, even just two or three of them. To be with him and to have him be with them is the desire of their hearts.
If you conduct church as if your congregation is not in fact a gathering of disciples on mission but simply a needy crowd, then that's what you will have.
If you, as church leaders, funnel your definition of mission entirely through a church-activity grid, then you're failing to teach the true nature of discipleship or the true nature of mission. It is almost entirely outside the walls, along the highways and byways.
If when disciples come together they choose to listen to someone preach, that preacher probably should preach what Jesus preached. They're Jesus followers, after all, not Bible-worshippers.
And when, after coming together and learning from one another, praying for one another, singing the praises of Jesus together, they go their separate ways, they are going back out to their missions as Jesus-followers. Their mutuality is in their love for Jesus and their shared mission as his followers.
The alternative to this vision of church is one in which the church is merely a dispenser of help (Biblical or not) and the congregation is merely a crowd of needy people. There can be a lot of comforting at such a church, but often very little calling. Leaders in these churches see their primary mission as attracting more needy people and dispensing the help they need, but seldom calling (and even re-calling) people to the mission the way Jesus did ("follow me, and I will make you fishers of men").
The congregation then takes on a two-tiered aspect. The handful that "minister," and the many that need "ministry." This set-up becomes entrenched by one-hour repetitions each Sunday morning. But it does not make disciples nor does it strengthen and encourage disciples, nor is it, I would suggest, even church.
On the other hand, a church that is the gathering of the called disciples will be all about sending not attracting. It will be all about mission, not about finding new way to get more people in the building.
Showing posts with label discipleship. Show all posts
Showing posts with label discipleship. Show all posts
Friday, July 08, 2011
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Tim Keller: "The Gospel is not advice."
Keller, in the second chapter of King's Cross
, makes the point several times that the Gospel is not advice but news. He must feel it is necessary to make this point because our churches are so flooded with advice instead of news.
Two weeks ago I went to a church in which the preacher talked about removing the obstacles from our lives that keep us from serving in the church. In that same church, at the start of communion, as the ushers passed out the little quarter-swallows of grape juice and tiny flakes of “bread,” an elder of the church talked to us about how God had spoken to him during his quiet time about . . . the need to have a quiet time. The elder then tried earnestly to impress upon us the importance of having our own special quiet time each day. No one ever seemed to think that maybe communion might be precisely the time to stop thinking about what we should do, and start thinking at last about what Jesus has done for us. In other words, rather than talking about quiet times, actually being quiet.
What I mean to say is, we're flooded with advice. So far, my on-again/off-again search for a new church home has been pretty disappointing on this score. No news, lots of advice. Either it's we should defend the faith and return America to its Christian roots, or we should be more generous, or we should examine our lives to see if we are pleasing to God, or we should remove the obstacles to service because the church needs us, or . . . well, you get the pictures.
I have no mind to be a church basher or a professional critic, but I will say this. By and large, people in the church accept this sorry status quo because they like it that way. I get the feeling that if a church service was focused on the announcement that Jesus Christ is Lord of all creation, they would walk away feeling they haven't been helped or strengthened in any way. I have seen Christians move happily from one system of advice to another with great enthusiasm. Seven steps to this, four steps to that, now let's everybody do this, now that, and each new set of principles is of course most definitely “life-changing.” And they hop on each of these bandwagons without the slightest sense that there all this seems deeply divergent from the New Testament model of discipleship.
In an interesting article about accountability groups, Tullian Tchividjian says this:
[One book that might serve as a helpful reminder here: Grounded in the Gospel: Building Believers the Old Fashioned Way
]
, makes the point several times that the Gospel is not advice but news. He must feel it is necessary to make this point because our churches are so flooded with advice instead of news. Two weeks ago I went to a church in which the preacher talked about removing the obstacles from our lives that keep us from serving in the church. In that same church, at the start of communion, as the ushers passed out the little quarter-swallows of grape juice and tiny flakes of “bread,” an elder of the church talked to us about how God had spoken to him during his quiet time about . . . the need to have a quiet time. The elder then tried earnestly to impress upon us the importance of having our own special quiet time each day. No one ever seemed to think that maybe communion might be precisely the time to stop thinking about what we should do, and start thinking at last about what Jesus has done for us. In other words, rather than talking about quiet times, actually being quiet.
What I mean to say is, we're flooded with advice. So far, my on-again/off-again search for a new church home has been pretty disappointing on this score. No news, lots of advice. Either it's we should defend the faith and return America to its Christian roots, or we should be more generous, or we should examine our lives to see if we are pleasing to God, or we should remove the obstacles to service because the church needs us, or . . . well, you get the pictures.
I have no mind to be a church basher or a professional critic, but I will say this. By and large, people in the church accept this sorry status quo because they like it that way. I get the feeling that if a church service was focused on the announcement that Jesus Christ is Lord of all creation, they would walk away feeling they haven't been helped or strengthened in any way. I have seen Christians move happily from one system of advice to another with great enthusiasm. Seven steps to this, four steps to that, now let's everybody do this, now that, and each new set of principles is of course most definitely “life-changing.” And they hop on each of these bandwagons without the slightest sense that there all this seems deeply divergent from the New Testament model of discipleship.
In an interesting article about accountability groups, Tullian Tchividjian says this:
Paul understood that Gospel-driven change is rooted in remembrance. What Paul did for the Colossians is what we all need our Christian brothers and sisters to do for us as well: remind me first of what’s been done, not what I must do.Tullian also quotes Sinclair Ferguson:
Historically speaking, whenever the piety of a particular group is focused on OUR spirituality, that piety will eventually exhaust itself on its own resources. Only when our piety forgets about us and focuses on Jesus Christ will our piety be nourished by the ongoing resources the Spirit brings to us from the source of all true piety, our Lord Jesus Christ.Even the first disciples did not understand the this-changes-everything nature of the good news, and none foresaw the cross as anything but a horrible defeat and failure. To understand the nature of the victory Christ won on our behalf is at least one part of discipleship, and it is one task of the church to teach exactly that understanding and its implications for all of life.
[One book that might serve as a helpful reminder here: Grounded in the Gospel: Building Believers the Old Fashioned Way
]
Thursday, August 05, 2010
Listening in
Interesting interviews with Terry Virgo. If you have the tine, listen in.
Speaking of interviews, I'm listening to blogger Dan Edelen on a radio program called Wise People. Dan is wise, so it's only right that he be on that show.
Speaking of interviews, I'm listening to blogger Dan Edelen on a radio program called Wise People. Dan is wise, so it's only right that he be on that show.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
On the relationship between discipleship and community
We can talk all we want about missional churches, but they are not missional at all if they are not full of missional people. Missional churches help folks be/become missional people.
That's why I like Dave Harder's blog title, Living Missional, and his subtitle, "engaging in a journey to love God and others." Here's a snip from his post entitled Love and Loss:
:
Bottom line, I'm not totally delighted about being church-less, but neither am I rushing out to find a congregation. Yes, the author of Hebrews did advise "not neglecting to meet together," and the ESV Study Bible footnote for that passage says, "Christian perseverance is a community endeavor." I like that. But I'm not convinced that the "community" has to be in the form of hundreds of folks from far and wide getting together once a week to sit in neat rows in a big auditorium and listen to an expert speak. If you want to do that, fine. Maybe the dude is a great and helpful speaker.
Yes, the talking dudes are okay and can be very helpful. They're on the radio, televison, Internet. They're talking all over the place. I'm thinking they might show up somewhere on my list of "good stuff" associated with Christian discipleship, maybe #27 or #28, I dunno. But more important than all that is "meeting together." And I don't take that to mean "listening together" to the expert Bible guy, not primarily anyway.
Here's anothert quote from Dave Harder (this time from a post called Churchless Christianity:
Discipleship. Eee gad, but that's a scary word. Eugene Peterson is good at de-mystifying this sort of thing. Here's another example of how he talks about it in his book Practice Resurrection.
Discipleship happens in community, but community has to be more, much more, than Sunday morning. Try this metaphor: Sunday morning is the flower of community, but the roots are in deeply real and authentic personal relationships among believers.
Here's my deal. I'm going to pursue the latter (the roots) and hope for the former (the flower) and not the other way around. After all, it was Paul who said, "if the root is holy, so are the branches" (Rom 11:16). And maybe the flower too.
That's why I like Dave Harder's blog title, Living Missional, and his subtitle, "engaging in a journey to love God and others." Here's a snip from his post entitled Love and Loss:
I have to say I absolutely love the way God calls us to live. He invites us to take His presence, His Kingdom wherever we go and when we are awakened to that reality things happen... God things happen. I don't know where you are at in your views of church and this Jesus life but God calls us into this way of living that is way more exciting than sitting in a church service listening to some dude talk... the church is real, active, alive, risky, present in every area of life.The "living" is the life of discipleship. Here's what Eugene Peterson says about that in Practice Resurrection
:Jesus used the birth metaphor for another kind of birth: becoming alive to God. Alive to God-alive. Life vast, complex, damaged, demanding . . . and beautiful. Alive to God's holiness, God's will, God's kingdom, power, and glory. There is more to life after birth than mother's milk, sleeping and waking, walking and talking. There is God.When I decided to "turn down" the Sunday morning church thing for a while, I knew that I would have to be more intentional than ever about discipleship. I would have to pursue it in new ways. I haven't exactly worked that out yet, but folks like Harder and Peterson are helping me get the focus right.
Bottom line, I'm not totally delighted about being church-less, but neither am I rushing out to find a congregation. Yes, the author of Hebrews did advise "not neglecting to meet together," and the ESV Study Bible footnote for that passage says, "Christian perseverance is a community endeavor." I like that. But I'm not convinced that the "community" has to be in the form of hundreds of folks from far and wide getting together once a week to sit in neat rows in a big auditorium and listen to an expert speak. If you want to do that, fine. Maybe the dude is a great and helpful speaker.
Yes, the talking dudes are okay and can be very helpful. They're on the radio, televison, Internet. They're talking all over the place. I'm thinking they might show up somewhere on my list of "good stuff" associated with Christian discipleship, maybe #27 or #28, I dunno. But more important than all that is "meeting together." And I don't take that to mean "listening together" to the expert Bible guy, not primarily anyway.
Here's anothert quote from Dave Harder (this time from a post called Churchless Christianity:
Instead of being the church, we have fallen into merely doing church, and far too often our doing is disconnected from being.I stopped into a Panera last week, early morning, and there were some guys in there meeting and talking with their Bible's open (well, actually, one of them had an ipad, but the rest were using the old "turn the page" technology). Anyway, this is Maine, and you don't see that kind of thing too often up here (not guys with Bibles at coffee shops, I mean). In fact, this was the first time I've seen it (other than those times when I myself have been a part of the group). It did my heart good, it did. Discipleship was going on.
Discipleship. Eee gad, but that's a scary word. Eugene Peterson is good at de-mystifying this sort of thing. Here's another example of how he talks about it in his book Practice Resurrection
.The most signifcant growing up that anybody does is to grow as a Christian. All other growing up is preparation for or ancillary to this growing up. Biological and social, mental and emotional growing is all ultimately absorbed into growing up in Christ. Or not. The human task is to become mature, not only in our bodies and emotions and minds within ourselves, but also in our relationship with God and other persons.Growth. Growth in relationship with God and others. This kind of thing cannot be primarily church-based. It has to be day to day, or it's mere playacting. That's why all the church-talk about "community" is trivialized when it only manifests itself as a Sunday gathering (no matter how effervescent that gathering may be).
Discipleship happens in community, but community has to be more, much more, than Sunday morning. Try this metaphor: Sunday morning is the flower of community, but the roots are in deeply real and authentic personal relationships among believers.
Here's my deal. I'm going to pursue the latter (the roots) and hope for the former (the flower) and not the other way around. After all, it was Paul who said, "if the root is holy, so are the branches" (Rom 11:16). And maybe the flower too.
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Kingdom-Oriented Relationships 3
Jesus taught us to love one another, but he also taught us to go and make disciples. I think that, with the best of intentions, we often choose the former and disregard the latter, as if the two were essentially at odds.
In our churches, we make discipleship a matter of theological study, increasing in our knowledge of church doctrine, and in time perhaps moving into a leadership role. Churches being human institutions, sometimes this process produces leaders who do not love, while the loving ones, choosing not to climb the leadership ladder, go about their lives in quiet and blessed anonymity.
Because I'm not a part of any church fellowship right now, I'm thinking about how to apply Christ's imperative, "go and make disciples," out here in the world beyond the church parking lot. But it's always helpful to define your terms. In the Christian context, a disciple is a follower of Jesus. To "make disciples," then, is to guide people toward Jesus.
Dallas Willard has laid out the problematic nature of discipleship in Evangelicalism in his great article for the Oxford Handbook of Evangelical Theology
(found online here).
Willard's article is very helpful, and you should read it all, but the essence of New Testament discipleship, as Willard sees it, is "being with Jesus, and learning to be like him." Here's more from Willard:
The life of a disciple is this "drawing near" to Jesus (in the Word, in prayer, in fellowship with other followers of Jesus), learning from him, and then application of that which we've learned. This application happens in contexts that are anything but private, inward, or strictly "spiritual," but intensely relational. This application, this "walking out," looks a lot like love.
In our churches, we make discipleship a matter of theological study, increasing in our knowledge of church doctrine, and in time perhaps moving into a leadership role. Churches being human institutions, sometimes this process produces leaders who do not love, while the loving ones, choosing not to climb the leadership ladder, go about their lives in quiet and blessed anonymity.
Because I'm not a part of any church fellowship right now, I'm thinking about how to apply Christ's imperative, "go and make disciples," out here in the world beyond the church parking lot. But it's always helpful to define your terms. In the Christian context, a disciple is a follower of Jesus. To "make disciples," then, is to guide people toward Jesus.
Dallas Willard has laid out the problematic nature of discipleship in Evangelicalism in his great article for the Oxford Handbook of Evangelical Theology
(found online here).Willard's article is very helpful, and you should read it all, but the essence of New Testament discipleship, as Willard sees it, is "being with Jesus, and learning to be like him." Here's more from Willard:
Now this practice of discipleship in the communities of Christ followers—being with Christ learning to be like him, in part by being with those who are further along on that same path—is what lends realism and hope to the glowing pictures of his people that stand out from the pages of the New Testament. Such passages as Matthew chapters 5-7, John chapters 14-17, Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Ephesians chapters 4-5, and Colossians 3 readily come to mind. These are not just passages stating required behaviors, as laws might do—"Turn the other cheek" and so forth—not a new and sterner legalism. Rather, as expressing what lies "beyond the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees" (Matt. 5:20), they are indications of what life becomes for those who are devoted disciples of Jesus Christ within the fellowship of disciples and under the administration of the Word and of the Holy Spirit. A life of this quality is the "output" of disciples of Jesus who make disciples wherever they go, gather them in Trinitarian reality, and teach them in such a way that they come to do all that Jesus told us to do out of transformed personalities. What is now generally regarded as "normal Christianity" drops away with the "cleaning of the inside of the cup" (Matt. 23:25-26). Discipleship is the status or position within which spiritual (trans)formation occurs.I'll have more to say concerning all this, but simply note for now that, given Willard's NT references above, you will understand that love is not something that happens apart from discipleship and disciple-making, but a fruit that is produced by our "being with and learning to be like Jesus."
The life of a disciple is this "drawing near" to Jesus (in the Word, in prayer, in fellowship with other followers of Jesus), learning from him, and then application of that which we've learned. This application happens in contexts that are anything but private, inward, or strictly "spiritual," but intensely relational. This application, this "walking out," looks a lot like love.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Praying on the Edge
I really didn't expect to be going on about the Jesus Prayer for post after post, but here I am again, back on the same theme. In the first post, Praying for the Kingdom of God, I tried to emphasize that the Jesus prayer has little in common with the way we usually pray. We usually pray with our "needs" uppermost, instead of the kingdom of God. And in the second post, The Jesus Prayer is a Missional Prayer, I tried to emphasize the related point that Jesus was teaching disciples how to pray. It is a prayer format for disciples.
There are a few things I want to say before going further. First, my prayer-life is no model of Christian piety. Believe me, I am no expert. I am a stuttering, befuddled, mind-wandering kind of pray-er. I pray often, throughout the day in fact, most often the age-old gem, "Help me, Lord!" But what I have found is that praying for myself and others in the way that Jesus taught us to pray has tended to cleanse my prayer-life of self-focused pleading, and helped me to picture myself as I pray not as the client of some wise and supernaturally gifted therapist and sugar-daddy, but as a front-line representative (one of many) of God's onrushing Kingdom.
I've been reading Darrell Johnson's book about The Revelation to John called Discipleship on the Edge, which emphasizes that The Revelation is primarily intended as an encouragement to disciples. I want to borrow something from Johnson that helps us to understand the position of the disciple in the plan of God to make his will be done "on earth as it is in heaven." This understanding frees us from reading The Revelation as a book of prognostication (as if John were an early Nostradamus). But it is not only a book for disciples, but a book for disciples "on the edge." When we see what Johnson means by that, it will help us to understand the real need for praying the way Jesus taught.
All this being the case, it changes the way we see, for example, our daily needs. We pray differently because we learn to "want" differently, for ourselves, and for our loved ones. Just as seeing Revelation as a discipleship book changes the way you read and understand its rich content, seeing the Jesus prayer as a discipleship prayer (and ourselves as disciples) changes the way we pray. It changes the way we want. It changes our hopes and dreams and the desires of our hearts. This is the work of the Holy Spirit, who is in the disciple-making business. That just happens to be one of the ways God is working out his kingdom plan.
In the next few posts I'm going to take the four requests laid out in the second half of the prayer of Jesus (provision, forgiveness, protection from temptation, protection from the evil one), and expand on how these things fit in our prayer-life as discipleship.
Final note: you might think that, since I'm quoting Darrell Johnson and all, I might at least quote his book on the Lord's prayer, called Fifty-Seven Words that Change the World: A Journey through the Lord's Prayer. All I can say is, it's in the mail.
There are a few things I want to say before going further. First, my prayer-life is no model of Christian piety. Believe me, I am no expert. I am a stuttering, befuddled, mind-wandering kind of pray-er. I pray often, throughout the day in fact, most often the age-old gem, "Help me, Lord!" But what I have found is that praying for myself and others in the way that Jesus taught us to pray has tended to cleanse my prayer-life of self-focused pleading, and helped me to picture myself as I pray not as the client of some wise and supernaturally gifted therapist and sugar-daddy, but as a front-line representative (one of many) of God's onrushing Kingdom.
I've been reading Darrell Johnson's book about The Revelation to John called Discipleship on the Edge, which emphasizes that The Revelation is primarily intended as an encouragement to disciples. I want to borrow something from Johnson that helps us to understand the position of the disciple in the plan of God to make his will be done "on earth as it is in heaven." This understanding frees us from reading The Revelation as a book of prognostication (as if John were an early Nostradamus). But it is not only a book for disciples, but a book for disciples "on the edge." When we see what Johnson means by that, it will help us to understand the real need for praying the way Jesus taught.
I have entitled this book Discipleship on the Edge because, as I hope to make clear, Revelation is not a crystal ball revealing esoteric secrets that enable us to escape the harsh realities of life on earth, but a down-to-earth manual on how to be a disciple of Jesus facing the harsh realities of life on the earth; in particular, how to do this the way Jesus did and does. Edge because, as I also hope to make clear, that is the "place" where we are called to be Jesus' disciples. I am using the image of an edge to refer to three places. First, to refer to living on the edge of the final inbreaking of the kingdom of God, on the edge between this world and the next. Second, to refer to living on the edge where the inbreaking kingdom of God presently comes up against the kingdoms of this world which are out of sync with it. And third, "edge" refers to living before the "sharp, two-edged sword" that proceeds from the mouth of the risen Jesus.... This "edge" is very sharp--like a surgeon's scalpel--with the same intent of deep healing and freedom. As we will see . . . the whole book is written to bring us to the razor-sharp point of decision: who will be the Lord of my life and of the world? Whose way leads to the establishing of God's just rule amnong the nations?Now, I've included this lengthy quote about discipleship because I want to emphasize that we who call ourselves Jesus followers live on this edge, and pray on this edge. This edge is a violent place where the enemies of God's kingdom make sorties and ambushes and full-scale assaults on God's kingdom ambassadors and intercessors. Satan is not interest in your "health and wealth," but in disabling you as a disciple of the triumphant Lamb! We long for this edge to be obliterated at last, for the time when we shall at last say "the kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever." [Rev. 11:15]
All this being the case, it changes the way we see, for example, our daily needs. We pray differently because we learn to "want" differently, for ourselves, and for our loved ones. Just as seeing Revelation as a discipleship book changes the way you read and understand its rich content, seeing the Jesus prayer as a discipleship prayer (and ourselves as disciples) changes the way we pray. It changes the way we want. It changes our hopes and dreams and the desires of our hearts. This is the work of the Holy Spirit, who is in the disciple-making business. That just happens to be one of the ways God is working out his kingdom plan.
In the next few posts I'm going to take the four requests laid out in the second half of the prayer of Jesus (provision, forgiveness, protection from temptation, protection from the evil one), and expand on how these things fit in our prayer-life as discipleship.
Final note: you might think that, since I'm quoting Darrell Johnson and all, I might at least quote his book on the Lord's prayer, called Fifty-Seven Words that Change the World: A Journey through the Lord's Prayer. All I can say is, it's in the mail.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Praying for the Kingdom of God
In this recent post I talked about how the Lord's prayer, as it is called, provides a format for intercession that keeps us from being self-absorbed in our prayers. Now I want to say something more.
When I pray, I try to pray in this format, starting out by focusing on the kingdom of God, thinking about the kingdom and longing for it to come at last in fullness and glory; and then, with some sense of kingdom-wonder lingering in my thoughts, I move on to the second half of the Jesus format: personal provision, forgiveness, protection from temptation and the evil one. Sometimes I focus more on one of these than the others, but I try always to start with the kingdom.
When we pray "may your kingdom come," we're praying for the biggest most momentous event we can ever imagine happening. We're praying that today, in our presence, Revelation 21 would happen. Here's just a sample of what that will be like:
But maybe the prayer for ultimate things will not be answered today. Maybe the New Jerusalem is still not yet. Maybe today will be like all the days that have come before. Well then, short of the kingdom of God in fullness, what should be our deepest desire for today? How about, at the very least, a foretaste of that kingdom. An inkling. A sense of what the Holy Spirit of God is doing around you. Paul mentions this in Ephesians 1:13-14, where he speaks of the Spirit as a guarantee of our inheritance. That is, a down-payment today of the kingdom-fullness that is to come.
What does that look like? Well, I believe it looks like "daily bread." and it looks like an ongoing attitude of repentance and forgiveness. And it looks like temptation overcome and protection from the lies, slander, and threats of the evil one. In other words, the rest of the Jesus prayer is a prayer for a little more of the kingdom now until the not yet finally comes in fullness.
So the Jesus prayer is a prayer for the kingdom from start to finish. It's an awesome prayer, a prayer for things far above our full understanding, a prayer for beauty and light and every tear disposed of and hopelessness obliterated and all sin done away with. The lamb is on the throne, and a river of life runs from there to all the nations. But it is also a prayer that positions us on the cutting edge of what God is doing in his world. It's the prayer, in other words (and I can't emphasize this enough), of a disciple.
When I pray, I try to pray in this format, starting out by focusing on the kingdom of God, thinking about the kingdom and longing for it to come at last in fullness and glory; and then, with some sense of kingdom-wonder lingering in my thoughts, I move on to the second half of the Jesus format: personal provision, forgiveness, protection from temptation and the evil one. Sometimes I focus more on one of these than the others, but I try always to start with the kingdom.
When we pray "may your kingdom come," we're praying for the biggest most momentous event we can ever imagine happening. We're praying that today, in our presence, Revelation 21 would happen. Here's just a sample of what that will be like:
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”Folks, this prayer is not about having a good day, getting along with your boss, getting good grades in school, or getting over your sore throat. It's a prayer for ultimate things, and when it comes, we will be on our faces in holy fear. When you begin here, you move on to other things with a certain sense of "perspective."
And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”
But maybe the prayer for ultimate things will not be answered today. Maybe the New Jerusalem is still not yet. Maybe today will be like all the days that have come before. Well then, short of the kingdom of God in fullness, what should be our deepest desire for today? How about, at the very least, a foretaste of that kingdom. An inkling. A sense of what the Holy Spirit of God is doing around you. Paul mentions this in Ephesians 1:13-14, where he speaks of the Spirit as a guarantee of our inheritance. That is, a down-payment today of the kingdom-fullness that is to come.
What does that look like? Well, I believe it looks like "daily bread." and it looks like an ongoing attitude of repentance and forgiveness. And it looks like temptation overcome and protection from the lies, slander, and threats of the evil one. In other words, the rest of the Jesus prayer is a prayer for a little more of the kingdom now until the not yet finally comes in fullness.
So the Jesus prayer is a prayer for the kingdom from start to finish. It's an awesome prayer, a prayer for things far above our full understanding, a prayer for beauty and light and every tear disposed of and hopelessness obliterated and all sin done away with. The lamb is on the throne, and a river of life runs from there to all the nations. But it is also a prayer that positions us on the cutting edge of what God is doing in his world. It's the prayer, in other words (and I can't emphasize this enough), of a disciple.
Monday, December 15, 2008
God Doesn't Think You're Awesome
The Gospel is good news, but it's not just any good news someone happens to think up. It's very specific good news. It's a particular piece of good news. Not just any happy-talk that comes along (which we then endlessly repeat to ourselves until we feel good for a while . . . then calling the whole procedure discipleship, and writing books about it!).
All of which is just my way of saying, Jared, you sure got that right!
All of which is just my way of saying, Jared, you sure got that right!
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Back to Missional
The last time I brought up the term "missional" around here, it provoked some small degree of discussion, pro and con. I’m probably coming to the use of this term late, but I’m definitely happy to "embrace" it (to use the sticky parlance of the moment). Seriously, it seems to me that a lot of folks have invested in this term as a form of Christian self-definition, finding it a useful corrective to certain prevailing trends. These folks call themselves missional, they discuss and apply the term continually, and by the use of this term they even seem to be self-consciously separating themselves from the general trend of contemporary Christianity. In saying, in effect, "we are the missional Christians," they are by implication suggesting that many others are not missional.
I generally like what I’m hearing from these missionals. As I mentioned a while back, the term seems to be a healthy alternative to the me-and-my-needs style of "doing church." Perhaps we can describe the difference this way: it’s the difference between a believer who skims the Bible looking for that special solace-verse that will address his personal problems and lift his spirit, and one who reads the Bible for a deeper understanding of his own mission and calling as a Christ-follower. Each is likely to find exactly what he's looking for. The former is once again comforted, and the latter is once again called.
This issue gets to the heart of my own oft-stated dissatisfaction with my church. In a lot of preaching that I hear, the congregation is urged to position themselves vis a vis Jesus in the place of the beseeching crowds of hurting people that seemed to gather around Jesus all the time. The various stories of Jesus healing "the many" work perfectly for this kind of sermon. First, the preacher shows us how Jesus cares for the hurting and ministers to their needs with power. Picture all that familiar "stock footage" from just about every Hollywood Jesus movie, where the Savior is walking among crowds of the destitute, the mournful, the crippled, the deaf, blind, and mute, the lepers and other untouchables, and as he walks he heals them with a touch.
Next on the preacher’s agenda, we in the congregation are urged to see ourselves in the place of those pleading ones. We are encouraged to "relate to" those in the beseeching crowd, reaching out hungry hands to Jesus. Cease depending on yourself, we are urged, admit your helplessness and come to Jesus. He will "transform" your life.
And the last step, the denouement of the sermon, is a call to the congregation to come to Jesus (in the form of "ministry teams" that line up in front of the church) and receive healing!
Now, I do not contend that any of this is wrong in and of itself. But I do contend that this sort of preaching does not correspond neatly to that which we read in Acts, nor to the emphasis we find in the epistles. This observation alone, if true, should be very humbling and disconcerting to us.
To understand how we might make a very different sermon from that very same scene in the healing ministry of Jesus, let’s take a second look at these typical "crowd scenes" from the Gospels. See again the reaching hands, hear the cries for pity; the sheer neediness of these people must have seemed overwhelming at times to the disciples, don’t you think? Indeed, part of the awe they must have felt toward Jesus was in the fact–the deeply mysterious fact–that he, the Master, was never overwhelmed.
But wait, I just mentioned the disciples. In the first rendering of this little scene, they didn’t appear at all. They are, apparently, in the background, easily ignored. Perhaps they are of little importance. Why mention them, after all? They’re only there, watching. That’s what they do. They follow Jesus, they watch what he does, they listen carefully to his teaching, they frequently misunderstand, slip up, look downright foolish, and then simply move on. They are learners, you see, and Jesus is their teacher.
But here’s the point: that’s us. As believers, as Jesus followers, shouldn’t it be these fellows, the disciples, in whom we are encouraged to see ourselves? At some point, should we not be encouraged to understand ourselves by looking at them, by seeing ourselves in them? That, it seems to me, is one of the great uses of preaching. From Sunday to Sunday to re-issue the call of Jesus upon our lives.
We are the disciples of our day. We have been called–each one of us–to spread the knowledge of Jesus Christ and His Kingdom in our corner of the world? A great step in the "working out of our salvation" is when, by the graceful in-working of God, we move from me-centered pleading to Christ-centered following. Hallelujah!
Our preachers should be helping us along in this process, rather than seeming to enforce (by repetition) a communally-shared self-definition as helpless pleaders. This is the great need of the church today, in my opinion. A concerted, thoughtful, and continuing restatement and explanation of the call of God on every believer. Whatever associations the word "missional" may have for others, this is my understanding of a missional church, and a missional people.
I generally like what I’m hearing from these missionals. As I mentioned a while back, the term seems to be a healthy alternative to the me-and-my-needs style of "doing church." Perhaps we can describe the difference this way: it’s the difference between a believer who skims the Bible looking for that special solace-verse that will address his personal problems and lift his spirit, and one who reads the Bible for a deeper understanding of his own mission and calling as a Christ-follower. Each is likely to find exactly what he's looking for. The former is once again comforted, and the latter is once again called.
This issue gets to the heart of my own oft-stated dissatisfaction with my church. In a lot of preaching that I hear, the congregation is urged to position themselves vis a vis Jesus in the place of the beseeching crowds of hurting people that seemed to gather around Jesus all the time. The various stories of Jesus healing "the many" work perfectly for this kind of sermon. First, the preacher shows us how Jesus cares for the hurting and ministers to their needs with power. Picture all that familiar "stock footage" from just about every Hollywood Jesus movie, where the Savior is walking among crowds of the destitute, the mournful, the crippled, the deaf, blind, and mute, the lepers and other untouchables, and as he walks he heals them with a touch.
Next on the preacher’s agenda, we in the congregation are urged to see ourselves in the place of those pleading ones. We are encouraged to "relate to" those in the beseeching crowd, reaching out hungry hands to Jesus. Cease depending on yourself, we are urged, admit your helplessness and come to Jesus. He will "transform" your life.
And the last step, the denouement of the sermon, is a call to the congregation to come to Jesus (in the form of "ministry teams" that line up in front of the church) and receive healing!
Now, I do not contend that any of this is wrong in and of itself. But I do contend that this sort of preaching does not correspond neatly to that which we read in Acts, nor to the emphasis we find in the epistles. This observation alone, if true, should be very humbling and disconcerting to us.
To understand how we might make a very different sermon from that very same scene in the healing ministry of Jesus, let’s take a second look at these typical "crowd scenes" from the Gospels. See again the reaching hands, hear the cries for pity; the sheer neediness of these people must have seemed overwhelming at times to the disciples, don’t you think? Indeed, part of the awe they must have felt toward Jesus was in the fact–the deeply mysterious fact–that he, the Master, was never overwhelmed.
But wait, I just mentioned the disciples. In the first rendering of this little scene, they didn’t appear at all. They are, apparently, in the background, easily ignored. Perhaps they are of little importance. Why mention them, after all? They’re only there, watching. That’s what they do. They follow Jesus, they watch what he does, they listen carefully to his teaching, they frequently misunderstand, slip up, look downright foolish, and then simply move on. They are learners, you see, and Jesus is their teacher.
But here’s the point: that’s us. As believers, as Jesus followers, shouldn’t it be these fellows, the disciples, in whom we are encouraged to see ourselves? At some point, should we not be encouraged to understand ourselves by looking at them, by seeing ourselves in them? That, it seems to me, is one of the great uses of preaching. From Sunday to Sunday to re-issue the call of Jesus upon our lives.
We are the disciples of our day. We have been called–each one of us–to spread the knowledge of Jesus Christ and His Kingdom in our corner of the world? A great step in the "working out of our salvation" is when, by the graceful in-working of God, we move from me-centered pleading to Christ-centered following. Hallelujah!
Our preachers should be helping us along in this process, rather than seeming to enforce (by repetition) a communally-shared self-definition as helpless pleaders. This is the great need of the church today, in my opinion. A concerted, thoughtful, and continuing restatement and explanation of the call of God on every believer. Whatever associations the word "missional" may have for others, this is my understanding of a missional church, and a missional people.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Nice
Found at Abductive Columns, in a post called "Discipleship":
If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea. –Antoine De Saint Exupery
Thursday, December 20, 2007
In Ministry
It’s commonplace in the church to speak of "ministry" as something that encompasses the whole of life. In other words, as Christians we are all in ministry, and in all walks of life we are called to minister.
It’s commonplace to say that, and to claim we believe it, but in practice it is still true in my opinion that most of us think of ministry in a more narrow and formal sense. There are ministries associated with the local church, for example, and if one is gifted for those ministries, one may have the opportunity to practice them in the church. These may include preaching and teaching ministries, or mercy ministries, or prayer ministries, etc. They are organized and overseen by the church, they have leaders, sometimes they raise money with fund drives or put on "events," and they are even often given catchy names, logos, and slogans. Sometimes you will hear people engaged in these activities speak of their ministry ("my ministry"), so closely is it associated with that person and that person's particular gifts. And as useful as all this might be, one would have to admit that it seems to have narrowed and functionalized the broad meaning of ministry as the word is used in the New Testament.
Then of course there are the "para-church ministries." Our involvement here is usually on the level of giving money. These ministries are almost always closely associated with a person and that person’s special gifts. You have Billy Graham’s ministry, or Charles Stanley’s ministry. Sometimes the ministry is even named after its leader (for example, "John Hagee Ministries"). They do massive amounts of fund raising, sell products, and mail out flyers with pictures of their dynamic leaders. These ministries are formally registered with the proper authorities as non-profit organizations. They are, in fact, institutions.
Now, I think that we modern Christians have been trained by our constant exposure to the use of the term "ministry" as referring to just these organized forms associated with the church or with para-church bodies, so much so that we are predisposed to think of ministry along these lines. It’s our mental "default setting." Sometimes we yearn for a ministry of our own. That is, we are unsatisfied with the ministry that we have in Christ (one that emcompasses the whole of life), and we yearn to be recognized as one who is "in ministry" in the narrow and formal sense described above. Maybe we think we'd like to hand out tracts on a street corner. Next, we think up a catchy yet Biblical name for this "ministry," also a purpose statement and an inspiring slogan. We might even develop a brochure and place a stack of them on a table in the church lobby (or the neighborhood laundrymat). Heck, if the Apostle Paul were alive today he might be doing the same thing!
There’s nothing inherently wrong about any of this, except perhaps that it contributes to this malformed and constricted mental concept of "ministry." If it is really true that the New Testament use of that word "encompasses the whole of life," then we may be said to be in ministry when we sit at the table for breakfast with our family, when we’re pushing a shopping cart in the grocery store or filling the tank at the gas station; even when we’re sitting alone in our cubicle at work. In all places, at all times, we are ministers.
And if this is so, then it really means that we need to change the way we speak of and think about ministry. Our default setting for understanding that word ought to be, "that which I do as an ambassador of the Kingdom, day in, day out, 24/7." Instead of yearning for a ministry, we will be doing ministry now, where we’re at, "in season and out."
Speaking for myself, I am trying to confront the full import of this understanding for my own life. I am trying to live it. I have not attained to this goal yet, but perhaps I have begun to "press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own."
It’s commonplace to say that, and to claim we believe it, but in practice it is still true in my opinion that most of us think of ministry in a more narrow and formal sense. There are ministries associated with the local church, for example, and if one is gifted for those ministries, one may have the opportunity to practice them in the church. These may include preaching and teaching ministries, or mercy ministries, or prayer ministries, etc. They are organized and overseen by the church, they have leaders, sometimes they raise money with fund drives or put on "events," and they are even often given catchy names, logos, and slogans. Sometimes you will hear people engaged in these activities speak of their ministry ("my ministry"), so closely is it associated with that person and that person's particular gifts. And as useful as all this might be, one would have to admit that it seems to have narrowed and functionalized the broad meaning of ministry as the word is used in the New Testament.
Then of course there are the "para-church ministries." Our involvement here is usually on the level of giving money. These ministries are almost always closely associated with a person and that person’s special gifts. You have Billy Graham’s ministry, or Charles Stanley’s ministry. Sometimes the ministry is even named after its leader (for example, "John Hagee Ministries"). They do massive amounts of fund raising, sell products, and mail out flyers with pictures of their dynamic leaders. These ministries are formally registered with the proper authorities as non-profit organizations. They are, in fact, institutions.
Now, I think that we modern Christians have been trained by our constant exposure to the use of the term "ministry" as referring to just these organized forms associated with the church or with para-church bodies, so much so that we are predisposed to think of ministry along these lines. It’s our mental "default setting." Sometimes we yearn for a ministry of our own. That is, we are unsatisfied with the ministry that we have in Christ (one that emcompasses the whole of life), and we yearn to be recognized as one who is "in ministry" in the narrow and formal sense described above. Maybe we think we'd like to hand out tracts on a street corner. Next, we think up a catchy yet Biblical name for this "ministry," also a purpose statement and an inspiring slogan. We might even develop a brochure and place a stack of them on a table in the church lobby (or the neighborhood laundrymat). Heck, if the Apostle Paul were alive today he might be doing the same thing!
There’s nothing inherently wrong about any of this, except perhaps that it contributes to this malformed and constricted mental concept of "ministry." If it is really true that the New Testament use of that word "encompasses the whole of life," then we may be said to be in ministry when we sit at the table for breakfast with our family, when we’re pushing a shopping cart in the grocery store or filling the tank at the gas station; even when we’re sitting alone in our cubicle at work. In all places, at all times, we are ministers.
And if this is so, then it really means that we need to change the way we speak of and think about ministry. Our default setting for understanding that word ought to be, "that which I do as an ambassador of the Kingdom, day in, day out, 24/7." Instead of yearning for a ministry, we will be doing ministry now, where we’re at, "in season and out."
Speaking for myself, I am trying to confront the full import of this understanding for my own life. I am trying to live it. I have not attained to this goal yet, but perhaps I have begun to "press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own."
Thursday, December 13, 2007
"that they may be called..."
Many people came to Jesus for healing, but not all who were healed became his disciples. And yet, the relational-trajectory of discipleship (excuse the awkward phrasing) moves from receiving from Jesus (receiving healing, receiving freedom, receiving joy, etc.) to following him, learning from him, and ministering to the world in his power. We circumvent the plan of God if all our focus is on the receiving, and little or none on the following.
You can see this trajectory foretold in Isaiah's wonderful prophecy of the coming Messiah.
And then of course there is the second part of that purpose statement: "that [God] may be glorified." See? God is glorified by the righteousness that he bestows on his children. The Jesus-people will provoke, by virtue of their progressive transformation into "oaks of righteousness," the praise of the One whom they call Lord.
All this is really only a restatement of the last post. To encourage believers to think of God merely as our great need-fulfiller (and only that), is to short-circuit the call of God on the lives of his children.
You can see this trajectory foretold in Isaiah's wonderful prophecy of the coming Messiah.
The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,Note: after the list of blessings (which actually closely parallel the beatitudes), there is a sort of double purpose statement:
because the Lord has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor;
he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor,
and the day of vengeance of our God;
to comfort all who mourn;
to grant to those who mourn in Zion—
to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit;
that they may be called oaks of righteousness,
the planting of the Lord, that he may be glorified.
They shall build up the ancient ruins;
they shall raise up the former devastations;
they shall repair the ruined cities,
the devastations of many generations.
that they may be called oaks of righteousness,See it? That they (the receivers of the kingdom blessings) should be recognized as "oaks of righteousness." Not: that they may be called receivers of blessings, healed by God, etc., but that they may be called (recognized as) righteous. Now, recalling that Christ fulfilled this prophecy exactly, and recalling that, as Paul said (in many places, but this one will do), Jesus is our righteousness, then to follow Jesus as a disciple is to begin down the road to becoming "an oak of righteousness."
the planting of the Lord, that he may be glorified.
And then of course there is the second part of that purpose statement: "that [God] may be glorified." See? God is glorified by the righteousness that he bestows on his children. The Jesus-people will provoke, by virtue of their progressive transformation into "oaks of righteousness," the praise of the One whom they call Lord.
All this is really only a restatement of the last post. To encourage believers to think of God merely as our great need-fulfiller (and only that), is to short-circuit the call of God on the lives of his children.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Beyond the need/fulfillment-of-need trajectory
People with many needs came to Jesus to have the needs taken care of, but that does not summarize the life of discipleship. The relationship of the disciples to Jesus seems not to have been primarily characterized by this need/fulfillment-of-need trajectory. If we ask the question, what lays beyond that trajectory, then we stand with Jesus and the disciples as disciples. That is, as students of Jesus, learning and following.
It's my opinion that church leaders are far more likely to build their congregations by molding the church experience in terms of the need/fulfillment-of-need trajectory. And, furthermore, that it is the inclination of people (perhaps I should say "of the flesh") to remain, if they can, in that relational trajectory. In church life that will look like this: I get a need fulfilled, praise God, testify to the congregation that God is the great need-fulfiller, and then join the rest in pressing in all the more to have still more needs fulfilled. When this happens, it is considered "doing church" successfully.
This model is reflected in our prayer-life as well. It is, I believe, entrenched. And I am not here to say that the church instead ought to completely ignore people's needs, or to suggest that God is not in the business of healing and providing for his children in all sorts of ways. But I am saying that this is not the extent of his call upon those whom He has chosen.
And we all know that. It's one of the tenets of our mental "statement of faith." And yet, on the ground, we have built a church that has trouble bringing people beyond the need-trajectory to the walk of discipleship.
I consider it a pressing problem in the church, and I have been reading the New Testament this year with a particular eye toward understanding what Jesus meant when he said, "Follow me." Embodied in that command, "Follow me," is a vast array of implications for the church, but these implications are played out in the hearts and lives of individual believers.
What I mean by that is, at some level this is a very personal matter. If, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer famously said, the call of Jesus Christ is always a call to come and die, well, that dying is not something the church can build a program around. At the literal end of the day, just before bed, can I say with complete honesty before my God, "It was not I who lived today, but it was Christ who lived in me, and the life that I lived today in the flesh I lived through him who loved me and gave himself for me."
The answer to that question, my answer anyway, is no. It was no yesterday, and I suppose it will be no today. When we come to this point, the call of Jesus begins not so much to comfort us with a promise of healing and health (or whatever), as to haunt us with a sense that we have not truly been his "followers" in the New Testament sense of that word. To put it another way: we have not loved Him with our whole heart, nor our neighbors as ourselves.
That feeling is not the end of the story, but perhaps not a bad place to begin. It's the place where Jesus began, after all, when he first sat down with his disciples to teach them how to be his followers. That's when he said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
It's my opinion that church leaders are far more likely to build their congregations by molding the church experience in terms of the need/fulfillment-of-need trajectory. And, furthermore, that it is the inclination of people (perhaps I should say "of the flesh") to remain, if they can, in that relational trajectory. In church life that will look like this: I get a need fulfilled, praise God, testify to the congregation that God is the great need-fulfiller, and then join the rest in pressing in all the more to have still more needs fulfilled. When this happens, it is considered "doing church" successfully.
This model is reflected in our prayer-life as well. It is, I believe, entrenched. And I am not here to say that the church instead ought to completely ignore people's needs, or to suggest that God is not in the business of healing and providing for his children in all sorts of ways. But I am saying that this is not the extent of his call upon those whom He has chosen.
And we all know that. It's one of the tenets of our mental "statement of faith." And yet, on the ground, we have built a church that has trouble bringing people beyond the need-trajectory to the walk of discipleship.
I consider it a pressing problem in the church, and I have been reading the New Testament this year with a particular eye toward understanding what Jesus meant when he said, "Follow me." Embodied in that command, "Follow me," is a vast array of implications for the church, but these implications are played out in the hearts and lives of individual believers.
What I mean by that is, at some level this is a very personal matter. If, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer famously said, the call of Jesus Christ is always a call to come and die, well, that dying is not something the church can build a program around. At the literal end of the day, just before bed, can I say with complete honesty before my God, "It was not I who lived today, but it was Christ who lived in me, and the life that I lived today in the flesh I lived through him who loved me and gave himself for me."
The answer to that question, my answer anyway, is no. It was no yesterday, and I suppose it will be no today. When we come to this point, the call of Jesus begins not so much to comfort us with a promise of healing and health (or whatever), as to haunt us with a sense that we have not truly been his "followers" in the New Testament sense of that word. To put it another way: we have not loved Him with our whole heart, nor our neighbors as ourselves.
That feeling is not the end of the story, but perhaps not a bad place to begin. It's the place where Jesus began, after all, when he first sat down with his disciples to teach them how to be his followers. That's when he said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Bonhoeffer on the Beatitudes
I've been studying discipleship lately. What it means, and how we are meant to do it (teach it, learn it, live it). As a part of this study I've gone back to the 20th century classic, Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship. More on this wonderful book in another post.
Meanwhile, I've been journaling through the Beatitudes for some time. So I was really interested to see this post at Kingdom Living [HT: Milton Stanley], which quotes Bonhoeffer on the the Beatitudes. Good stuff.
Meanwhile, I've been journaling through the Beatitudes for some time. So I was really interested to see this post at Kingdom Living [HT: Milton Stanley], which quotes Bonhoeffer on the the Beatitudes. Good stuff.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
"...these sinners, these followers of Jesus..."
I am nearly done reading James Montgomery Boice's Christ's Call to Discipleship. This book has been very helpful to me. I’m kind of on a mission to learn as much as I can about the meaning of "discipleship," and this book will take it's place among the essentials on my reading list.In the meantime, I've recently begun journaling through the "sermon on the mount" [Matt. 5-7]. I’ve been meditating on the beatitudes, and it so happens that Boice spends some time with these verses, as they are in essence a portrait of Christlikeness.
With regard to the first beatitude ("Blessed are the poor in spirit") Boice turns to A. W. Tozer for these words:
The blessed ones who possess the kingdom are they who have repudiated every external thing and have uprooted from their hearts all sense of possessing.... They have reached an inward state paralleling the outward circumstances of the common beggar on the streets of Jerusalem; that is what the word "poor" as Christ used it actually means. These blessed poor are no longer slaves to the tyranny of things. They have broken the yoke of the oppressor; and this they have done not by fighting but by surrendering. Though free from all sense of possessing, they yet possess all things.Regarding the sixth beatitude ("blessed are those who mourn"), Boice turns to Dietrich Bonhoeffer:
These men without possessions or power, these strangers on the earth, these sinners, these followers of Jesus, have in their life with him renounced their own dignity, for they are merciful.... They take upon themselves the distress and humiliation and sin of others. They have an irresistible love for the down-trodden, the sick, the wretched, the wronged, the outcast and all who are tortured with anxiety.... If any man falls into disgrace, the merciful will sacrifice their own honor to shield him, and take his name upon themselves. They will be found consorting with publicans and sinners, careless of the shame they will incur thereby.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
3 Qutoes on Discipleship
In the past few days a couple of books about discipleship have arrived in the mail. The first was Bill Hull's Choose the Life. I gobbled that one down pretty quickly. It is not exactly the book I was looking for, but it definitely got me thinking. Hull writes:
The second book on discipleship is James Montgomery Boice's Christ's Call to Discipleship. This book came out back in 1986, so I suppose it ranks as a "classic" by now. Boice's opening paragraph:
As it happens, Boice also quotes Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who is famous for writing about (and paying with his own life) The Cost of Discipleship:
Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "Christianity without discipleship is always Christianity without Christ." Enough of the church has adopted a nondiscipleship Christianity to render it ineffective in its primary task--the transformation of individuals and communities into the image of Christ. This Christless Christianity has create leaders who are addicted to recognition and success and congregations that believe forsaking all things to follow Jesus is optional and a separate issue from salvation.The latter part of Hull's book is directed at leaders and it becomes in some ways a typical "leadership" book, which I generally try to avoid like the plague.
The second book on discipleship is James Montgomery Boice's Christ's Call to Discipleship. This book came out back in 1986, so I suppose it ranks as a "classic" by now. Boice's opening paragraph:
There is a fatal defect in the life of Christ's church in the twentieth century: a lack of true discipleship. Discipleship means forsaking everything to follow Christ, but for many of today's supposed Christians -- perhaps the majority -- it is the case that while there is much talk about Christ and even more furious activity, there is actually very little following of Christ Himself. And this means in some circles there is very little genuine Christianity.Those are stern and penetrating words -- the kind of words, in fact, that pierce to the very marrow. Just as an aside, I have come to think that we Christians have grown very shy of letting the Word of God pierce us in this way. How often do we really allow God to question us the way He questioned Job? And it so happens much of what Jesus had to say that was challenging and "piercing" had to do with discipleship.
As it happens, Boice also quotes Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who is famous for writing about (and paying with his own life) The Cost of Discipleship:
Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man will gladly go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price, to buy which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble; and it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him. Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be askedfor, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ.I've just started reading the Boice book. After that I will probably move on to reread Bonhoeffer's classic. So you can guess what I'll be posting about in the near future.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
More on Christianity as Crisis Management
My last three posts have been closely related. I've been chatting about holiness. And I suppose "discipleship" (though I haven't actually used the word). I said that we need to understand the relationship between sin and the many crises, conflicts, and trials that we face.
I guess I started down this trail after hearing yet one more sermon about how we need to cry out to God in our times of need and distress. Not that I don't agree, mind you. But it's another example of crisis management Christianity--Jesus as some sort of ascetic Santa Claus/Superman figure. We cry out, he comes to our rescue. Is that New Testament Christianity?
These types of sermons are very "successful." Many people will come forward for prayer at the end of the service, and many will tell the pastor how wonderful it was, and that we need to hear more like that. But nothing, nothing, nothing will ever change.
Am I just being snarky and hyper-critical, as usual. No, I think it's that I'm sensing a lack, a missing ingredient. All these crises and distresses that so many of us so often need rescue from . . . it's not simply that the devil is "pulling out all the stops," as some would say. Have you noticed that in some Christian circles at least (the ones I'm most familiar with) there is more talk about Satan than sin, more about fallen angels than flesh with its inevitable (and intimate) corruptions. And yet, clearly, the world is enmeshed in sin, hopelessly tangled in it, and we are tangled in it ourselves. In fact, sin is resident in us, and right at home it seems. We are going to have to get a least as honest as Pogo, who said:
That's a start.
I guess I started down this trail after hearing yet one more sermon about how we need to cry out to God in our times of need and distress. Not that I don't agree, mind you. But it's another example of crisis management Christianity--Jesus as some sort of ascetic Santa Claus/Superman figure. We cry out, he comes to our rescue. Is that New Testament Christianity?
These types of sermons are very "successful." Many people will come forward for prayer at the end of the service, and many will tell the pastor how wonderful it was, and that we need to hear more like that. But nothing, nothing, nothing will ever change.
Am I just being snarky and hyper-critical, as usual. No, I think it's that I'm sensing a lack, a missing ingredient. All these crises and distresses that so many of us so often need rescue from . . . it's not simply that the devil is "pulling out all the stops," as some would say. Have you noticed that in some Christian circles at least (the ones I'm most familiar with) there is more talk about Satan than sin, more about fallen angels than flesh with its inevitable (and intimate) corruptions. And yet, clearly, the world is enmeshed in sin, hopelessly tangled in it, and we are tangled in it ourselves. In fact, sin is resident in us, and right at home it seems. We are going to have to get a least as honest as Pogo, who said:
We have met the enemy, and he is us!So here are some possible alternative sermon topics: why do I do the things I don't want to do? Who can save me from this body of death? What does cross-carrying mean? What does following Jesus look like, and why is it so hard? What is grace, and why do I need it any longer if I'm already saved? If I'm a new creation, how come I keep doing the same things I always did? Why do I keep building my house on sand instead of rock? What has the cross of Christ got to do with any of this?
That's a start.
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Bill Hull on Discipleship
I never heard of Bill Hull until this morning, browsing Amazon. The man's career has been focused on thinking and teaching and writing about discipleship. His new book is called Choose the Life. He has a website of the same name, in which you can find an article called What Must change Now. Referencing Dallas Willard, he provides the following checklist for how we so often "do church" these days:
1. Worship as performance,
2. Leadership as celebrity,
3. Greatness measured by numbers,
4. Salvation by agreement with religious facts,
5. Evangelism without incarnation,
6. Discipleship as optional,
7. Catering to consumer mentality,
And then this checklist for what we should be aiming at:
1. Worship as a heartfelt answer to God,
2. Leadership as humble service,
3. Greatness measured by character,
4. Salvation by a decision to follow Jesus,
5. Evangelism as love,
6. Discipleship as normative,
7. Catering to the committed.
This is a great article, and I hope you'll read it carefully. If you need another sample, try this:
1. Worship as performance,
2. Leadership as celebrity,
3. Greatness measured by numbers,
4. Salvation by agreement with religious facts,
5. Evangelism without incarnation,
6. Discipleship as optional,
7. Catering to consumer mentality,
And then this checklist for what we should be aiming at:
1. Worship as a heartfelt answer to God,
2. Leadership as humble service,
3. Greatness measured by character,
4. Salvation by a decision to follow Jesus,
5. Evangelism as love,
6. Discipleship as normative,
7. Catering to the committed.
This is a great article, and I hope you'll read it carefully. If you need another sample, try this:
The evangelical belly is full of CDs, DVDs, sermons, books, seminars, and packaged answers. Leaders look at this sumptuous feast before them and say, "I can’t eat another bite" as they push back from the table. What is required is to find the kind of spiritual food that they are hungry for, that being I believe is the hunger to live and work from a satisfied soul. This means a radical change in what we teach, the environment that we create, what we reward, and what we punish. It will require a different kind of leadership, a rehabilitated clergy detoxified from the mania that drives them to cultural definitions of success. A newly defined laity that sees themselves as ambassadors and that the real action of making disciples is “out there” where they live work and play and, not "in here." The gathered church.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Elementary Discipleship
I need to mention something: I'm aware that much of what I've been posting about discipleship lately has the feel of someone groping in the half-light and coming to rather unremarkable and even elementary conclusions. Yes, of course, I can sense a reader muttering, I know that disciples pray. Of course, they pray! Of course they believe in Jesus, for crying out loud! Of course they love him and try to abide in him. No kidding! You're serving up milk when what I really want is red meat!
But then I'm not writing with that reader in mind. Red meat is simply not on the menu. I'm writing, in fact, with me in mind. I'm getting down to basics, to fundamental things, core things. I simply need to do that for myself, and this blog is the place I do it.
And here's one of those fundamentals: disciples pray. I notice that Jesus emphasized prayer as a remarkably powerful component of the disciple's way of life after he leaves them, and I wonder, have I been that kind of disciple? I mean, there is no way that I can be considered a prayer-warrior. Often I have been downright reluctant to pray, who knows why? Often in prayer my mind wanders, and I certainly don't want to answer for every thought I have occasionally entertained while praying with others.
But here are the words of Jesus, spoken to his eleven remaining disciples on his last night with them, even as Judas was receiving his 30 pieces from the hands of a cabal of bloodthirsty Pharisees:
I'm not. Jesus did say "whomever" and the singular pronoun "he" in this statement. And Jesus was speaking to individuals, eleven of them, who could only have understood the Master's words in their plain sense, as a message to each of them.
But notice this: as soon as Jesus speaks of doing greater works than those he had done, a plainly outlandish thought, he quickly connects such doing with prayer. These "greater works" are accomplished, apparently, through prayer. And he says this: we are able to do them because Jesus has gone to the Father.
Just stop and think about that for a moment. Remember, always remember, what "going to the Father" actually meant to Jesus. Jesus knew when he spoke those words that his going to the Father would be by way of the cross. It was a path chosen among the Trinity before time, and by his traveling that path (a path that no one else could travel) we have the access of sons and daughter's to the Father.
Do you get it? We do not pray as servants beseeching an unpredictable master, but as sons and daughters speaking to their loving Father. That is the spirit of sonship (and daughtership, we might as well add). And whatever we ask in the name of Jesus, the Father will do, for by this means he has chosen to demonstrate his glory.
Because Jesus endured the cross, we can pray in confidence for even "greater works" to be done by the Father through our prayers in Jesus' name. Imagine that!
But then I'm not writing with that reader in mind. Red meat is simply not on the menu. I'm writing, in fact, with me in mind. I'm getting down to basics, to fundamental things, core things. I simply need to do that for myself, and this blog is the place I do it.
And here's one of those fundamentals: disciples pray. I notice that Jesus emphasized prayer as a remarkably powerful component of the disciple's way of life after he leaves them, and I wonder, have I been that kind of disciple? I mean, there is no way that I can be considered a prayer-warrior. Often I have been downright reluctant to pray, who knows why? Often in prayer my mind wanders, and I certainly don't want to answer for every thought I have occasionally entertained while praying with others.
But here are the words of Jesus, spoken to his eleven remaining disciples on his last night with them, even as Judas was receiving his 30 pieces from the hands of a cabal of bloodthirsty Pharisees:
Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.I wonder, does this passage trouble you just a little? A pastor once explained to me that Jesus was refering here to the church, to the disciples collectively through the centuries. According to this view, it is the church that will do works greater than Jesus did. Not individuals. Are you buying that?
I'm not. Jesus did say "whomever" and the singular pronoun "he" in this statement. And Jesus was speaking to individuals, eleven of them, who could only have understood the Master's words in their plain sense, as a message to each of them.
But notice this: as soon as Jesus speaks of doing greater works than those he had done, a plainly outlandish thought, he quickly connects such doing with prayer. These "greater works" are accomplished, apparently, through prayer. And he says this: we are able to do them because Jesus has gone to the Father.
Just stop and think about that for a moment. Remember, always remember, what "going to the Father" actually meant to Jesus. Jesus knew when he spoke those words that his going to the Father would be by way of the cross. It was a path chosen among the Trinity before time, and by his traveling that path (a path that no one else could travel) we have the access of sons and daughter's to the Father.
Do you get it? We do not pray as servants beseeching an unpredictable master, but as sons and daughters speaking to their loving Father. That is the spirit of sonship (and daughtership, we might as well add). And whatever we ask in the name of Jesus, the Father will do, for by this means he has chosen to demonstrate his glory.
Because Jesus endured the cross, we can pray in confidence for even "greater works" to be done by the Father through our prayers in Jesus' name. Imagine that!
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Disciples Ask
So I'm thinking about believing, because Jesus speaks much of it and highly. He says, "Believe in me," and he explains why. He explains who he is. The content of Christian believing is first and foremost a believing in Jesus--in who he is and what he has done. Sometimes I run into a Tug McGraw kind of Christianity (baseball fans over 50 will know what I'm talking about) which is nothing more than positive thinking. This manifests itself in statements that begin, "I'm trusting God for . . ." You fill in the blank.
Okay, I'm not here to condemn such thinking. Perhaps there's something to it. But I can't help but notice that the Bible is pretty darn specific about just what we are to believe. I've been reading Walter Marshall's The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification, and his purpose therein is to show that our sanctification, our willingness and power to walk in obedience--to put on Christ--flows from our believing, and it is a believing in certain fundamental things about Jesus and about the Father.
Jesus, in his final talk with his disciples, says:
But all of my recent posts have been after an understanding of discipleship. From Jesus' words I must conclude not only that disciples believe in Jesus, but the natural follow-though of that believing is that disciples pray in his name. Disciples ask.
I don't pretend to have the answers to all the questions about prayer. I only say this. Disciples pray. Disciples ask. Disciples intercede. Judging by the prominence that Jesus gives to this particular characteristic, which he enjoins upon the eleven at least three times on that last night with them, I must conclude that it is one of the central actions of the disciple's faith.
Okay, I'm not here to condemn such thinking. Perhaps there's something to it. But I can't help but notice that the Bible is pretty darn specific about just what we are to believe. I've been reading Walter Marshall's The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification, and his purpose therein is to show that our sanctification, our willingness and power to walk in obedience--to put on Christ--flows from our believing, and it is a believing in certain fundamental things about Jesus and about the Father.
Jesus, in his final talk with his disciples, says:
Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.I make no claim here to plumbing the depths of these incredible promises, and I've got to admit that I haven't been a model of such believing. Sometimes I ask little because I expect little. In other words, I have not always trusted this partiuclar "truly, truly" of Jesus.
But all of my recent posts have been after an understanding of discipleship. From Jesus' words I must conclude not only that disciples believe in Jesus, but the natural follow-though of that believing is that disciples pray in his name. Disciples ask.
I don't pretend to have the answers to all the questions about prayer. I only say this. Disciples pray. Disciples ask. Disciples intercede. Judging by the prominence that Jesus gives to this particular characteristic, which he enjoins upon the eleven at least three times on that last night with them, I must conclude that it is one of the central actions of the disciple's faith.
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