Luke is written from a certain perspective which lifts up those who are often called the least, the last, and the lost. In that context the community of Jesus is called on to not only reach out to the least and the last and the lost, but to recognize that it is to be a community made up of such folks. But not only is the community to be made up of such folks, it is to live in a way that keeps it open to people that others -- even others that the least, the last, and the lost might not want showing up. There are a number of places this shows up in Luke, but one of the most powerful is in Luke 6 -- The Sermon on the Plain. Here is what Jesus says, ““But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either.Give to everyone who begs from you, and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back.And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them. “If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount.But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.” (Luke 6:27–36 ESV)
Here is a short list of the first part of that passage:
do good to haters (your enemies)
bless those who curse you
pray for those who abuse
strikes one side, offer other
cloak plus your tunic
give it way to one who begs
goods taken, don't get them back
wish from others, so do to them
How do you bring in people you don't want there...do the above. But the reality is, which of us is up to such a style of life? Luke calls us out and leaves us breathless with the extent of the call. Luke calls us out and our reality is that we can't imagine living this gospel. Luke calls us out and we come to see the only way to live the gospel is to see that God took the first steps by doing good to haters i.e. to us. Paul writes in Romans using the same word for enemies as Jesus does, “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.” (Romans 5:6–10 ESV) But even with this we wonder, "Who is up to this call?"and "What would the community of faith look like and how would it shape the world if it lived the words of Jesus' call?"
The word "Savior" is now somewhat foreighn to modern colloquial speech. It is not a subject that comes up much. It does not seem important.
Understandably, we do not think of ourselves as seeking a savior. But I think the quest for redemption, the search for salvation is a staple of human existence. Every person is looking for a savior. Idolatry, in the biblical sense, is only the attempt to find a savior in anything other than the one God provided.
Don't think so? Ask yourself what you are struggling with. What is ailing, impeding you or just down right important to you? Behind that thing you will find a false savior. What you foolishly place your faith and hope in.
Most of us do not have the self-awareness to see it. Why are you so driven to success or perfection? Because if you obtain it it will save you from your feelings of inadequacy and silent self-loathing. Why is another so driven toward a substance abuse? Because it momentarily swoops in as a savior to rescue you from your overwhelming anxiety.
Since the Newtown tragedy the media has swarmed with the cry for political saviors. What are those political saviors? They are new laws or the cry for new leaders who will come in with a strong hand and plan to vanquish evil and make us safe.
The idea of a political leader punishing evil is a biblical idea. In Romans 13:4 Paul says of political leaders, For he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.
But this does not change the fact that we naively think that we really can obtain peace and safety this side of eternity. In the last few elections, the country was split down the middle in hopes that their candidate would bring in the peace and security we all seek. In fact, one candidate even campaigned on the biblical premise of "Hope" though falling so short of it.
Are we any safer? Can we have any more hope? The slick campaign failed to stop the Colorado shooting and the Newtown massacre. Nor is it stopping AIDS or genocide, and sexual trafficking of children. The previous president with his conservative and tendency to "live by the sword" failed at it too. Both Democrats and Republicans keep making promises that a human savior just cannot keep.
In ancient Israel God's people found themselves at a dangerous crossroads as well. They lived in the shadow of a threat. No, it was not the terrorists of today, WMD's and deranged psychopaths who shoot children. It was amilitaristic imperial nation known as Assyria who was threatening the entire middle east.
What did Israel want to do? The same things we are -- to look to other political entities to save them. They wanted to trust in an alliance between King Rezin of Syria and Remaliah the King of Israel. But God promised them that Assyria would rise up over them and take them away the way a great river floods its banks (Isaiah 8:5-8).
This is to say, the search for a savior is the right thing. The bad part is that we always look for our savior in all the wrong places. We look for it in laws, politics, our careers, relationships, sex, substances, and the one that fails us more than any other, ourselves.
It is in this context God makes a promise to this people, For to us a child is born to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called Wonder Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. (Isaiah 9:6-7) God promised a child of the line of David who would come and establish a kingdom in peace and righteousness. It would be a kingdom without end. Yes, Jesus is quite a political saviour, but not the way we think of him. He is about justice, safety, and peace for his people. But it is not here yet, it is coming.
When we celebrate the incarnation of Jesus during Christmas and Epiphany, we need to understand that the birth of Jesus (whenever that happened) was about laying the foundation stone for that kingdom. It is not here yet; it is being built one life at a time.
So many will ask, why does he not bring it in now? Well, that is because he is merciful. You see, we are not really prepared for seeing the consequences of real peace and righteousness in the earth. Out of Jesus' second coming will be immeasurable beauty, blindingly so. But that will only come through judgement of what is evil. What we are so unprepared to consider is that we are part of that evil.
The funny thing about it is this: Even though most people believe in God, for some reason we find it harder to believe the promises of the Gospel than to trust fallen men who prove their unreliability consistently. They let us down again and again. What reason do we rationally have left to trust human leaders? Did you notice the last preseidential campaign literally had "lost" its "hope?" Yes, no talk of "hope" anymore. Why? Because it would have insulted and shamed us for our naivete four years before.
As we celebrate Christmas and Epiphany with our families and friends, I want you to be thinking about "hope." Not a fleeting one. But a real one that comes in the form of a child born in Bethlehem. This is the child of Isaiah 9, the one upon whom the weight of the government will be on his shoulders, the one who will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of peace. It is in this child we have a savior upon which to practice hope. As Paul says in Romans 8:24-25, For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we await for it with patience. We have a hope in what we cannot see. What we cannot see is the promise of the Kingdom of righteousness without end. And that strength begins in the weakness of an infant born to a virgin in a manger.
So what is Christmas about? It is about God giving us what we are all already looking for, a Savior. Only He sends it in a package that is too hard to comprehend, too good to be true, too seemingly weak to accept, and all to easy to reject: a child.
“Jesu, Joy
of Man’s Desiring.” On Christmas morning we
light the Christ Candle of the Advent wreath. The candle that tells us that Jesus, the light
of the world has come, Jesu, joy of man’s desiring has come. As we light the candle, as we hear the words
about Jesus being the light of the world we feel the push of darkness, even on
this Christmas morning. The darkness
that is close to home. Firefighters shot
to death as they respond to a fire, children killed in a hail of gunfire, and
for all the pain of that it reflects only a small portion of the pain of the
more than 10,000 murders in the U.S. during this past year. We can add on to this violence so much more
that speaks of darkness on this Christmas morning. People who long for work but can find none,
marriages that are failing, children who are abused--and such a picture comes
only from our corners of the world.This
morning in Myanmar people got up and went to the pawn broker, sold their
pillows and mosquito nets in order to buy a ticket for the bus to get to work,
they will work all day and then come home, they hope they will have enough
money at the end of work to go back to the pawn broker to buy back what they
sold that morning, and they hope that they will have enough to have at least
one meal.And this is not just the story
of adults; it is the story of children, most of whom get 1 year of education
before they enter the work force or in an even worse case, are sold into
slavery.
The
darkness presses all around us on Christmas morning, on this morning when we light
the candle that says that the light of the world has come. We feel the darkness; we feel the powerful
reality that when we look at the world we know that this is not the way it is
supposed to be.And yet we light the
candle.We declare that into the
darkness light has come, into the darkness we hear the words, speak the words,In the beginning was
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.He was in the beginning with God.All things were made through him, and without
him was not anything made that was made.In him was life, and the life was the light of men.The light shines in the darkness and the
darkness has not overcome it.(John 1:1-5 ESV) Wonderful words
that John uses not only to tell us that the light has come, but also to draw
our minds back to the beginning of the story, back to the beginning of the one
true story of the whole world.In
the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.The earth was without form and void, and
darkness was over the face of the deep.And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.And God said, “Let there be light,” and there
was light.And God saw that the light
was good.And God separated the light
from the darkness.(Genesis 1:1-4 ESV) Now the earth was formless and empty,
darkness was over the surface of the deep…To the
people reading this in ancient near east these words had echoes of chaos to
them, to things being out of control. And they, like us, were fearful of the chaos. So what can God do in the face of this chaos
that envelops the entire cosmos? More of
our text. And God said, “Let
there be light,” and there was light.God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the
darkness.God called the light “day,”
and the darkness He called “night.”(Genesis 1:3-5a NIV)“And God said…” This is the first time that God speaks and
when He does His word shatters the silence and signals the birth of new cosmic
order--an order designed to be a place of beauty, goodness.A place designed to be a place of life, joy,
justice, and deliverance--that’s what light symbolizes in the Bible.Notice the first thing God creates is light;
we don’t find the sun making its appearance until later, it is just light. The first thing God creates is that which
symbolizes life, joy, justice, and deliverance. In the bumps and bruises of life, the
struggles and tears of life we look at God’s creation; we look at the light of
the morning and know that God’s heart toward His creation and toward us is
life, joy, justice, and deliverance.“And God said…” God said is another way
of saying “God willed;” here we find God completely independent of His creation.
His creation doesn’t control Him,
doesn't have power over Him.No, He is
over the creation. And the fact that God
can speak this creation into being shows an effortlessness in creating what we
are awed by, an absolute reign over creation.
The beginning
of the story is light; the beginning of the story is the overcoming of darkness
by the light. This is where John wants
our eyes to go first as he speaks of Jesus as the light.He wants us to go back to the beginning of
the story.As the light challenged the
darkness in the days of creation so now again there is the challenge of light
to the darkness. Only now the light is
the son of God, the Father, if you will, has upped His game.As N.T. Wright comments, Whatever else John is going
to tell us, he wants us to see his book as the story of God and the world, not
just the story of one character in one place and time.This book is about the creator God acting in
a new way within His much-loved creation.It is about the way in which the long story which began in Genesis
reached the climax the creator had always intended.And it will do this through ‘the Word’…The
Word challenged the darkness before creation and now challenges the darkness
that is found, tragically, within creation itself.The Word is bringing into being the new
creation, in which God says once more, “Let there be light!”
Let there
be light! For there to be light there needs to be not only an announcement, but
also a presence, the light has to break into the darkness.And the Word became flesh and
dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the
Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14 ESV) The word
became flesh and dwelt among us. And the
Word became flesh and dwelt among us.Dwelt:Greek Skenoo, which is the Greek word for tent or tabernacle.The Word became flesh and tabernacled among
us.John wants us to know more the
story. He wants us to see the
tabernacle. And when we look at the
tabernacle we should see God as work doing what He did in Genesis 1: creating,
even as He created the heavens and the earth. We read in Exodus 25, And
let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst.Exactly as I show you concerning the pattern
of the tabernacle, and all of its furniture, so you shall make it.(Exodus 25:8-9 ESV)The tabernacle is God’s creation,
made according to His specifications, even as the creation was put together
exactly as God has spoken.
The tabernacle is God’s
new creation project.It is a wonder of
design and a riot of color, texture; it is a place of beauty and it is worthy
to be dwelt in by the King of the universe.It is built by craftsman who take the goodness of God’s creation and
shape and form it into a structure that brings honor and glory to the creator
of the universe i.e., by craftsman who take up God’s creational mandate to
unearth the wonders of God’s creation and use them in a way that brings glory
to God.It is a place where God can
again dwell in the midst of His people, even as He came down to be with Adam
and Eve in the Garden of Eden, to walk with them in the cool of the
evening.It was the one place in the
whole world where people got God right.While many other temples and tabernacles had similar structure in the
ANE, the tabernacle was missing something that those temples had. A bed for the god to sleep in and priests
whose job it was to feed the god.The
structure of this tabernacle and what it is missing declared that God could
take care of Himself and that He was the only God; there was no other.It was a place where when the people had
failed to live up to God’s standards, when they had failed to be His people who
carried out His call to enjoy His blessing and to bless the world around Him,
when they had rejected Him, here was a small place on earth where forgiveness
could be sought, where holiness could be restored through sacrifice.It is the one spot in all the world, all the
fallen, broken world, a world of chaos and disorder where God’s command and
word have been followed to the letter, as it was in the original creation.
Or putting it simply: In
the midst of a fallen world, in exile from the garden of Eden, the original
‘heaven on earth’, God undertakes an act of creation, a building project and
creates a piece of holy ground in a world that has lost its way.One commentator writes, At this small, lonely place in the midst of the chaos of the
wilderness, a new creation comes into being.In the midst of the disorder, there is order.The tabernacle is the world order as God
intended writ small in Israel.The
priests of the sanctuary going about their appointed courses are like
everything in creation performing its liturgical service—the sun, the trees,
human beings.The people of Israel
carefully encamped around the tabernacle in their midst constitutes the
beginning of God’s bringing creation back to what it was originally intended to
be.The tabernacle is a realization of
God’s created order in history…Moreover, this microcosm of creation is the
beginning of a macrocosmic effort on God’s part.In and through this people God is on the move
to a new creation for all.God’s
presence in the tabernacle is a statement about God’s intended presence in the
entire world.
When you read this part
of Exodus you see God concerned with the smallest detail of the building
because this is God’s new creation, a piece of holy ground and holy hope in a
world that is in chaos, that is filled with darkness.It is the small spot on earth that speaks of
what the world is supposed to be like.It is the small spot on earth where God declares, “Build me a sanctuary
that I may dwell with them.”
That I may dwell with
them, God fully intends to be present in the world.But for that to happen God needs a new
address; He needs to change His address.His address has been the address of all the gods, if you will.For gods as the ancients knew lived on
mountains, far removed from the people, enjoying their own life, often uncaring
and oblivious to the pain that’s down the mountain.But God changes His address.He leaves His mountain abode and moves into
the midst of a messy world, into the midst of His people.And from this place He will lead His people
to restore His good but fallen world, back to the splendor that is hinted at in
this tent in the desert.God changes His
address.
And now John as he calls
us to look back at the fullness of God’s story tells us that God is changing His
address again on Christmas morning. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God.He was in the
beginning with God.All things were made
through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.In him was life, and the life was the light
of men.The light shines in the darkness
and the darkness has not overcome it… And the Word became flesh and dwelt among
us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full
of grace and truth. (John 1:1-5, 14 ESV) And the Word became flesh and dwelt
among us.Dwelt: Greek Skenoo, which is the Greek word for tent
or tabernacle.The Word became flesh and
tabernacled among us.God changes His
address.God is loose in the world; He
no longer is in the walls of the tabernacle, He is walking the streets not as a
holy piece of ground in a world that has lost its way, but as a holy person
touching an unholy world, an unholy people and restoring it and them to what
God intended from the beginning.The
tabernacle is loose on the streets and by the way, on the water where He calms
the chaos, feeds the hungry, releases those captured by the powers of this
world and tells us that all of this points to the kingdom of God: the rule and
reign of God where every part of this world is holy, where every part of this
world lives out God’s call, where every part of this world finds peace instead
of chaos, light instead of darkness.
And yet there is still
darkness, too much darkness, even though the light has broken in. Which is why I think that John adds those
words, We have
seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and
truth.(John 1: 14b ESV) Grace
and truth bring us to a place that may surprise us.For they bring us back again to the Old
Testament, back to the covenant God, the God who makes it abundantly clear that
He is the God who makes promises and will keep His promises. The words go back to Exodus The Lord descended in
the cloud and stood with [Moses] there, and proclaimed the name of the
Lord.The Lord passed before him and
proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger,
and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for
thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin…(Exodus
34:4–7 ESV)“Steadfast love and faithfulness” is the
way that Exodus speaks the words of John’s “grace and truth.” In other words, Jesus reveals that God is
remaining faithful to His promise, His promise of bringing light, His promise
of creating a new world filled with a riot of color, of justice of
righteousness, a new world where the light overcomes the darkness.As God has been faithful to His promises thus
far, so He will be faithful and one day all will be well.
One day, but what of
today?What about today’s darkness and
chaos?Three things.One goes back to the magnificent song “Jesu,
Joy of Man’s Desiring.” While many of
have heard the words of the song, the reality is that the words we have in English
are not a translation of the German They
were inspired by the German, but they are not the words.Here are the words, words that tell us why we
desire Jesus, words that tell us how we walk in the darkness clinging to the
light.
Well for me that I have Jesus,
Oh how strong I hold to him
That he might refresh my hear,
When sick and sad am I.
Jesus have I, who loves me
And gives to me his own,
Ah, therefore I will not leave Jesus,
When I feel my heart is breaking…
Jesus remains my joy,
My heart’s comfort and essence,
Jesus resists all suffering,
He is my life’s strength,
My eye’s desire and sun,
My soul’s love and joy;
So will I not leave Jesus
Out of heart and face.
The Apostle Paul who
lived through more than his fair share of darkness said it this way in the book
of Philippians, I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound.In any and every circumstance, I have learned
the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.I can do all things through him who
strengthens me.(Philippians 4:11–13 ESV)In the darkness, “Well for me that I have Jesus.”
In the darkness well for
the world that God fills the world with the body of Christ. The body of Christ,
the church that both serves the light of the world and acts on behalf of the
light to bring light. Jesus says to us, You are the light of
the world.A city set on a hill cannot
be hidden.Nor do people light a lamp
and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the
house.In the same way, let your light
shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to
your Father who is in heaven.(Matthew 5:14–16 ESV)
God’s people, empowered by Spirit, led by Jesus Christ are the light that is to
shine into the world, into the darkness. The wonder of this call is captured by the
Contemporary Testimony, In our world, where
many journey alone, nameless in the bustling crowd, Satan and his evil forces
seek whom they may scatter and isolate; but God…gathers a new community…In the
new community all are welcome: the homeless come home, the broken find healing,
the sinner makes a new start; the despised are esteemed, the least are honored,
and the last are first…Joining the mission of God, the church is sent with the
gospel of the Kingdom to call everyone to know and follow Christ…The Spirit
calls all members to embrace God’s mission in their neighborhoods and in the
world: to feed the hungry, bring water to the thirsty, welcome the stranger,
clothe the naked, care for the sick, and free the prisoner.Into
the darkness we people shine; out of the ashes of the world we, by the power of
the Spirit, bring hope and healing, pointing people toward new life, toward the
true light.
One day, but for today
well for me that I have Jesus, and well for the world that God’s people see
themselves as the light of the world, a people of good works who seek to bring
light into the darkness. And well for
all of us that God is not yet done. The lighting of the Christ candle is not
only a remembering, it is a declaration that finally light will invade the
world in such a way that the darkness not only will not overcome it, but there
will be absolutely no place for the darkness.And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the
glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.By its light will the nations walk, and the
kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be
shut by day—and there will be no night there…Then the angel showed me…the tree
of life…The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.No longer will there be anything accursed,
but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be [the city], and his servants will
worship him…And night will be no more.They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their
light and they will reign forever and ever. (Revelation
21:22–22:5 ESV)
I giggle with delight sometimes at the goofy way God works. We try to box Him up and force Him into our strictures of how He should do His work and then He blows it all up with His tender love and gracious actions toward those He calls to Himself.
I spoke a couple of weeks ago at Pima Community College in David Gainey's class entitled "Religion and Pop Culture." David is a good friend and asks me to speak to his class each semester around the theme of spiritual warfare and demons and angels. He has the class watch the horror movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose as a setup for my visit. Since I am not a professor but only a guest speaker, I am not bound by rules about sharing my faith. The class is full of folks who self-identify from every imaginable religious background as well as agnostics and atheists. I usually tell some stories around demonic influences in peoples' lives. That triggers some great conversations. We talked about "sensing" evil on Thursday and one guy, Frank, asked me if I ever experienced evil in a place. Were there places where I "felt the evil." I told him there were places that made me uncomfortable and he asked me to name one. I told him that Sedona, Arizona was one of the most beautiful places on earth but that it felt very spiritually dead to me. He said, "I love Sedona. Thanks for ruining it for me!" That got a good laugh from his classmates and soon because a punchline in several other questions during our time together.
Unbeknownst to me, Frank went home that day and told his girlfriend Jessica about my lecture. She was experiencing all kinds of spiritual darkness and had weird encounters in the night that would give her chills and then make her sick the following day. She got my name from Frank and searched the internet for my number. When she found it, she called me on a Monday and asked if I could come and bless their house and make the forces of darkness leave. I told her that I would love to pray for her but that I would like to meet and talk elsewhere first. She agreed to come to the church on Wednesday and talk with my co-pastor, Eric, and me.
She came and told us her story. It is an amazing story! She was born in Italy, near Milan, and her parents were followers of Rev. Moon. As members of the Unification Church the marriage had been arranged in order to bring harmony in the future. Jessica's father was abusive and eventually her mother took her and her brother to the United States to get away from their father. Her mother left the church and began to abuse drugs and alcohol. She introduced all sorts of strange men into her life. Jessica's father eventually came to the states as well and they reestablished a bit of a relationship. Jessica had a few wild moments also, but eventually became deeply involved in the cult activities. She would raise money and even got involved in political efforts in Washington on behalf of the church. She hobnobbed with high government officials before she was eighteen years old. She was matched and married in a mass ceremony in New York. Her new husband was from Korea and wanted to go back to Korea, but instead they moved in with his parents in Tucson. He was mean and abusive to her. She got pregnant but the baby died seven months into the pregnancy. It was a horrific blow to her since she had always longed to be a mom and raise children. She got pregnant again and had her daughter. She finally ran away from her husband, divorced him, and had a series of relationships before settling in with Frank. Frank became a father figure to her little girl and they have been together for five years.
We listened to her story. Eric asked her what she wanted and she wept and told us she wanted to be free of the darkness. She told us she was going to all kinds of spiritualists looking for help. Eric asked her what she believe about Jesus and she told us that she was taught Jesus could have been the Messiah but that he had failed to get married and have children so that he was a failed Messiah. He was considered a wise and good prophet. Eric told her that we believe Jesus was the Messiah and that he was God. "For reals?" she said. "You actually believe Jesus is God?" She had a hard time getting her head around that. Eric did a beautiful job of telling the story of the gospel to her and she sat back, amazed. I told her that we would love to walk with her but to truly find peace she would have to come to grips with Jesus being God. She said she wasn't sure she was ready to acknowledge that. We told her we would love to help as best we could in anyway and that we would pray with her.
She bowed her head and Eric asked her if she would like to pray first. She nodded her head and started an argument with herself. She went back and forth first announcing that Jesus was God and then denying it was possible. Then she would say it more firmly and renounce it again. It was amazing to listen to. Finally, she announced that she was choosing to believe that Jesus was God and that she wanted to give him her whole life, as messed up as it was. It was a sweet moment watching the peace flow over her. We prayed for her and she took a Bible and some passages that Eric said she should read and left with a promise to come to church and become part of that community. We prayed that she would find a new place to live and that she would find peace from the torment and sickness.
She called me the next day to tell me that when the demons had come to her in the night she had told them to go away since she now belonged to Jesus and then she cried out to Jesus to come and rescue her. She said that the chills left immediately and that she did not wake up sick. She was thrilled to have found such peace. She also told me they would be moving into a new apartment the next day. Those were beautiful answers to prayer!
On Thursday after Missional Cafe', I was visiting with my sister in Englewood. The phone rang and it was Jessica. She told me they were moved in and that she was unpacking. She said that her boyfriend, Frank, had told her to relax and that he would pay the bills for awhile while she took care of herself. Frank identifies himself as an unbeliever who has occasionally gone to church on Easter or Christmas or whenever he feels bad about his life. Jessica told me that she was feeling guilty not doing things and wondered what the requirements were to belong to the Village. She told me she wanted to do lots of things including helping people, but wanted to also start doing things that the church would require of her. She must have used the word "do" fifty times. I finally interrupted her and told her that she didn't have to do anything. I told her that she was dearly loved by God and to just "be" Jessica. I told her to love her daughter and Frank and take joy in not having to do anything. She started to cry.
She told me how much she loved being home with her daughter, meeting her new neighbors, and decorating their new apartment. She cried some more. I told her to continue to do the things that delighted her. She said that every night she was reading books to her five-year-old before she went to bed and how much fun that was. She said she felt like a good mom.
"Rod," she said. "I might have messed up, but I need to tell you something." She went on to tell me that she had been reading a book to her daughter and when they finished her daughter pointed to the Bible and said, "Let's read the new book you got, Mommy."
She told me she didn't know where to read from so she just opened the book and started reading. She told me she was reading about some guy pursuing a girl and describing her with an ivory neck and breasts like towers and like fawns. Jessica said, "I don't know if you have read that part of the Bible, Rod, but it is hilarious. My daughter and I were rolling on the floor laughing. It was so funny my daughter kept asking me to read more. We giggled all night. I don't know if it was appropriate for my daughter or not or if that is what I should be reading myself, but was very good and very funny."
I told her that the man in the story was God and that she was the girl He was loving and pursuing. I told her that the girl in the story didn't have to do anything to earn the love of the man and that she didn't have to do anything to earn God's love either. I told her to giggle and laugh and roll on the floor in delight and take pleasure in being loved by God. She wept for a long time before she whispered, "I needed to hear that," and we finally hung up.
Sunday, she and Frank and her little girl came to the Village. Folks engaged them and asked them good questions. They made them feel welcome. It was good to see them being gently enfolded into the community. Since they were surrounded with folks, I ate dinner with April and her husband Michael, who is also not a believer. He says he is just supporting April and isn't at the Village to hear about God. He had liked some things in the sermon and was talking to me about it. He is a prison guard and liked the idea of confession as a path to be released from darkness since prison inmates are always trying to turn guards and it is important for guards to quickly confess when they have done wrong so as to keep from being turned. Frank stopped by the table to tell me how much he appreciated the message and that he had learned a lot. He said he would be back next week along with Jessica and her daughter. Michael told him to make sure to come back because even though he himself wasn't a Christian, people at the Village were "good people" who cared about each other and helped other people. Michael said that he himself was learning a lot of stuff about God. Frank assured Michael that he would be back.
You have to love when unbelievers are inviting other unbelievers to church! You have to really love when God uses horror movies, new apartments, and randon verses from the Song of Songs to draw people to Himself. You have to love the gospel.
The principle of community in our missionary practices is to intentionally bring people into close and valued relationships with our community. But it is more than just connection. It has also been my experience that as we increase the relational investment quantitatively, the indentification and conversion moves along more rapidly and effectively. Let me explain.
There are two types of relational equity. First is Qualitative Equity. The deeper the quality of the relationship and personal connection between two people, the greater comfort level and intimacy is obtained so freeing up conversation. For instance, persons who are long-time friends may talk openly about the personal problem one of them has, which may not happen with a newer acquaintance. It should be noted here that this is usually what people have in mind when they talk about "friendship evangelism." In this view people are thinking that the primary goal is to go deeper in the relationship until a level of intimacy is obtained to be able to talk about spiritual things. Sometimes this does in fact happen, but sometimes it does not. Sometimes people bracket their relationships where they may allow a great deal of intimacy on certain topics, but not others. For instance, a Christian woman may have a close girl friend at work who connects with her and even opens up to her about her relationships with the men she is dating and even sleeping with. But she may, on the other hand, be completely closed off to spiritual questions with this person for unknown reasons. Then the Christian woman can often feel discouraged because she has been making a great deal of investment in this relationship only to hit an invisible brick wall. Then comes the desperation of trying to force the subject, which often leads to an awkward conversation, in spite of all the intimacy and emotional investment anyway. This is discouraging. Or it may leave her feeling like it was a waste of time and eventually she will give up on the relationship.
The other type of relational equity is Quantitative Equity, which is not the depth of the relationship with the person but actually the number of relationships with other Christians. This is what the "friendship evangelism" paradigm grossly underestimates. It always tries to go deep, rather than wide. But since we are communal people, there is a power in numbers that cannot be underestimated. For instance, nobody enjoys a party where they don't know anybody, or even just one person. But when you walk into a party and four or five people say, "Hey Todd!" there is a deeply soothing and compelling level of comfort and belonging that comes over a person. With this you also relax more and feel more comfortable to be yourself. In fact, this comfort might even embolden you in the crowd you know more so than in one-on-one settings.
As we also noted, people tend to conform to the group they identify with. That is why "going deep" with "friendship evangelism" can often seem so ineffective. You may have a lot of relational equity with a person, and they may even value that relationship so much that they do not mind putting up with your annoying attempts at evangelizing them, but if they have their identity rooted somewhere else, you will have a hard time getting through to them. Like I said, the Gospel is a "world view" and it is inseparable from our personal identity. The problem facing the Christian woman exampled above is that she is going at it alone. She has no support. However, if she is part of a Christian community, and she and that community make intentional decisions to befriend the non-Christian woman too, they will begin to do things together as a group. They will all as a group begin to share experiences and enjoy one another. But then what will happen is the non-christian woman will begin to notice (without them asking her to church or having an awkward conversation, etc.) that they will also speak freely when around her of their corporate experiences in faith together. This does not need to be "spiritual talk" either like "Praise Jesus" every other sentence! In fact, such spiritualized jabber should be avoided because it always sounds weird, even to a lot of Christians, and if nothing else, fake. Rather, she will just begin to enjoy the mutual relationships of the group, while also seeing that there is another experience that her friends are sharing that she does not understand and enjoying that she is not. This will naturally evoke interest and questions. I have seen this happen again and again.
The key principle is quantitative community equity. This is to say, the more connections a person has to your Christian community (that is people), the more they naturally begin to identifuy with that group and are naturally prone to begin asking questions of faith. A particular way of life may not be persuasive until that person relaizes that quite a number of pople they respect buy into it which will naturally make investigation seem much more worth while. Of course this becomes all the more compelling when these poeple are loving each other, serving one another, and speaking to one another respectfully in contrast to their other typical relationships. The most compelling aspect of the Gospel is always our love for one another. Also, this quantitative equity (the multiplication of persons in relationship to the non-Christian) naturally supports the qualitative equity of the primary contact person. The great relief to the rank and file Christian is that with this approach you do not need fancy presentations, intellectual gifting, apologetic knowledge, or even printed literature. Also, you do not ever have to feel tongue tied or the pressure of having all the right answers because you are not doing it alone. You are not trying to present a list of propositional truths and defend them, but you are bringing that person into the experience of the community and way of life where the Gospel already exists in the lives of each person. As the person begins to ask questions, you can easily defer to someone else who has more knowledge. Ironically enough, it is the humility of "I don't have all the answers" that is more often far more winsome than the typical apologetic evangelism that wins battles and loses wars.
Contact with the Christian community offers a gentle and friendly exposure to a world view lived before their eyes. But for a person to see this most compelling aspect of disciples loving one another, they must be in contact with a community of disciples. They cannot see our love for one another if they only know one of us! This is what Jesus says in John 13:35, By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. They cannot see us love one another if they are not exposed to the community.
