Gospel Hospitality
Hospitality is a forgotten art. It also has a lost biblical history. We can recover the art of hospitality by understanding what it is and discerning how the gospel changes our notions of hospitality. In general, hospitality is about treating strangers as equals by creating space for them to be protected, provided for, and taken care of, followed by assisting and guiding them to their next destination. Let's see how this holds up to scripture. The Origin of Hospitality
There is a lot of history to consider in understanding the act or art of hospitality, but it all goes back to the beginning. In Genesis 1-2, we discern God’s first hospitable act. Consider what God did when he created the world and the garden of Eden for humanity to live in it. He gave Adam and Eve all they needed to enjoy life restfully while doing the work He created them for. He gave them space to exist, to enjoy creation, and to enjoy each other and fellowship with Him. They were given both the space and the capability to create, to work, and to exercise authority, with all the resources necessary they needed.
Israel: God's Hospitable People
Consider God’s commands to His people regarding hospitality to strangers (Lev 19:9-10, 33-34; Deut 10:18-19). Through Abraham and Sarah, God created a new nation - a People blessed to be a blessing to all nations. He gave them all the resources and capabilities to exercise hospitality to strangers, orphans, and widows. Similar to the Garden experience, Israel offered His people a place of refuge where others could rest and receive all they needed, enabling them to do what God had created them to do. However, now this rest came in the midst of a broken, sinful world.
On the flip side, think of the number of occasions where Israel found itself as the strangers among a host people. In some cases they found a hospitable reception (Egypt with Joseph in charge; the spies and Rahab). In other cases they found themselves treated like enemies or slaves (Slavery in Egypt; Babylonian Captivity). God had called them to be hospitable, yet they often failed to do so. After, receiving hospitality this must have become clearer to them.
God allows us to experience grace as recipients so that we might be distributors of grace to others.
God allows us to experience grace as recipients so that we might be distributors of grace to others. Hospitality toward Israel was a clear example of God’s gracious gift, once again, and should have motivated generous hospitality. Unfortunately, Israel failed to enter God's rest because of their unbelief and disobedience (Heb 4). So, they not only failed to rest in the work of God, but also failed to offer that rest to other nations. In all their hospitable failures, they needed one who would fully rest in God in order to become an enduring place of refuge for others.
Rethinking Hospitality with Jesus
Jesus entered into a culture shaped by a variety of world views (The Imperial Cult, Jewish Monotheism, and Hellenistic Philosophy to name a few). In this culture, the concept of hospitality was rooted in several different traditions. First, the idea of taking in a hostile stranger or enemy and treating him as you would yourself. Second, the Greek practice of hospitality in which a stranger passing outside a Greek house would be invited inside the house by the family. The host washed the stranger's feet and offered him/her food and wine. Only after the stranger was feeling comfortable, could the host ask his or her name. This practice stemmed from the thought that the gods mingled among men, and if you played a poor host to a deity, you would incur the wrath of a god.
A third shaping force in the concept of hospitality in Jesus’ day was the Hebrew understanding (as briefly considered in the passages above and demonstrated also in the story of Lot and the angels– Genesis 19). Jesus comes into this cultural context and calls the weary to himself, feeds the hungry, mends the broken, eats with sinners and tax collectors, washes his disciples' feet...and ultimately gives his life to cleanse us from sin, deal with our unbelief and provide a way and place for us to rest. Jesus lives, loves, obeys, works, dies, and rises again so that we might find a place of rest, renewal and recreation. He offers us rest in order to send us on our way to be about God's purposes - rescued to offer rest. Jesus saved us to be His Hospitable People!
3 Ways the Church Can be Hospitable
In light of the Gospel, we might define hospitality as the creation of a space that allows people to BE themselves, to BECOME renewed, and to DO the works God has saved them for. When we properly exercise hospitality, we welcome people to be themselves in the warmth of the light of Christ, to become renewed by being changed by the work of Christ, and to do works we have been created for in Christ.
To Be Rested
In a broken world, marred and diseased by the effects of sin, people need the space to rest. This is why Jesus called people who were weary and heavy-laden to come to him. He would give them rest for their weary souls. Jesus calls us to rest in His work on our behalf so we can be a people at rest who provide sanctuaries of rest for others.
Before the Fall, Adam and Eve were naked and unashamed. God had created a place and made space for them to be themselves without covering or facades. If we are in Christ, we are clothed with His righteousness. We don’t need to cover up or hide. One of the ways we create space for people to experience and come to understand the gospel is by creating space for people to reveal their true self and see that they are loved regardless of the “wrinkles and scars” of sin. How do we create space for people to be their true self?
To Become Renewed
The gospel isn’t only about loving and forgiving sinners. It is also about restoring broken and marred people into healed and whole people who grow up to become imitators of Jesus Christ – restored image bearers of God. Jesus created space for people to be and to become (Think of Mary, Peter, Thomas, the woman at the well, the blind man, the paralyzed). Gospel hospitality implies creating space for people to be known, to be real, to be loved, and ultimately to be led with the Holy Spirit’s help to healing and wholeness through the work and person of Jesus Christ. How do we create space for people to be led toward healing and wholeness?
To Do Works
The gospel moves from who God is and what Christ has done on our behalf into the works He created us to do (See Ephesians 2:8-10).
This is the result of Jesus’ gospel hospitality. He got on the same level with his enemy – becoming human. He became our servant – to the point of death. He spent all that He had in order to clean us up – by becoming our sin and giving us His righteousness (2 Cor 5:21). Then He sent us His Spirit to empower us to do good works for His sake so others could be welcomed in to the family. When we engage in gospel hospitality, we are regularly asking ourselves this question:
How do we create space for the stranger to be rested, restored, healed, and prepared in Jesus Christ for the work God has called them to?
Will you join God's rich history of providing rest in order to extend rest? Remember, everything he has called you to do he has already done for you in Christ Jesus. You have everything you need to offer gospel hospitality to the strangers, friends, and even enemies around you.
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Jeff Vanderstelt and his wife, Jayne, have three children: Haylee, Caleb and Maggie. He is a pastor at Soma Communities in Tacoma, WA and a trainer for church planters. He blogs here. Twitter @JeffVanderstelt
Plant the Gospel, Plant Churches
As I write this article, the core team for our new church has been gathering for a grand total of three weeks. We currently have about twenty people on the team and several children. We are filled with excitement, joy, anticipation, and nervousness. I have served as an itinerant evangelist, a camp pastor, a succession pastor, and (still am) a seminary professor. But I have never planted a church. Where should I begin? The answer is, of course, the Bible. But does the Bible actually say anything about church planting? I often hear people, even my friends, say things like, “Church planting is not in the Bible” or, “Jesus never told us to plant churches.” To which I say, “Are you sure about that?”
Standing on the shoulders of wise missiologists, let me point out two New Testament convictions and one New Testament example that provide a basic biblical understanding of church planting. The biblical foundations for church planting are not limited to these, but these three particular items are essential and memorable.
Two New Testament Convictions
First, the Great Commission points to church planting. This doesn’t mean that Jesus gave us a command to “plant churches” explicitly. Admittedly, you will look in vain to find such a command. However, Jesus told us to “make disciples of all nations” by “baptizing them” and “teaching them.” What do you call making of disciples by baptizing and teaching them? I call this incorporating them into the life of a church.
In my view, baptism is an ordinance of the church, which serves as a public profession of faith for believers. It identifies them with the body of Christ. Therefore, Christ’s orders in the Great Commission seem to have the church in view.
After Peter preached on the Day of Pentecost, about 3,000 were converted, and then baptized. Immediately following this, we read about these believers gathering in Acts 2:42-47 for worship in this new church. These baptized believers gathered for worship and to, among other things, teach all that Jesus commanded. I would argue, then, that the Great Commission points to the idea of church planting – not church planting with a building, a budget, and a website – but church planting in terms of identifying new believers in baptism and equipping new believers through sound teaching.
Another way to say this is that we are called to “plant the Gospel” and then see that healthy churches are developed. This is our goal at Imago Dei Church. We want to plant the Gospel in Raleigh. Even though Raleigh is in the South, it is, at best, 16% evangelical, and is currently one of the fastest growing metro areas in the nation. There are people studying in RDU from all over the world, in an area that boasts more "Ph.D.’s per capita" than anywhere in the nation. We want to plant the Gospel in this influential city, and then make disciples through the local church.
Second, Paul’s basic ministry methodology was urban church planting. Again, the goal was “plant the Gospel first, then help the church get established,” but nevertheless, it was a church planting movement. In Acts, we find Paul preaching the Gospel in major cities, then establishing the church in which elders were appointed for the purpose of spiritual growth and health. Many of these new congregations are described for us in the New Testament letters. In fact, the New Testament is basically a collection of new church plants.
Certainly, there are practical reasons to plant churches today. Around the world, more people are moving to urban centers, filled with throngs of people and few churches. The ethnic diversity of America is growing, also, which calls for new churches. In some unreached places, various people groups have little or no biblical church. These are all important notes to consider, which add weight to these two New Testament principles. Not only do we have biblical reasons for planting new congregations, but we also have a context in which we need to apply them urgently. People need the gospel and a church in which to belong.
A New Testament Example: The Church in Philippi
Consider the church in Philippi (Acts 16:6-40). Paul, in response to the Spirit’s call, plants the first church on European soil! How did it happen? Again, the same pattern: plant the Gospel; plant the church. In joyful sacrifice, Paul reaches three different types of people.
He first goes to a place of prayer where a lady named Lydia is converted and baptized. She then invites Paul and the missionaries to her home. Later, she apparently allowed her home to become the gathering place (new church) for the entire group of believers in Philippi (v. 40). Next, Paul encounters a fortune telling slave girl who is delivered from an evil spirit. Finally, there is a jailer who is present when Paul and Silas are put into prison. Here we have three different classes of people: Lydia (wealthy), the slave girl (poor), and a jailer (middle class?). We have three different avenues for reaching them: Lydia (with teaching at a religious gathering), Slave Girl (through deeds of mercy), and a Jailor (through example). They also represent three different nationalities: Lydia (Asian); Slave-Girl (Native Greek); Jailer (Roman). Moreover, each had different spiritual backgrounds: Lydia (Religious); Slave-Girl (spiritual turmoil), and a Jailer (indifferent?). Paul faithfully ministers the good news in the city to various types of people, and as a result, the first church in Europe - probably meeting in Lydia’s house - is formed (v. 40).
About ten years later, Paul writes to the Philippian church from a Roman prison. His epistle to the Philippians radiates with joy. They were his partners, his brothers and sisters. The apostle continued to labor for “their progress and joy in the faith” (Phil. 1:25).
In response to the Great Commission, and in light of the missionary methods of Paul, let’s plant the gospel all over the world; and let's plant healthy churches for the glory of Christ and the progress and joy of all peoples.
I’m indebted to Tim Keller’s Church Planter Manual for the outline of this article. Other helpful resources include Ed Stetzer, Planting Missional Churches.
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Tony Merida serves as the Lead Pastor of Imago Dei Church, Raleigh, NC and as the Associate Professor of Preaching at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is married to Kimberly, with whom he has five children. Tony is the co-author of Orphanology and author of Faithful Preaching. He travels and speaks all over the world at various events, especially pastor’s conferences, orphan care events, and youth/college conferences. Twitter @tonymerida
What to Do With Prayerlessness
Prayer. Often the word triggers guilt. For some, it sparks warmth, and for others, nothing. No warmth, no guilt. Flat. It’s a vaporous word that appears and vanishes without meaning. Guilty Prayer
Prayer is one of the most prominent themes in Scripture (occurring several hundred times), yet it is one of the most neglected practices in the church. Why the chasm between prominence and practice?
Well, if guilt springs to mind when we think of prayer, why should we let prayer come to mind? Keep the guilt at bay. Fend it off. We respond to guilt in two main ways: Action, to assuage our conscience, or inaction, to deny guilt’s entry into our conscience. Make up for the guilt or try to make off without it.
We might guiltily pray, filling journals and prayers with endless words. Or we might try to ignore it. If we’re prone to making up for failure to pray, our reasoning might go something like: “I’d like to pray (not true), but I’ve got so much to do today.” We ignore prayer (inaction), in order to focus on something that doesn’t produce guilt—like work or service (action)—in hope that guilt will go away. I’ve tried both.
I used to feel guilty when I didn’t pray. If I didn’t make it through my prayer list or spend half an hour in solitary prayer, I’d feel guilty for not praying more.
There is a guilt that's from God and a guilt that isn’t. Guilt 1 is associated with shame. Shame defines you by your guilt. You're an utter failure, a spiritual sloth. Guilt 2 is associated with conviction. Conviction defines you by your relationship with Christ. It calls you to be who you truly are in Christ. It appeals to the deep longings of the Spirit, who stirs us to pray (1 Cor 2; Rom 8; Jude 1). Guilt 1 presses us down. Guilt 2 lifts us up. Guilt 1 says you'll never pray enough. Guilt 2 says Christ is praying for you right now, join him! Shame drives us into a corner; conviction drives us to Christ.
Somewhere along the way, I was liberated from prayer-by-shame. Part of this liberty came when I realized that God doesn’t relate to me based on guilt but based on grace. Grace reminds me that when I was guilty of deep distrust in God and his promises, Christ died and kept God’s promises to absorb my guilt, so now I have every reason to trust. Grace reminds me that God relates to me based on what Jesus has done, not on what I have not done.
Why Did Jesus Pray?
Jesus prayed—a lot. This is weird when you consider the fact that he is God, until we begin to understand prayer. When prayer becomes more concrete, we become more prayerful.
Why did Jesus pray? Jesus prayed for God to rescue people: disciples, enemies, and sinners. He taught his disciples to do the same (Luke 6:28; 10:2). Jesus also prayed because he was incredibly dependent on the Father: “The Son can do nothing on his own accord” (John 5:19). “I can do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the Father taught me” (John 8:28). In the words of Paul Miller, “Jesus was the most dependent human that ever lived.” Jesus prayed because he knew how dependent he was - and how dependent we are - on the grace of our heavenly Father. Why should we pray? Because we are incredibly dependent on the Father and because we want God to rescue people.
Dependence-driven prayer isn’t a sign of weakness, per se, but a sign of love. Jesus prayed because he loved his creation and his Father. When I read Jesus’ prayer recorded in John 17, I can feel the warmth licking off the page. Jesus didn’t address him as “God” but as “Father.” Prayer wasn’t an exercise in guilt removal; it was a communication of warmth. If you read John 17, you can feel Jesus’ longing to be with his Father “in glory” once again.
Because Jesus loves the Father, he does God's will by sharing the words of eternal life with his disciples. Sensing the profound satisfaction that eternal life will bring them, Jesus says: “Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one” (11). Jesus prays that we would join in his oneness with the Father, that we would know their love and warmth. He elaborates (was this necessary?): “I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me” (23). Jesus prayed because he loved being with the Father, and he prays for us because he wants us to enjoy being with the Father. Prayer is an expression of love for the Father and for one another.
Drawing Near to God
In the words of James, prayer is “drawing near to God” (4:8). Abraham Kuyper clarifies love for God as drawing near to God when he writes: “To have love for God is a different and a much weaker thing than to be able to say:’ I love God.’” Many of us “have love for God” but have trouble saying, with sincere conviction, “I love God.” We live with what we love. If we love God, we will live with him in prayer. If we love entertainment, we will live with it in prayerlessness. May I be so bold as to say that our mornings and evenings are marked by what we love? If we lay down to Netflix and rise up to Internet, could it be that we love distraction more than we love God? Perhaps, in an unconscious way, we drift to entertainment because it distracts us from guilt. Guilt will drive you into a corner, but it will not drive you to Christ.
Prayer is about love not about lists. It is about drawing near to God, not about impressing God. It is about enjoying his grace not enduring guilt. In fact, our genuine guilt for loving something altogether more than we love the Father is gone in Christ. God so loved us that he sent his only Son to be cut off in death so that we might be wonderfully united with him in life. Prayer is a response to the Father and the Son; it is a warm reaction to what they have together done for us. Prayer is communion with God, a cementing of souls together in a common delight, in this case, a delight in God and his grace towards us in Christ. It begins and continues with honest words about our loveless lives, our guilt-ridden approaches to prayer, and a shameless embrace of God’s reckless love and grace.
Respond to his love, even now. Turn and receive his grace. Don’t let your guilt drive you into a corner but to Christ. As you receive his love and grace, respond by saying: “I love you God.” Then, you have prayed.
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Jonathan Dodson (M.Div, Th.M) is happy husband to Robie, and proud father to Owen, Ellie & Rosamund. He is also the lead pastor of Austin City Life church and directional leader for PlantR and Gospel Centered Discipleship.com. Jonathan is also the author of Gospel-Centered Discipleship (Crossway, 2012). He blogs at jonathandodson.org, enjoys listening to M. Ward, watching sci-fi, and following Jesus. Twitter @Jonathan_Dodson
What is Gospel Centered Ministry?
The theological foundation of the church is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Churches fall into error whenever they move away from the gospel as their foundation. Alan Hirsch reminds us that, “Discipleship, becoming like Jesus our Lord and Founder, lies at the epicenter of the church’s task. It means that Christology must define all that we do and say...It will mean taking the Gospels seriously as the primary texts that define us.” Therefore, the gospel of Jesus Christ that saves individuals is also the gospel that grows individuals through discipleship in the church. Man-Centered Ministry
One of the major problems in many churches is bad ecclesiology and a man-centered view of ministry. The recent development of trends in North America such as mega-churches, seeker churches, and emerging churches has brought the issue of ecclesiology to the forefront of debate/discussion for church leaders. Many churches in North American have a pragmatic approach to ecclesiology that focuses on church growth more than church health and on cultural accommodation rather than biblical faithfulness.
The result is that many churches produce consumers and not radical disciples of Jesus Christ. Contemporary churches are being shaped more by contemporary trends than by the biblical ecclesiology. Some churches have either adopted a hierarchal structure that resembles a corporate business structure or they simply have no church structure at all. The truth is that church structure is extremely important for the overall health of a local church and the discipleship process.
Understanding the Gospel
Discipleship begins with understanding the gospel. Many Christians have a watered down, man-centered version of the gospel. The result of not having a solid grasp on the gospel is a dysfunctional and fragmented faith. C.J. Mahaney warns that three things result when we move away from the gospel: legalism, condemnation, and subjectivism.[i] There is a need for a clear understanding and a rediscovery of the gospel in the 21st century. Jerry Bridges writes, “The gospel is not the most important message in history; it is the only essential message in all of history. Yet we allow thousands of professing Christians to live their entire lives without clearly understanding it and experience the joy of living their lives by it.”[ii]
What is the gospel?
The gospel is the declaration of the good news that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that He died for our sins on the cross of cavalry. Simply put, there is no gospel without the sinless life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Tim Keller beautifully describes the gospel as, “The person and work of Jesus Christ, God fully accomplishes salvation for us, rescuing us from judgment for sin into fellowship with him, and then restores the creation in which we can enjoy our new life together with him forever.” [iii]
Doctrines of Grace
To be gospel-centered requires that one knows the doctrines of grace. Men like Martin Luther and John Calvin fought to bring a reformation to the church that would put faith back into the hands of the people. Arising out of the period of the Protestant Reformation were five foundations which summarized in part what the Reformers were trying to do. These banners were known as the "Five Solas" (Latin for 'only' or 'alone') of the Reformation: the authority of scripture, salvation in Christ alone, by Grace alone, through faith alone, and to God Alone Be Glory. These five solas of the faith are as important now as they were then.[iv]
A gospel-centered view of salvation is completely Christocentric. Christianity begins and ends with Jesus Christ. The word Christian literally means “Christ-like.” Therefore, a proper Christology is the place to start if we are really going to talk about salvation. Gospel-centered theology distinguishes between man-centered and God-centered views of salvation.
Salvation involves the redemption of the whole person and is freely offered to all who repent of their sins and accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. By His blood, Jesus has obtained eternal redemption for every believer. We are “saved by grace through faith, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). Therefore, salvation is the work of God from beginning to end. Salvation is wholly dependent upon the work of God's grace. God credits His righteousness to those who put their faith in Christ alone for their salvation, thereby justifying them in His sight.
Applying the Gospel
The gospel has implications for every Christian believer that reach far beyond salvation. Christians should live gospel-centered lives. Believers are saved by the gospel and called to live by the gospel. The gospel is for all of life. Not only should every Christian have a clear understanding of the gospel, but we should also apply it to every area of our lives.
The gospel is to be applied to every area of thinking, feeling, relating, working, and behaving.[v] Christians must never move beyond the gospel. C.J. Mahaney writes that believers should memorize the gospel, pray the gospel, sing the gospel, review how the gospel has changed our lives, and finally we should continually study the gospel.[vi] This is the reason why the gospel is the foundation for discipleship.
Gospel-Centered Ministry
There is an important connection between the gospel, ministry, and discipleship. Our theology has a direct effect on our ministry and discipleship. In many ways, our discipleship is the fruit of our theology. Sadly, many church leaders use church growth principles to add people to the church; however, only the gospel can grow people into disciples of Jesus Christ.
In conclusion, a Gospel-centered church does not only preach the gospel. The gospel is not an addition to our ministry or even a beginning point; rather, the gospel must saturate every part of our church’s life. Each stage of our discipleship process should also be gospel-centered. From assimilation, to preaching and teaching, to counseling, to leadership development, the gospel must be central. Even our worship should be gospel-centered.
The church should reach lost people with the gospel through community outreaches, personal evangelism, and missional living. The church should develop and grow disciples with the gospel through small groups, Bible study, service, and the teaching of spiritual disciplines. It should seek to reproduce disciples grounded in the gospel through leadership development and the mentoring of godly men who will become elders and deacons. Let the gospel be the heart of your church from beginning to end.
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5 Ways to Keep Church Discipline from Seeming Weird
Recently, the subject of church discipline has hit the radar in many circles due to some high profile controversies and scandals. The way some churches appear to poorly exercise church discipline is as distressing as the way many Christians reacted to the concept. There has been a collective incredulity about church discipline as some kind of “strange fire” in the evangelical world. I can’t help but think that this aversion is partly because, as God has built his church, his church leaders have not always kept up with what makes a church a church. So even to mention the idea of a church disciplining its members strikes tenderhearted and undereducated Christians as weird, mean, and legalistic. How do we work at keeping church discipline from seeming weird? Here are 5 ways:
1. Make disciples.
Many local churches have simply becoming keepers of a fish tank. A surface level of fellowship is often in place, but the central mission of the church - to make disciples - has been neglected. Instead, churches are structured around providing religious goods and services, offering education or even entertainment options for their congregational consumers. People aren’t being trained in the context of ongoing disciple relationships. But this largely what “church discipline” is - training.
If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. Matthew 18:15
In discipling relationships, we are always disciplining one another, not chiefly or only in the fight against sin but largely in our encouragement of each other, edifying one another, teaching one another, and sharing one another’s burdens. In short, disciples know each other. And so Matthew 18:15 might be happening all the time, perhaps weekly within loving relationships where there is no imminent danger of somebody being kicked out of the church but rather a constant iron sharpening of iron.
In churches with healthy discipleship cultures, church discipline is going on all the time in helpful, informal, everyday ways. When the more formal processes of church discipline become necessary, they are much less likely to be carried out too harshly or received strangely. The church will already have a positive training context for knowing that discipleship requires obedience, correction, perseverance, and mutual submission.
2. Create clarity about church membership.
In many churches, there is no church membership structure at all. But even in churches that maintain formal church membership, the expectations and processes are unclear. Prospective church members need to provide more info than merely their profession of faith, previous church membership, and the area of service they are interested in. They need to know what the body is promising to them and what they are promising the body. If church membership is a Christ-centered covenant relationship - and it is - their needs to be a clear, mutual promise between all invested parties that their yes will be yes and their no will be no, so that there can be no surprise when someone’s yes to sin is received with a no from the church.
3. Teach the process.
I remember a church meeting once upon a time where elders were sharing the grounds for dismissal of the lead pastor. The evidence was extensive and serious, and there was plenty of testimony about the elders having for years seeking the pastor’s repentance and his getting counseling to no avail. One woman, visibly upset, shouted, “Where is the grace?!” The whole idea seemed weird and unchristian to her. She did not have the biblical framework to know that the last several years’ of seeking the pastor’s repentance was a tremendous act of grace, and that indeed, even his dismissal was a severe mercy, a last and regrettable resort in seeking to startle him into Godly sorrow over his sin. But churches aren’t accustomed to thinking of discipline that way; they think of grace as comfort and niceness. This is because we don’t teach them well.
For some, church discipline will always be objectionable because it seems outdated and unnecessary. But for many, their objection is a reflection of simply not knowing what the Bible teaches on the matter. If a church never broaches the subject until a church’s response to someone’s unrepentant sin must be made public, church discipline will always seem alien. “What are you doing bringing all this law into a place that should be filled with grace?” And the like. So we have to preach the relevant texts.
One word of caution, however: Some churches love teaching the process of church discipline out of all proportion; they love it too much. In some church environments, church discipline is mainly equated with the nuclear option of excommunication and the leadership of the church is not known for its patience but for its itchy trigger finger. Teaching the process of church discipline is not about filling the church with a sense of dread and covering the floor with eggshells. It’s about providing enough visibility about the guardrails and expectations that people can actually breathe more freely, not less. Church discipline - rightly exercised - is motivated by real, sorrowful love and concern.
4. Follow the process.
Once again, we fail our congregations when we don’t begin church discipline until we feel pressed to remove someone from membership and refuse them the Lord’s Supper. It’s as if there aren’t previous, patient, hopeful steps in Matthew 18. Even the context of Paul’s command in 1 Corinthians 5:13 appears to demonstrate excommunication is the final straw, not the only one. If we will follow the biblical process of church discipline, beginning with confidential and humble rebuke of a brother’s or sister's sin, if unrepentance persists and the circle of visibility widens, expulsion will be seen as a regrettable and sorrowful necessity, and as something intended for a person’s repentance and restoration, not for their punishment.
5. Practice gospel-centeredness.
God will get the glory and our churches will give him glory when church discipline is practiced in the context of a grace-driven culture. You can expect church discipline to seem unnecessary and legalistic in churches where the gospel has not had any noticeable effect on the spirit of the people. But in churches where God’s free grace in Christ is regularly preached and believed, church leaders will be regularly setting aside their egos and narcissistic needs and the laity will be bearing all things, hoping all things, enduring all things, and believing all things (1 Corinthians 13:7), including that while no discipline feels pleasant at the time, in the end it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it (Hebrews 12:11).
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Gospel Centered Leadership - Transparency
There’s a scene in the movie, We Were Soldiers where Mel Gibson’s character assures the men he is leading into battle that he will be the first person off their helicopter and the last man to step back on when they leave the battlefield. He's upfront and transparent with his men. Good leaders are transparent. When leaders aren't transparent, when their behavior doesn't model what they say, people find it very difficult to follow them. Few mistakes shine brighter in an organization than when a leader violates the principles, traditions and ethical standards that shape the culture of that organization.
Gather people to your vision and show them what it looks like to walk through life in pursuit of that vision. This is true in both normative and catalytic seasons within your organization. Change brings uncertainty and resistance. No amount of instruction will pry people away from the golden myth of the past as effectively as a leader who models what it looks like to live out a new rhythm of life.
This goes deeper than the hard work of crystallizing what matters most to you into pithy statements or a set of bullet points that you post on your office wall like an alternate set of ten commandments. For example, it’s one thing to capture a conviction about a life shaped by God’s calling to community and mission. And while we never want to minimize the beauty of a life that’s built around other people as we declare and display the greatness and glory and goodness and grace of God in everyday life, there’s something else at work in the lives of leaders who change the way other people think and live and love.
We don’t grow into a family of missionaries - ultimately - through the collective adoption of best practices. What changes the people God has given us to lead is not merely their observation of our hospitality or incarnational posture. It’s quite possible that they’ll watch you live out this new way of life, provide the occasional word of encouragement, or offer of help - yet never embrace any of it as their own. This can be particularly problematic in established churches or Christianized cultures where the work of community and mission remains the sole work of professional ministers.
If we intend people to become part of a family of missionaries in our cities, we must lead with a transparency that is far more foundational and pervasive than missional convictions and communal methodology. I’ve spent this year meditating on the book of Colossians and this morning I was back at the beginning of the letter, greeted with a reminder that grace has been given and peace has been secured on my behalf. On one hand, this means that I am loved - lavishly - with an affection that is settled and steadfast. There is much that is uncertain in my world, but the love of my heavenly Father is not in question. On the other hand, this love that has rewoven everything that could possibly unravel my relationship with God is a tapestry of grace. It is love that is undeserved, even as it is freely and abundantly given. The very concept of grace is a reminder that while there is nothing that can separate me from the love of God, it is a love given in lieu of the actual content of my life.
Grace creates transparent leaders in two particular ways: it convinces us that we are loved with unbreakable and unyielding affection; and it compels us to own up to the manifold ways we reject such love. Beyond our principles and practices, Gospel-centered leadership models a life of repentance and faith. The call to community and mission protects this from discombobulating into a life of flaccid passivity. Yet in a culture that threatens to careen into a hyper-active obsession with all things communal and missional, here in the simple language of grace and peace is a patient and persistent reminder that the life we are called to is a life that never disconnects from undeserved yet unwavering love.
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Matt Adair is the lead pastor of Christ Community Church in Athens and area director for Acts 29 in the state of Georgia. Twitter @mattadair
Discipleship 101: How to Disciple a New Believer
There are two men in their 20s who recently came to faith in Christ through the ministry of our church. I baptized them a few weeks ago. I’m discipling these guys right now. So, the question of how to disciple new believers is foremost in my thoughts. Discipleship involves a lot, but one of the most important things we can do for a new believer is teach them how to read, understand, respond to, and apply God’s Word. I’m discipling these two men is through weekly Bible reading meetings. This is how I do it:
-Every Wednesday night these guys come to my house to join in our Neighborhood Group with people from our church and neighborhood.
-I have the guys come 30 minutes early so the three of us can read the Bible together.
-Each week we read one paragraph of Scripture together and talk about it. Right now we’re reading Philippians because it’s the book I’m preaching through, it’s the book all of our Neighborhood Groups are studying, and because I think Philippians is a pivotal book to master for new believers.
-Each week I ask the guys two questions about the text: 1) What did this text mean in its original 1st century context? 2) What does this text mean for our lives today? As we work through these two questions I connect our thoughts to Jesus and the bigger storyline of Scripture.
-From 30 minutes of Bible reading and these two questions, we end up covering a ton of theological and practical ground. Last week’s study of Philippians 1:3-11 led to conversation about the Trinity, the second coming of Christ, how to pray, and God’s sovereignty and human responsibility.
Most believers have never been intentionally discipled and most believers have no clue how to go about discipling a new believer. The problem is that people don’t have a good understanding of what discipleship is. Here’s a definition we use:
Discipleship is truth transferred through relationship.
It’s that simple. What I’m doing with these two men on Wednesday nights is transferring truth through a meaningful relationship. I love these two men, and they know it. In relationship with them, I’m teaching them the truth, and at the center of that process, we're learning how to read, rejoice in, and apply God’s Word.
This post originally appeared at JustinBuzzard.net.
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Justin Buzzard is founder and lead pastor of Garden City Church, a new church plant in Silicon Valley. Buzzard has been dating his wife for nine years and is the father of three young sons. He speaks widely, writes at JustinBuzzard.net, and earned an MDiv at Fuller Theological Seminary. He is the author of Consider Jesus and mostly recently Date Your Wife. Twitter @JustinBuzzard
Taking the Long View
A few years ago I read A Narrative of Suprising Conversions by Jonathan Edwards, and there is one particular paragraph that God used to shape and change my heart. Edwards is talking about his grandfather, Solomon Stoddard, who preceded Edwards as pastor of his church. Listen to how Edwards describes him: “He was eminent and renowned for his gifts and grace; so he was blessed, from the beginning, with extraordinary success in his ministry, in the conversion of many souls.” Edwards explains that this happened in five seasons or “harvests" spread over Stoddard's 60 years in ministry. Edwards tells us exactly when they happened:
Harvest one erupts, and many are saved… Four years pass… Harvest two comes, and a great number of people are converted… Thirteen years pass… Harvest three happens, many come to know Christ… Sixteen years pass… Harvest four comes about, people flock to faith in Jesus… Six years pass… Harvest five errupts, and many are saved.
Years passed - sometimes more than a decade - between the times in which this church saw God bless them with great seasons of numerical growth by conversion. This great man of God pastored in the same place for nearly 60 years, pouring his life out for the sake of Jesus, working hard to make disciples, and was blessed to see amazing things.
We like to talk about those periods when growth is happening. It’s exciting. It’s energizing. We love to tell stories of churches that are seeing many people coming to faith. New services are started. Locations are multiplied. Baptisms are happening. But my question is: what about the seasons in between? What was happening in Stoddard's congregation then?
For every harvest there must be a sowing. When you add up the numbers, for 39 of his 60 years in ministry Solomon Stoddard didn’t see extraordinary growth. To be sure, people came to faith. Undoubtedly, the Spirit of God was at work. But, by most standards today (at least those we use in the American Church), Solomon Stoddard wasn’t much of a success.
At the heart of his ministry is a quality that is unfortunately all but forgotten by many: faithfulness. If Stoddard had been evaluated today, he might have been told to give up. To reevaluate his call. To change things up, try something new, adopt another strategy. Why? Because we are so tempted to trade the call to faithfulness for the allure of success. It is not sexy or glamorous to spend decades faithfully preaching the Word of God, investing your life in the people God has entrusted to you while seeing very little visible fruit.
But for a true harvest to come, there must be seed sown. Cared for. Watered. Tended to. Protected. Nourished. It is only after this hard work of faithful care has been done that a lasting harvest can come.
My prayer today is that God would give us the long view of ministry, and that our desire would be to give our lives in faithful service – trusting God to bring a tremendous harvest!
Bill Streger serves as the Lead Pastor of Kaleo Church, an Acts 29 Network church in Houston, TX. Born and raised in Houston, he attended Houston Baptist University and is currently pursuing his M.Div. from Reformed Baptist Seminary. Bill is a husband to Shannon, daddy to Mirabelle and Levi, and a life-long Houston Rockets fan. Twitter @billstreger
How to Respond to Religious Pluralism
Is Jesus the only way to God? I'm often asked this question. If the answer is, “Yes, Jesus is the only way to God,” a line is drawn where we would sometimes rather things remain fuzzy. Why would we prefer this particular claim to remain fuzzy? In many cities there are arrays of religious beliefs: Mysticism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Christianity, to name a few. The presence of so many different religions in cities leads people (Christians included) to conclude that all religious paths lead to God. Why does this happen in cities? In urban areas, we are more likely to develop relationships with people from various religions. When we realize that they are kind and sincere because of their religious beliefs, it seems arrogant to insist their beliefs are wrong. After all, their religion appears to have made them very likable, respectable people. I have met secularists and Buddhists who are more generous and sacrificial than many Christians I know. How, then, should we respond to this array of religions with the claim that Jesus offers the one, true way to God?
Answering the Question Socially
When people of other faiths rival Christian character, we face a tendency to affirm all religions as valid ways to God. We make a theological decision based on social experience. Rather than investigate the answer to one of the most important questions, we prefer to glaze the question with inch-deep reflections upon the character of people we meet. Understandable but not wise.
What if we became known for not only posing great questions but also grappling deeply and sincerely with great answers? Many Christians claim that belief in Jesus is the only way to God. Others insist there are many ways to God, a view popularly called religious pluralism (academic religious pluralism advocates inter religious dialog not that all religions lead to the same God. Here we will deal with religious pluralism in its popular form). Let’s examine the claims of religious pluralism.
Over the past five years in Austin, Texas (a case study city for Harvard’s Pluralism Project), I have had the opportunity to meet, know, and talk with both Christian and non-Christian pluralists. As I have reflected on these conversations, it seems that there are at least three reasons people embrace religious pluralism. They believe it to be more enlightened, humble, and tolerant. Let’s examine each of these reasons more closely.
Is Religious Pluralism Enlightened?
Is the belief that all religious paths lead to the same God more enlightened or educated? Comparatively, each religion teaches very different things about who God is and how humans reach the divine. In fact, there is a lot of disagreement between the religions regarding the nature of God. Buddhism, for example, doesn’t believe in God. Islam teaches an impersonal monotheism, Allah. The Koran states that God reveals His will, but not His person. Christianity teaches a personal trinitarianism, where God is three persons in relationship, Father-Son-Spirit that can be known and enjoyed. Hinduism varies on this question, ranging from polytheism to atheism. This is due to the absence of definitive revelation to clarify Hindu “theology.” Instead, Hinduism has multiple sources of revelation (Upanishads, Vedas, etc.) Contrary to Islam, Hinduism has no presuppositions about the nature of God. In short, religious views of God differ. If so, it would seem far from “enlightened” to claim that all religions lead to the same God, when their views of God are, in fact, radically different. This claim of religious pluralism contradicts the tenants of the religions themselves.
Religions not only teach different things about who God is but also how we “reach him.” Buddhism suggests the 8-fold Noble Path, Islam the 5 Pillars (Shahadah, Prayer, Fasting, Charity, Pilgrimage) and Christianity the gospel of Jesus. Therefore, to say that all religions lead to God is not only unenlightened it is inaccurate. This is the thesis of Stephen Prothero, Boston College professor, in his book God is not One. He writes:
And it is comforting to pretend that the great religions make up one big, happy family. But this sentiment, however well-intentioned, is neither accurate nor ethically responsible. God is not one.
Prothero goes on to point out that just as God is not one, so also all religions are not one. They are distinct and make very different claims about God and how to reach him. In light of what we have observed regarding what religions teach about the nature of God and how to reach him, religious pluralism must be reconsidered. Subscribing to religious pluralism because it is more enlightened or a more “educated” view of world religions is not only unenlightened but also inaccurate.
Is Religious Pluralism More Humble?
Despite very clear differences on the nature of God and human access to the divine, religious pluralists continue to insist that there are many ways to God. Why would educated people persist in an inaccurate view of other religions? One major reason is because they believe it to be an act of humility and love. Very often I hear people say: “Who am I to judge someone else’s religion, to tell them that they are wrong?” This implies, of course, that maintaining Jesus is the only way to God is arrogant. I’ll be the first to admit there are arrogant Christians who rudely insist that Jesus is the only way to God. I’d like to apologize for those kinds of Christians. Arrogant insistence on your beliefs actually runs counter to the life and teachings of Jesus. However, just because someone is arrogant doesn’t make him or her wrong.
People are arrogantly right about all kinds of things—Math, Science, Religion. You probably work with someone like this. (Dwight Schrute?) The arrogantly right person always talk down to others with an air of arrogance because they have the right answer. It might not be nice, but it doesn’t mean they are wrong.
For all the Christians who are arrogant about Jesus’ exclusive claims, there are many more who have ardently searched religions, compared their claims, and humbly come the conclusion that Jesus was telling the truth, that personal faith in the Messiah is the only way to God. This doesn’t make them arrogant; it makes them authentic. They are willing to stand by what they discovered to be true. Insisting on what is true doesn’t automatically make you arrogant. There are both humble and arrogant ways to insist on Jesus’ claim that he is the only way to God. After all, it is Jesus who said it, and Jesus was quintessentially humble, especially if he is who he said he was. By contrast, religious pluralism exclusively insists that its view—all ways lead to God—is true while all other religions are false in their exclusive teachings.
When religious pluralism claims that there are many ways to God, it is not humble. It actually carries an air of arrogance about it. How? Religious pluralism insists that its view—all ways lead to God—is true while all other religions are false in their exclusive teachings. Religious pluralism dogmatically insists on its exclusive claim, namely that all roads lead to God. The problem, as we have seen, is that this claim directly contradicts many religions like Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, and Christianity. The claim of the religious pluralist is arrogant because it enforces its own belief on others. It says to other religions: “You must believe what I believe, not what you believe. Your way isn’t right, in fact all of your ways are wrong and my way is right. There isn’t just one way to God (insert your religion); there are many ways. You are wrong and I am right.” This can be incredibly arrogant, particularly if the person saying this hasn’t studied all the world religions in depth and makes a blind assertion. Upon what basis can the religious pluralist make this exclusive claim? Where is the proof that this is true? To what ancient Scriptures, traditions, and careful reasoning can they point? The lack of historical and rational support for religious pluralism makes it a highly untenable view of the world and its religions.
Is Religious Pluralism Truly Tolerant?
Very often people hold to religious pluralism because they think it is more tolerant than Christianity. I’ll be the first to say that we need tolerance, but what does it mean to be tolerant? To be tolerant is to accommodate differences, which can be very noble. I believe that Christians should be some of the most accommodating kinds of people, giving everyone the dignity to believe whatever they want and not enforcing their beliefs on others. We should winsomely tolerate different beliefs. Interestingly, religious pluralism doesn’t really allow for this kind of tolerance. Instead of accommodating spiritual differences, religious pluralism blunts them. Let me explain.
The claim that all paths lead to the same God actually minimizes other religions by asserting a new religious claim. When someone says all paths lead to the same God, they blunt the distinctions between religions, throwing them all in one pot, saying: “See, they all get us to God so the differences don’t really matter.” This isn’t tolerance; it’s a power play. When asserting all religions lead to God, the distinctive and very different views of God and how to reach the divine in Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, and Islam are brushed aside in one powerful swoop. The Eightfold Noble Path, the 5 Pillars of Islam, and the Gospel of Christ are not tolerated but told they must submit to a new religious claim–religious pluralism–despite the fact that this isn’t what those religions teach. When it does this, religious pluralism places itself on top of all other religions.
The Religion of Religious Pluralism
People spend years studying and practicing their religious distinctions. To say they don’t really matter is highly intolerant! The very notion of religious tolerance assumes there are differences to tolerate, but pluralism is intolerant of those very differences! In this sense, religious pluralism is a religion of its own. It has its own religious absolute—all paths lead to the same God—and requires people of other faiths to embrace this absolute, without any religious backing at all. This is highly evangelistic. Religious pluralism is preachy but under the guise of tolerance. In the end, it is a step of faith to say there are many paths to God. Says who? The idea that all paths lead to the same God is not a self-evident fact; it is a leap of faith. It isn’t even an educated leap, nor is it as humble and tolerant as it might appear.
Here is Stephen Prothero’s response to this tenant of religious pluralism:
Faith in the unity of religions is just that—faith (perhaps even a kind of fundamentalism). And the leap that gets us there is an act of the hyperactive imagination.
As it turns out, each of the reasons for subscribing to religious pluralism—enlightenment, humility, and tolerance—all backfire. They don’t carry through. Religious pluralism isn’t enlightened, it’s inaccurate; it isn’t humble, it’s fiercely dogmatic; and it isn’t really all that tolerant because it intolerantly blunts religious distinctions. In the end, religious pluralism is a religion, a leap of faith, based on contradiction and is highly untenable. Christianity, on the other hand, respects and honors the various distinctions of other religions, comparing them, and honoring their differing principles–Karma (Hinduism), Enlightenment (Buddhism), Submission (Islam), and Grace (Christianity). As we conclude, let’s explore Jesus’ exclusive claim that he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life as well as the charge that his teachings in Christianity are arrogant, unenlightened, and intolerant. In particular, we will examine the unique principle of grace.
Christ Teaches Us Humility
First, Jesus is the Way. What does this mean? Does it mean that Jesus is our trailblazer, clearing the other religious options aside so we can hike our way to heaven through spiritual or moral improvement. If I keep the Ten Commandments, if I serve the poor and love my neighbor, if I pray and read the Bible enough, then God will accept me. No. As the way, Jesus doesn’t create a path for us to hike. We can never make it—do enough spiritual, moral, or social good to impress God. Much less love him with all our soul, mind, and strength. We can’t make it up the path. We all fail to love and serve the infinitely admirable and lovable God. In fact, we love other things more, that’s a crime of infinite proportions. It’s against an infinite God. The sentence for our crime must be carried out.
When Jesus takes the arduous hike for us he goes down into the valley where the criminals die. He hikes down into our sin, our rebellion, our failures and he heaps them all on his back and climbs on a cross, where he is punished for our crime, a bloody gruesome death. The innocent punished for the guilty. If he doesn’t take our punishment, then we must endure it—forever separation from God. If you reject Jesus, then you will pay the infinite consequences. However, if you embrace Jesus in his sin-absorbing death you get forgiveness, and Jesus hikes not only through the valley but up the mountain to carry your forgiveness to God, where he pleads our innocence (Hebrews 10). This is what it means for Jesus to be the way. He hikes into the valley of our just punishment and up the mountain for our forgiveness. He is the redemptive way. He takes our place. This understanding of Jesus as the way should make us incredibly humble not arrogant. We realize how undeserving we are and how much mercy we have been shown.
Christ Enlightens Us
Jesus is also the Truth. What does that mean? In John chapter 1, we are told that God became flesh and was full of grace and truth in Jesus. The truth is that God is Jesus. Christianity is the only religion where God is born as a man, becomes fully human. This is the height of enlightenment. All other religions teach that humans must work their way toward divinity. The truth is Jesus. The truth is a person who dies in our place, for our crimes, and in turn gives us his life. The truth is that God works his way down to humanity and dies for us. That’s grace. See, the truth isn’t a special prayer or code word we say at the pearly gates. In Christianity, the truth is essentially revealed in a Person, Jesus, full of grace and humility. All other religions God is impersonal, but in Christianity we meet God in Jesus. The truth is a Person who dies for us. Wonderfully enlightened, moving.
Christ Guides Us to Persuasive Tolerance
Finally, Jesus is the Life. As if it wasn’t enough to be our way, incredibly humbling, and the truth, truly enlightening, Jesus caps it off by offering us not just his death but his life. What life? Later on in John, Jesus says he is the resurrection and the life, and that whoever believes in him, though he die yet he will live (11:25). He goes down into the valley to take our death, and rises up from the dead to up the other side of the valley where he prepares a new place for us to enjoy life with him forever. The hope of Christ’s life should break into the lives of Christians today, making us persuasively tolerant. We tolerantly extend people the dignity of their own beliefs. We don’t minimize the differences between religions. We honor them. The life of Christ produces in us true humility. But it also produces in us true enlightenment. We’ve come to grasp grace, that God works his way down to us, dies for our moral and religious failures, and offers us life. If this is true, we must lovingly, humbly try to persuade others to believe in Jesus—who alone offers the wonderful promise of the way to God, the truth of God, and life of God.
In the end, it doesn’t matter how nice or moral a person is because there is not enough niceness or morality to pay for our rejection of God. Either we must be rejected or we turn to Jesus who was rejected for us. This is the heart of the gospel. Jesus lays down his own life for those who reject him, for his enemies, for those who don’t believe in him, and offers them forgiveness. Why would we reject such a man?—such a God? Jesus’ claims are better than the claims of religious pluralism. Christianity delivers where pluralism cannot. Instead of being unenlightened, Jesus is truly enlightening. He is God—full of grace and truth. Instead of being arrogant, Jesus should make us incredibly humble. He created the way to God for us at the expense of his own death. Finally, instead of being intolerant, Jesus should make us persuasively tolerant, granting people the dignity of unbelief but pleading with them to accept true life!
We all have a choice—where to place our faith. Will we place it in unenlightened, dogmatic, and intolerant pluralism? Or will we place it in Jesus, who is the incredibly humbling way, the enlightening truth, and the persuasively tolerant life? Both require faith. In The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, Leslie Newbigin wrote: “Doubt is not autonomous.” We can’t rely on doubt alone. We can’t doubt one thing without placing our faith in another. We can doubt Jesus and trust pluralism, or we can trust Jesus and doubt pluralism. We cannot say, “I believe Jesus is the only way,” and also say, “I believe all religions lead to God.” Ask yourself, will you place faith in Jesus who is the way, truth, and life? Or, will you place your faith in religious pluralism?
Jonathan Dodson (M.Div, Th.M) is happy husband to Robie, and proud father to Owen, Ellie & Rosamund. He is also the lead pastor of Austin City Life church and directional leader for PlantR and Gospel Centered Discipleship.com. Jonathan is also the author of Gospel-Centered Discipleship (Crossway, 2012). He blogs at jonathandodson.org, enjoys listening to M. Ward, watching sci-fi, and following Jesus. You can find him on Twitter @Jonathan_Dodson.
The Call To Discipleship
There is a growing recognition in churches today about the need for discipleship. In what follows I would like to describe, from the Gospel of Luke, what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Luke has some helpful insights about discipleship. The first eight chapters are focused on “who is Jesus?” But there’s a shift in chapter 9, where Peter with the help of the Holy Spirit realizes that Jesus is not one more in a succession of prophets and teachers. Peter says, “You are the Christ of God” - you are the Messiah, the one who is bringing the ruling power of God back into the world to heal and repair all the brokenness—whether it’s spiritual, psychological, social, or physical.
From the time Jesus’ identity is revealed, he begins to say, “Follow me.” If he is who he says he is, what does it mean to follow him? Being a disciple of Jesus Christ means setting a new priority, finding a new identity, and living a new mercy. All three are critical; they all fit together. Let’s look at them.
Setting a New Priority
Being a disciple means setting a new priority. In Luke 9:57–62 Jesus meets three eager men, all willing to follow him. Jesus’ responses to them are surprisingly blunt.
The first man says, “I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus says, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” It’s as if Jesus is saying, “There’s nothing wrong with what you just said, but I discern a wrong attitude underneath your statement. Do you know what kind of Savior I am? I’m not the kind that rallies constituents, pulls together armies, and then triumphs. I am a Savior who saves through being condemned, through dying, through giving my heart to be broken. Let’s apply this to one area of your life: I see that you have a home, a nice standard of living. Are you willing to put me before that? Are you willing to lose those things for me?”
Then Jesus addresses two other men, similarly concerned with their families. One says, “I’d love to come with you, but first I have to bury my father.” The other says, “First let me go back and say goodbye to my family.” There is nothing wrong with having a funeral for your father or going back to see your family, but behind these requests Jesus sees a wrong attitude of heart. He’s saying, “I know you. For you specifically to go to your father’s funeral—or back home—would be a bad idea. I must come first.” Notice their language. In both cases they say, “Lord, first, let me do this.” Jesus says there can’t be any but first. “I must be your first priority.” That’s what he means when he says: “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”
Anyone who plows a field must be completely focused on plowing. And following Jesus is no different, “My disciple has to be utterly focused on me.” By the way, “fit for the kingdom” is an unfortunate translation; the word there means “useful.” You might think he’s saying, “Unless you’re totally committed, you don’t qualify for my kingdom.” Of course no one qualifies for Jesus’ kingdom. It’s all by grace. He’s saying: Unless delighting Jesus, resembling him, serving him, and knowing him is your highest priority, the healing power of the kingdom of God will not be flowing through you. You will not be a useful vehicle for it.
The second and more cryptic line is, “Let the dead bury their own dead.” Obviously physically dead people can’t dig graves, so the first noun must refer to the spiritually dead. To be spiritually dead means to be as blind and insensitive to spiritual reality as a physical body is to physical reality. You may be saying, “Well, I believe in Jesus, but I can’t put him first right now. I’ve got my career; I’ve got to wait till my parents die, because they would be unhappy if I became a Christian . . . I see who he is and what he’s done, but I’m not going to put him first just yet. Someday I will.” When someone says, “I understand Christianity. I’m just not ready to put it at the central place in my life,” then that person really doesn’t understand it yet! Jesus says: Putting anything before me reveals spiritual deadness. Let the dead bury their dead. If you put your father before me, there’s a spiritual deadness in your life.
Talking this harshly is not my style, but I’m afraid to mute the smelling–salts-ness of Jesus’ message: Let the dead bury the dead! No one who looks back is fit for the kingdom of God! Foxes have holes, birds have nests . . . But “I have to be the first priority in your life, or you’re not a disciple; if you don’t put me first in your life, it’s not that you’re just uncommitted or lazy, disorganized or undisciplined. No, you just don’t get it! You don’t really see who I am and what I’ve done; you don’t understand the meaning of my life and work. You need to wake up!”
Let me illustrate. In 1971 I heard a talk—two illustrations—that changed my life. The woman who gave the talk, named Barbara Boyd, said, “If somebody says to me, ‘Come on in, Barbara, but stay out, Boyd,’ it’s a bit of a problem, because I can’t separate them. It’s not like the top half of me is Barbara, and the bottom half of me is Boyd. So if you won’t have Boyd, you can’t get Barbara. If you’re going to keep the Boyd out, I can’t come in at all!” She continued: “To say, ‘Jesus, come into my life, forgive my sins, answer my prayers; do this for me, do that for me—but don’t be the absolute master of my life; Jesus, Savior, come in; but Lord, stay out,’ how can he come in at all? Because he’s all Savior, and he’s all Lord. He’s Lord because he’s Savior. He’s Savior because he’s Lord.”
I remember her second illustration: “If the distance between the Earth and the sun, which is 92 million miles, was the thickness of a piece of paper, the diameter of our galaxy would be a stack of papers 310 miles high. And our galaxy is less than a speck of dust in the part of the universe that we can see. And that part of the universe might just be a speck of dust compared to all the universe. And if Jesus is the Son of God who holds all this together with the power of his word, is this the kind of person you ask into your life to be your personal assistant?” Then she asked us all to go outside and for one hour say nothing. “Just think about what this means to you.”
She was expanding on Jesus’ message: If you intellectually assent, “Yes, I think Jesus is probably the Son of God; I think he probably died for our sins,” but he is not the center of your life, then you may think you understand, but you really don’t. It’s not just a matter of commitment or lack of discipline, there’s spiritual deadness; you don’t really see it, understand it, get it. Wake yourself up!
Finding a New Identity
Discipleship is not just a matter of bending your will to Jesus’ will; it’s melting your heart into a whole new shape. A disciple is not someone who simply sets a new priority; a disciple finds a new identity. We see this in Luke 9:23–25. At first sight verse 23 looks like it’s just another way of saying set a new priority: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” But there’s more to it than that. In Semitic literature, the second and third sentences often restate the first. And here the second and third sentences say, “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for me will save it.” The word life is not the word for physical life. There’s a good Greek word for that: bios, from which we get our word biology. The Greek word that’s translated “life” here is psyche, meaning “self.” He’s talking—pretty radically—about the psychological, inner life. “Your old way of having an identity, of gaining a sense of self, has got to end. In a sense you have to die to it. And I can give you a whole new identity. You’ll get a whole new true self.”
Let’s look at this more closely. Verses 24 and 25 show what he’s not saying. He’s not taking the typical Eastern or Western approach to identity. In Buddhism the deepest consciousness of enlightenment is losing all sense that you are an individual self. The boundaries between you and the rest of reality disappear. The Eastern way to humility, to peace, is to actually lose the sense of an individual self.
But Jesus doesn’t stop at, “I want you to lose yourself.” He says, “Lose yourself to find yourself,” which means, “I want you to die to your old approach to identity, and get a new sense of individual self.” He’s not going the Eastern way. But he’s sure not going the Western way either.
W. H. Auden wrote a work called The Age of Anxiety in which he satirizes the modern Western obsession with “finding yourself.” In it there’s a great line that reads: “Miserable wicked me, / How interesting I am.” Others have also noted our obsession with finding and fulfilling your deepest desires as the main thing you’re supposed to do in life. It almost seems that Jesus has us in mind when he says, “You’re never going to find out who you really are by trying to find out who you really are. You’re going to have to lose yourself in serving me.” Some things happen only as a byproduct, and identity is one of them.
“What good is it for a man to gain the whole world?” (9:25). Gaining things from the world is the normal way we try to get a self. In fact, the three men at the end of Luke 9 are examples of this. Some people say you’re nobody unless you have a lucrative career. People in more traditional cultures say you’re nobody unless you have a family. But Jesus is saying, “If you get the whole world, it cannot give you a stable self.” He says, “If you lose yourself for me . . .” In other words, “Instead of trying to gain a self by gaining things, build everything in your life on me, on who I am, on what I have done, then finally you’ll have a true self that is stable, because you were built to know me.”
A disciple is not only someone who has set a new priority, but someone whose entire identity has been reshaped and forged. But how is that possible?
Living a New Mercy
The key to setting a new priority and finding a new identity is in living a new mercy. And this is also evident in Luke 9. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, and, it says in verse 52, “He sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him.” They rejected him. “When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, ‘Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?’”
Let’s try to understand them. Remember that there was a prophet, named Elijah, who called down fire upon some soldiers who were seeking to arrest him. And on the Mount of Transfiguration, Jesus had appeared—to James and John—with Elijah and Moses. The message of the Transfiguration (Luke 9:28–36) was that Jesus was even greater than Moses and Elijah.
So think of the logic of the disciples: You’re greater than Elijah. These people have rejected you, and that’s even worse than rejecting Elijah. That adds even more effrontery to the godhead. Shall we not bring down fire and destroy them?
This would be the kind of prophet the world can relate to. But Jesus Christ doesn’t rebuke the unbelieving Samaritans; he rebukes the disciples! He is the absolute un-Elijah. Can you imagine their continued perplexity if they still believe he’s greater than Elijah? The soldiers come after Jesus to kill him—in the Garden—and what does he do? He heals an ear that was cut during a skirmish. Later on, the soldiers are pounding nails into his hands, and what does he say? Father, forgive them; they really don’t understand what they’re doing.
Why doesn’t fire come down on the Samaritans? On the soldiers? The answer comes in Luke 12, where Jesus says, “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled.” That’s very interesting for two reasons. One is that fire, in biblical imagery, always means the judgment of God. Second, he says he comes to bring fire on the earth! This is perplexing because, after all, he has just rejected Elijah’s fiery approach. Ah! Semitic literature: the second sentence is a restatement of the first; this is what he actually says, in Luke 12:49–50: “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is completed!” He’s already been baptized with water, so he’s clearly talking about something else. “I’ve come to bring fire. How constrained I am until it’s completed. I have come to undergo a baptism, how crushed I am until it’s over.” Why didn’t the fire come down on the Samaritans or later on the soldiers? Because the fire came down on him. He was baptized. He was the one immersed in the judgment of God. He got what we deserved. This is the answer to all the riddles.
Look back over the years, and you will see that when people want to atone for their sins and be forgiven, they put a sacrifice on the altar and burn it with fire. There’s something inside us that intuitively says, “That can’t be enough to put away sins.” That’s right. All those fires were pointing to this fire. It didn’t come down on the Samaritans or the soldiers, because it came down on Jesus Christ. He came to take it. He came to bear it. Luke 9:22 says, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected . . . and on the third day be raised to life.” They rejected him; shouldn’t they be rejected? He’s rejected for them. The Son of Man came to be rejected and to be killed. This is the secret to the change of identity. You have to be melted and amazed and astounded that he took the fire, the punishment, for you. And that’s the key to everything else.
Here’s the reason: You cannot change your identity without a radical experience of mercy; without a radical experience of grace; without a radical experience of love.
I’ve heard people say, “You’re right. I probably should change my identity, build my identity on God.” But you can’t change your identity by just deciding. It’s not an act of the will. A person can’t just say, “You know, I’m having a problem in my life because I built my identity on my parents’ expectations. I think I’ll build my identity on my career and accomplishments.” You can’t do that! That’s not transformation; that’s acting. Your heart is not a computer in which you can just install a program. There’s only one way that the root of your personality can be changed, and that is by an experience of love. Only when your heart experiences love from a new source beyond anything it’s ever known before will your heart start to move toward that source, and begin to be deeply changed.
Thomas Chalmers, the well-known Scottish preacher, in his famous sermon, “The Expulsive Power of a New Affection,” says it all: Seldom do any of our habits or flaws disappear by a process of extinction through reasoning or “by the mere force of mental determination.” Reason and willpower are not enough. “But what cannot be destroyed may be dispossessed... The only way to dispossess [the heart] of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one.” A young man, for example, may “cease to idolize pleasure, but it is only because the idol of wealth has become the stronger and gotten the ascendancy,” and is enabling him to discipline himself for prosperous business. “Even the love of money ceases to have the mastery over the heart” if it’s drawn into another world of ideology and politics, “and he is now lorded over by the love of power.” But “there is not one of these [identity] transformations in which the heart is left without an object. Its desire for one particular object may be conquered, but . . . its desire for having some one object” of absolute love “is unconquerable.” It is only when admitted “into the number of God’s children through the faith that is in Jesus Christ [that] the spirit of adoption is poured out upon us. It is then that the heart, brought under the mastery of one great and predominate affection, is delivered from the tyranny of its former desires, in the only way that deliverance is possible.” So it isn’t enough to hold out a “mirror of its imperfections” to your soul. It’s not enough to lecture your conscience. Rather, you must “try every legitimate method of finding access to your hearts for the love of him who is greater than the world.”
Until you’re melted by the amazing sight, knowledge, and sense of Jesus taking the fire for you, you can’t have that transformation of identity. You can’t just decide, “I think I’m going to change my identity.” It can’t be done. It has to be an experience of love.
Jesus is saying that your career can’t buy it for you. Even the best parents can’t give it to you. “Don’t give the title deed of your heart to anyone but me. Don’t have any other master but me, because I’m the only one that will never leave you, and if you fail me, will forgive you.”
So you have to have all three. There must be an experience of this new, radical mercy, which leads you to find a new identity, which in turn helps you set a new priority.
Being a Disciple
Notice three practical things about being a disciple. First, discipleship is not an option. Jesus says that if anyone would come after me, he must follow me. If you want to come after me—it’s a general term—if you want to have any experience of me, any relationship with me, you have to be a disciple. There are not two kinds of Christians: regular Christians and people who are really disciples. There’s only one: to be a Christian is to be a disciple. To have anything to do with me is to follow me in the way I define it: setting a new priority, finding a new identity, experiencing living out of a new mercy.
Second, having said that it’s not an option—on the other hand, it is a journey. It’s rhetorically brilliant of Luke to note this. In verse 51 Jesus sets out on a journey toward Jerusalem. It’s Jesus’ journey of discipleship, “He sets his face to go to Jerusalem.” And it’s from the moment he begins his journey toward the cross that he begins all his teaching about discipleship. All the next nine chapters, all the teaching on discipleship, comes as he’s going on a journey. This is Luke’s way of saying that discipleship is a journey. In other words, on the one hand, there is a decisive point. You have to leave. Have you left? To go on the journey means saying, “I take my hands off my life.” To go on the journey means saying, “I give up my right to self-determination.” To go on the journey means saying, “I will obey you, Lord, and I’ll get rid of all the if’s. Not “I’ll obey you if,” but obey. Period. I drop my conditions. I drop the if’s; they’re gone!” Not until you say that have you begun the journey. However, after your decisive beginning, the fact remains that it’s a journey. It’s a process that takes time. You’re not going to have it all together. It’s very important to keep that in mind, because if you think that discipleship is the way you’re saved—that by being committed and focused and giving Jesus the priority you’re going to please God and that will get you saved—you’re missing the point. Look at the order. He doesn’t say, “If you follow me, I’ll go to the cross for you.” He says, “I’m going to the cross for you, so follow me.” You’re not saved because you’re a disciple; you’re a disciple if and only if you understand what he has done to save you.
There is one last thing. The sign of true, growing, gospel disciples is their gentleness. What really amazes me about the heart of this passage is that the disciples say, “We’re going to show you how intensely committed we are to you. Look at those people rejecting you. Don’t you want us to bring fire down on them?!” And what does Jesus say? “You don’t get it.” And here’s why.
My experience is that committed disciples of any religion, philosophy, or political cause are hard on themselves and on other people too. They’re committed to the cause, so why aren’t you committed to the cause? You should all be committed to the cause; what’s the matter with you? But the gospel is utterly different. The harder you are on yourself and the gospel, the easier you are on other people. Jesus Christ is saying: My disciples are not terrorists. My disciples know they’re saved by grace, so when they look at people who aren’t doing it right, they don’t say, “Why aren’t you as good as we are? Why aren’t you as committed as we are?” They don’t call fire down from heaven. Jesus says to his disciples: You don’t understand yet. You haven’t had the transformation of identity, because you don’t yet understand my mercy. You don’t know what I’ve done for you, because as yet you can’t, but someday you will. These disciples are probably racist; notice this: they’re calling down fire on the half-breed Samaritans. A lot of Israelites have done a lot of things to reject Jesus, but this is the first time any of his followers wanted fire to come down. Perhaps there’s racism; there’s definitely self-righteousness. Superiority, bigotry, stridency, harshness—they go away, the more you become a disciple. They go away as you become aware that Jesus took the fire for you, as it becomes more central in your heart. And that’s a sign that you’re not just trying to save yourself, not just being religious.
Are you becoming more gentle? More tolerant? More gracious with people around you? More kind? Follow Jesus. He’ll give you what you need. He’s a wonderful counselor. One guy comes and says, “I’m ready to follow you wherever you go.” Jesus says, “Go home and think about it.” Another guy says, “I want to go home and think about it.” Jesus says, “Follow me.” Why? Because he’s the perfect counselor. All other counseling theories look flat next to his, because he never gives you a template. He gives you exactly what you need. Follow him, and he will love you singularly. He will love the real you, and love you into a whole new identity. He will give you exactly what you need.
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Timothy Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, which he started in 1989 with his wife, Kathy, and three young sons. For over twenty years he has led a diverse congregation of young professionals that has grown to a weekly attendance of over 5,000. Dr. Keller’s books, including the New York Times bestselling The Reason for God and The Prodigal God, have sold over 1 million copies and been translated into 15 languages.
[This is adapted from a sermon by Timothy Keller given February 9, 2003 at Redeemer Presbyterian Church, New York. Edited and transcribed by the C.S. Lewis Institute. All rights reserved. Reprinted here with permission.]
Gospel Diagnostic Questions
Preaching the gospel to ourselves and to others is an art all of us must grow in if we seek real, lasting change in our lives. It is often assumed that the gospel is only for those who have not yet trusted Christ. This is a faulty view of the gospel and limits its work to a personal salvation experience rather than the explosive power and catalytic dynamic for renewal in our hearts on a continuous basis.
To sum up, the life of the Christian is one of continual repentance and belief, without which we slip into a boss/employee, earn/wage, work/rights relationship with our God.
It then becomes the loving responsibility for each of us to run gospel diagnostics to determine whether or not what motivates our heart and lives is “in step” with the gospel (Gal. 2:14).
Here are twenty gospel questions to ask ourselves:
(1) What is my greatest nightmare? What do I worry about most?
(2) What, if I failed or lost it, would cause me to feel that I did not even want to live? What keeps me going?
(3) What do I rely on to comfort myself when things go bad or get difficult?
(4) What do I think about most easily? Where does my mind go to when I am free? What pre-occupies me?
(5) What prayer, unanswered, would make me seriously think about turning away from God?
(6) What makes me feel the most self-worth? What am I the proudest of?
( 7) What do I really want and expect out of life? What would really make me happy?
(8) What position of authority do I desire to give me a sense of power?
( 9) Whose opinion of me do I hold so dear that if lost I would be undone?
(10) What type of financial loss or gain would change my sense of security?
(11) What one criticism would cause me to respond in anger (wife, children, work, ministry, family, friends, etc.)? What am I most touchy about when brought to my attention?
(12) If I had ______________, then I’d be truly happy and feel as if my life has meaning and value.
( 13) If I lost ______________, I would be undone.
(14) I’m impatient because I’m ____________.
(15) I’m critical because I’m _____________.
(16) I’m angry because I’m _____________.
(17) I’m unhappy because I’m ____________.
(18) I’m in despair because I’m ____________.
(19) I have hope because I’m ___________.
(20) I feel worthy because I’m ___________.
These are only a few questions to help us be truthful with ourselves about the gospel. There is no benefit answering these questions with the “right” answers at the expense of the “true” answers (how we really feel and think).
It is only when the “true” answers come to light that the “right” answers will have any power.
We must spend time excavating our idols by asking these questions. When we sin, we do so because some idol has promised us power, prestige, influence, joy, peace, satisfaction, security, pleasure, etc. - that is far more attractive than Christ at the moment. We don’t sin with a gun held to our heads. We sin willingly because it is overwhelmingly appealing.
We need to discover why sins are so appealing by asking these questions and then remind ourselves that idols:
- are weak - can’t deliver when you succeed
- can only raise the bar
- can’t forgive when you fail
- will only condemn you
- are harmful to you and to others
- hurt you spiritually, emotionally, and physically
- hurt others by undermining your ability to love
- are grievous to God
By pursuing this idol you are saying to God, “Jesus is not enough. I also need ______ to be happy.”
Our daily struggle is to realign ourselves with the truth of the gospel, to discover new ways to surrender our trust to Christ and grow.
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David Fairchild was the co-founder and preaching elder of Kaleo Church in San Diego and now serves as the Lead Pastor of Mars Hill West Seattle as well as a founding member of The GCM Collective. He currently lives in Seattle with his wife, Grace, and their two children, Michael and Madison.
Over-Parenting Vs. Missional Parenting
Over-Parenting Okay, I’ll be the first to admit it. I’m an overprotective parent. I have a tendency to overdo it and obsess over the little things that don’t really matter. I guess that’s why I was intrigued by TIME magazine’s cover story a couple of years ago, "The Case Against Over-Parenting: Why Mom and Dad Need to Cut the Strings."
Nancy Gibbs begins her article with these provocative words: "The insanity crept up on us slowly: we just wanted the best for our kids."
Ironically, a good desire has led many parents to become obsessed with their kids’ safety and success. Gibbs calls them “helicopter parents” as they hover over their children’s lives from the classroom to the ball field protecting them and pushing them to succeed.
The result? By worrying about the wrong things, Gibbs says, “we do actual damage to our children, raising them to be anxious and unadventurous.” (Pediatricians have also found that this hurried lifestyle of constant pressure and stress can contribute to health problems like childhood obesity and depression).
So what’s the solution? Well, if the problem was simply hovering over our children’s lives, the solution would be to simply back off and lighten up. And there’s some truth to that! But the problem goes much deeper.
The problem is that we are afraid. If our greatest aim as parents is to protect our children and prepare them to receive some kind of academic or athletic recognition, than most likely we are parenting out of fear. Why? Because deep down we’re scared if they don’t succeed. We feel like we’ve failed as parents. So we work hard to prepare our children to make the grade or make the team so we would look good. It’s like our children are little trophies that we, as Paul Tripp says, “secretly want to display on the mantels of our lives as visible testimonies to a job well done” (Age of Opportunity, p.35).
If we were honest, we would admit that much of our parenting is motivated by fear. That’s what keeps us from lightening up and letting go of the reins. And what’s more, as Christians we spend so much time protecting our children from the world that we fail to prepare them to make a difference in this world. Biblical parenting, however, pictures parents as courageous warriors getting ready to release their children into battle. Psalm 127:4 says:
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior so are the children of one’s youth.
Arrows were made to fly. They can’t sit safely in the quiver or rest on the bow forever. They must be released! That’s what our preparation is ultimately for–to release our children into this world equipped with the gospel of Jesus Christ to serve people for the glory of Christ.
So lighten up all you helicopter parents! (me included). Let go of the reins. Parent your children as God parents you. Protect them, yes. But all the while prepare them … so you can release them … to fly into the battle with the glory of the gospel.
Missional Parenting
Much of our parenting is motivated by fear. Consequently, we’re more concerned with protecting our children from the world than preparing them to make a difference in this world. Gospel-centered, missional parenting is much different. It pictures parents as courageous warriors getting ready to release their children into battle. Psalm 127:4 says,
I see missional parenting happening in 3 stages. Of course these stages are fairly fluid with some overlap to be expected.
Gregg Harris says that in the time Psalm 127 was written, there were no arrow factories. Consequently, it took time for each arrow to be crafted with care and precision. The arrow had to have a good sharp tip on one end–that might deal with academic training and biblical instruction; and it had to have a good set of the fletching on the other end–which might apply to discipline. This would provide the arrow with a guidance system. So as parents, we must see ourselves as warriors shaping our young children during their formative years with doctrine and discipline driven by the gospel.
As children grow and mature we must give them opportunities to see the sinful reality of the world around them. Under our guidance and supervision we must expose our children to fallen creation and the crying need for restoration. Instead of an “us vs. them” mentality, we must teach our children to see and serve our culture through the lens of the gospel. We could picture this stage as the arrow being pulled out of the quiver and onto the bow.
Arrows were made to fly. They can’t sit in the quiver or rest on the bow forever. They must be released! Yet the point of release is often the most difficult time in parenting. As Gregg Harris says:
When you aim the arrow and release the arrow, beware–the greatest tension in your relationship with your children will often be just before you release them. Because it feels to the arrow like it’s going backwards when it wants to go forward. The tension is building in the bow, the warrior is aiming, and then there’s the release. From that point on, the guidance system that is in the arrow itself is what keeps it on track.
There comes a time when we must release our children into the battle. This is the purpose of the arrow as well as the purpose of parenting. We cannot be scared of this sinful world. Indeed, this is the world Jesus entered into and told us, “As the Father sent me, so I send you” (John 17:18). So let us follow our Savior with the attitude of a warrior as we prepare our children for the battle.
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Doug Wolter served for eight years as family pastor at LaGrange Baptist Church in Kentucky. He is now senior pastor at Oak Hill Baptist Church in Humboldt, Iowa. He has an amazing wife and three incredible kids who continue to humble him and fill him with joy. He enjoys drinking coffee, reading, exercising, and blogging at life2getherblog.com.
Discipling through Anger [video]
This part 5 in a series of video interviews about the book Gospel-Centered Discipleship.
Church Planting, Confessions, and Catechism
What do church planting, confessions, and catechisms have in common? The answer is a lot. Christians have used confessions and catechism to teach the essentials of the faith for centuries. Many of the great confessions and catechism were originally discipleship tools for new churches during the time of the Reformation.
One of the biggest challenges church planters face is teaching new believers the essential doctrines of the Christian faith. Many of the people who come to a new church know little if any about the basic doctrines.
What is a Catechism?
You may be wondering, “What is a catechism?” When I was a new believer, I had no idea what a catechism was. For those of us who were not raised in the church, words like catechism, creed, or confessions sound like something you would learn in a catholic school.
So what is a catechism? A catechism is the process of instructing believers both young and old in the basics of the Christian faith. The Greek word for "instruct" or "teach" is katecheo from which we get our English word "catechize".
Catechisms provide basic summaries of the church’s teachings to ensure that all members of the church understand the essentials of the faith for themselves. Most catechisms generally have questions and answers accompanied by Biblical support and explanations.
Brief History of Catechisms and Confessions
As early as the Middle Ages, the Church required new believers to learn the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostles’ Creed, and the Ten Commandments. During the time of the Protestant Reformation, the Reformers compiled many catechisms to help train new believers.
Donald Van Dyken says, “The great leaders of the Reformation, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, attacked the colossal ignorance they met in Germany, Geneva, and Scotland by making catechisms and by catechizing.”[i] Among these Reformed documents were The Augsburg Confession in 1530 and the Heidelberg Catechism written in 1562.
Martin Luther whole-heartedly believed in using them. He said, “In the catechism, we have a very exact, direct, and short way to the whole Christian religion. For God himself gave the ten commandments, Christ himself penned and taught the Lord's Prayer, the Holy Ghost brought together the articles of faith.”[ii]
The Puritans later developed catechisms, including the Westminster Confession and Catechisms in the 1640’s. For many Protestant Christians everywhere, the Westminster Catechisms are the most important and influential of all the catechisms. The Westminster Shorter and Larger Catechisms where written in the 1647 by English and Scottish divines. These documents were written to provide children, new believers, and church members alike a short but comprehensive summary of the Reformed church’s doctrines.
Evangelicals on the Catechism Trail
Today, there is a misconception that only non-evangelical liturgical churches use catechisms and confessions. However, many evangelicals such as Presbyterians, Methodists, and Baptists have used them for a long time. Some may be surprised to know that the Southern Baptists have a rich confessional history.
Tom Nettles remarks, “Many contemporaries have a deep―seated suspicion of catechisms. In our own Baptist denomination, many would consider the words "Baptist catechism" as mutually exclusive.” However he goes on to say, “Baptists, including Southern Baptists, produced scores of catechisms for use in this variety of ways.”[iii]
Spurgeon on Catechisms
Standing in this tradition, the famous preacher Charles Spurgeon developed his own catechism from the London Baptist Confession of 1689 and the Westminster Shorter Catechism. He believed that a good catechism was essential in training the faithful. He said:
“I am persuaded that the use of a good Catechism in all our families will be a great safeguard against the increasing errors of the times, and therefore I have compiled this little manual from the Westminster Assembly's and Baptist Catechisms, for the use of my own church and congregation. Those who use it in their families or classes must labour to explain the sense; but the words should be carefully learned by heart, for they will be understood better as years pass.”[iv]
Using the Confessions and Catechism
Many evangelicals are rediscovering the benefit of a good catechism. Both new and existing churches can benefit from using catechisms. A catechism can be used as an individual study, times of family worship, or in small groups. Catechisms are not a pass or fail fill-in-the-blank test, but an invitation to learn the doctrines of grace. This invitation involves vital learning, ongoing reflection, and discussion within the community of faith.
They are still as useful and as needed today. Ponder each doctrine and let them speak to your head and your heart. Share them with your children or your spouse.
Here is a sample of the First Catechism for beginners that you can use in your church, with your family, or in times of study.
- Who made you? God.
- What else did God make? God made all things.
- Why did God make you and all things? For his own glory.
- How can you glorify God? By loving him and doing what he commands.
- Why are you to glorify God? Because he made me and takes care of me.
- Is there more than one true God? No. There is only one true God.
- In how many Persons does this one God exist? In three Persons.
- Name these three Persons. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
- What is God? God is a Spirit and does not have a body like men.
- Where is God? God is everywhere.
- Can you see God? No. I cannot see God, but he always sees me.
- Does God know all things? Yes. Nothing can be hidden from God.
- Can God do all things? Yes. God can do all his holy will.
- Where do you learn how to love and obey God? In the Bible alone.
- Who wrote the Bible?
Chosen men who were inspired by the Holy Spirit.[v]
[i] Donald Van Dyken, Rediscovering Catechism. New Jersey: P&R publishing. 2000. 14.
[ii] Martin Luther, Table Talk.
[iii] Tom Nettles, An Encouragement to Use Catechisms. Founders Journal.
[iv] Charles Surgeon, A Puritans Catechism.
[v] First Catechism. Great Commission Publications, Inc. 2003.
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Dr. Winfield Bevins serves as lead pastor of Church of the Outer Banks, which he founded in 2005. His life’s passion in ministry is discipleship and helping start new churches. He lives in the beautiful beach community of the Outer Banks with his wife Kay and two daughters where he loves to surf and spend time at the beach with his family and friends. Twitter: @winfieldbevins
A Story Of Gospel Community
In two weeks, in a suburban town outside of Seattle, we'll celebrate God's grace and the Spirit's work through baptizing a new disciple of Jesus. This is the story of how a neighborhood can look like the book of Acts, where disciples are made and we teach and preach from house-to-house, an example of how to make disciples in our sphere of influence... in today's context. We moved into our housing development 7 1/2 years ago, and for the first 6 years, we didn't know anyone who didn't live next to us. I’m serious. I didn't know the guy across the street. By the way, his name is Trevor, and he's getting baptized in my backyard. But, for the first 6 years, the extent of our reaching-out to our neighbors was leading a youth group and handing out bibles door-to-door and singing Christmas carols in the dark because people shut off their lights on us. Sometime while standing in the cold singing "O Come All Ye Faithful," I started to think, "Maybe we need a different modus operandi for bringing the gospel to my neighbors."
I decided to leave my one church to seek out help from people who have done this before, and I landed with Soma Communities. Truth be known, I am very prideful in the way I do things. Whether it is my orthodoxy or my orthopraxy, I feel like I have it down to some degree, which is a spillover from my success in business. It is wrong thinking, but I know this about myself. When coming to Soma Communities, I purposed to be a learner. What I asked myself was, "If you know so much, how come no one around you is repenting and being baptized?" So, even though I was soon asked to take a lead role in a Missional Community out in my suburban city, I decided to just sit back and learn. As I learned, as I listened, I began to be intrigued, and I finally had to act on it.
I asked a new friend of mine, Caesar, "How should I start? Where should I begin in my community?"
He suggested, "Ask the Spirit, 'What's next?'"
At that time, I rarely asked the Spirit to guide and empower me for mission because I was doing nothing that would require the Spirit. I was insular, hanging around only Christian people, and rarely ever engaging anyone with the Gospel or showing them the effects of the Gospel and how that might look in our community. There was no reason to pray. It would have been like asking God to help me flip the channels on my television.
Well. My wife and I prayed... Spirit, what's next?
If you want to open the power of the Spirit like freeing a hungry lion from its cage, then ask the Spirit what's next with a desire to show others what He's like for the sake of making disciples.
The Spirit answered by simply telling my wife and me this: On July 4th, instead of having your BBQ in the backyard, move it to the front yard.
This isn't earth shattering, but as Luke 16:10 puts it, he who can be trusted with a little, can be trusted with a lot. We agreed with the Spirit and decided that would be a good idea. Then He pressed. We ended up putting together a 4th of July wiffle ball tournament and cook off and going door-to-door handing out flyers. The response was overwhelming. This was the first time I met Trevor, my neighbor from across the street. He entered a wiffle ball team, and they won. Whatever. In the end, we had about 40 people play in the tourney and around 150 people at the 4th of July festivities. People continued to come up to me and tell me it was the best 4th of July party they had ever been to. It reminded us all of the Wonder Years. We didn't want this to only happen once a year. So, we started throwing BBQs all the time and inviting people over to have dinner from the connections we made on the 4th.
As summer was drawing to a close, my wife and I knew one thing: we needed help to build this community to reflect the community of God. We started praying that God would send helpers and had other leaders within Soma praying for us as well. God answered. He ended up moving another couple to our city from a different Soma Expression and then sent us another couple from our old bible study. It was beautiful. We came together with a plan that we felt was from the Spirit. We sought to continue the dialogue with these new couples by hosting Saturday morning breakfasts at our house. We wanted these other couples to be there with us to engage our neighbors and become part of our community. To do this, they had to be willing to lay aside some of the things they might have been more comfortable with to pursue our neighbors. But, our goal was to have these breakfasts with an eye on going through the Story of God at some point with those people with whom we were building relationships. We figured this might take a year or so to build these relationships strong enough to engage them on a deeper spiritual level.
This whole time, my wife and I kept asking the Spirit, "What’s next?" Now, we were able to put names to these prayers. We started the breakfasts in October and by the end of the month the Spirit was opening doors for the Gospel like I've never seen. People were asking us, "Why do you do all these things for the community? (We had also arranged a Halloween party, game nights, etc.) Do you sell Avon? Are you Christians? What church do you go to? etc."
We answered those questions, and then asked, "Would you be interested in walking through the story of what the Bible says about God and why we feel compelled to bring about this type of community? We can do it our house and have fun and eat like we always do anyways and then have this story time with dialogue among friends.”
We ended up asking about 6 couples from our neighborhood and 4 said yes, including Trevor and his wife. After 10 weeks of engaging in story and having a lot of fun, summer was back. We told those who went through the story that if they wanted to continue with us to dig into the Scriptures to see what the Gospel says about making disciples, we'd be happy to have them. Trevor and his wife agreed and really started to delve in. We again threw a huge 4th of July party with wiffle ball, cook off, and fireworks, and kept following up with BBQs and studied the word together as a Missional Community.
Now, this entire time, we had, as a group, been praying that God would put on our hearts those people in our lives who seemed to be pushing into the kingdom. We'd been praying (and are still praying), because we were going to once again be doing the Story of God coming up in January. We then had a study on baptism, and two things came out of Trevor's mouth: 1) I want to be baptized 2) I've been praying and talking to my brother and his fiancé and they desire to not only come to the BBQs but also to the Story of God when we start it.
Praise God!
In two weeks we'll be having Trevor's whole family, some friends, and our Missional Community in our backyard for a BBQ and a baptism. He's being commissioned to make disciples, but because he’s been watching me, and I've been walking this out with him day-to-day in normal everyday life for a year and a half, he's already doing it. To him, a disciple of Jesus naturally makes more disciples.
Our Missional Community started the day I put aside my own comforts and moved my BBQ from my backyard to my front yard. We went 6 years without knowing anyone. Now, if we throw a BBQ, we have 70 people show up. We have 6 couples in our Missional Community. We are doing pre-engagement for one couple and trying to save another couple from going through a divorce. We think we might have to multiply coming up in January because we could have close to 40 people that desire to go through the Story of God with us.
I'm no saint. I'm nothing special. I'm not paid by the church. I'm not paid by the community. God pays me money through my business - not to hoard it, but so I can be making disciples who make disciples in the neighborhood where I live.
This story isn't crazy. This story isn't outlandish. It's pretty normal. My family is pretty normal. That's the beauty of it. This is a small taste of what has been happening in our neighborhood and also in our own spiritual development. You’ll notice as you live this out, life, as usual, isn’t perfect. There are times of much difficulty. As a dude in our Missional Community put it, “You only get really irritated with people if you actually get to know them. It’s hard to get irritated at others if you merely wave at them when putting your garbage at the curb.”
If you're reading this, what’s holding you back from going to your knees tonight and just asking God, "What's next?" Be careful. Once you’ve let this Lion of Judah out of the cage, He'll take over the neighborhood.
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Seth McBee is the adopted son of God, husband of one wife, and father of three. He’s a graduate of Seattle Pacific University with a finance degree. By trade Seth is an Investment Portfolio Manager, serving as president of McBee Advisors, Inc. Today, he’s a missional community leader, preaching elder with Soma Communities in Renton, Washington, and executive team member of the GCM Collective. In his down time, he likes to do CrossFit, cook BBQ, host pancake ebelskiver breakfasts at his home and many other neighborhood events in his hometown of Maple Valley, Washington. You can find him on twitter @sdmcbee or at www.gcmcollective.com.
The Gospel Affects How We Treat Leaders [video]
This part 4 in a series of video interviews about the book Gospel-Centered Discipleship.
All The Right Answers: Reasons It's Difficult to Share Our Faith
This is part four of the series The Difficulty of Sharing Our Faith. I’ve often heard people say the reason they find it difficult to share their faith is because they don’t have all the right answers. “What if someone suggests all paths lead to the same God, making Jesus irrelevant?” they say. Or “What if a co-worker claims she could never be a Christian because the Bible has too many errors?” These are serious questions that deserve thoughtful responses. As Christians, we should have reasons for our hope. However, I wonder if we often put our hope in having right answers instead of hoping in the reason for our faith? Let’s consider the role of “right answers” in the difficulty of sharing our faith.
Reasons for Hope
While some consider Christianity to be an unthinking faith, the Bible underscores the importance of reason. Peter, a disciple not known for being good with words, wrote this: “Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” (1 Pet 3:14-15).
We are to offer “reasons” for our hope, to always be prepared. Prepared to do what? “Make a defense” is a translation of the word from which we get apologetic. An apologetic isn’t an “I’m sorry” attitude. Nor is it a defensive, antagonistic stance against culture. It is a reasoned statement of belief. To make an apologetic, then, is not to argue out of defensive insecurity, but to offer a reasonable explanation from our security. What kind of security frees us to offer reasonable explanations for our faith?
Two kinds of security free us to engage in apologetics. The first is intellectual security. The Christian faith has a long tradition of apologists who have faithfully defended the faith century after century, answering some of the most difficult questions. The earliest apologists include: Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Tatian, and Clement of Alexandria (view their texts here). Their apologetic answers have been handed down from generation to generation. New apologists, such as Ravi Zacharias, William Lane Craig, Tim Keller, John Frame, and Alvin Plantinga, also address new questions. We do well to read them.
It is important to note that the gospel alone acts as a grand apologetic, addressing the deepest of life’s questions including: the problem of evil and suffering, the existence of God, the hope of salvation, the nature of God and man, and the role of faith. Through apologetics the gospel has proven intellectually credible and existentially satisfying for many people across many cultures. The gospel provides a coherent, rational view on the world that is intellectually secure. It makes sense of a world where things are not as they are supposed to be. But there is another security that frees us to offer reasonable explanations for Christian faith.
Deep Security
Many of us won’t make time to read the old and new apologists. And perhaps we don’t have to. Is it possible that Peter had in mind an apologetic that included, not just reasons, but faith? Peter was writing to people who feared persecution for their faith. When we struggle to share our faith, do we not face persecution? We are attacked by thoughts that undermine our confidence, diminish our trust in Christ, and redirect us away from speaking about Jesus. Surely, this is a spiritual persecution. Cultural apologist Ken Myers has said:
“the challenge of living with popular culture may well be as serious for modern Christians as persecution and plagues were for the saints of earlier centuries.”[1]
While we may not face the gallows or plagues, we do face something more subtle--the invisible power of pop culture that undermines truth, dismisses character, and radically orients us toward comfort. The good news is that we have the same ability as those early saints to be secure and strong in our faith. When doubts surface and silent accusations fly on the cusp of mentioning the gospel, we need a security stronger than our persecution.
Before instructing the early Christians to always have an apologetic, Peter prefaces his statement with this: “Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy…” (1 Pet. 3:14). He reassures them, in the face of mockery, to sink their security deep into their hearts not heads. He reminds them that they have nothing to fear because they have Christ who offers perfect peace. He makes apologetics about Christ not right answers, a matter of both the head and the heart.
So, when we face that moment of temptation to shy away from identifying with Jesus, it is our identity in Jesus that we need most. We need not fear men because we can rest in Christ. People may reject us, but our forever acceptance in Christ gives us every reason to speak of Him, of His grace, mercy, kindness, love, and triumph over sin, death, and evil. O for stronger men and women who sink their identity deeply into what Jesus says about us more than what peers and co-workers (might) say about us! Our silence will convince no one of our rich, rewarding faith in Jesus. Fear over co-worker frowns will not inspire a smiling faith.
Authentic Apologetics
Our moment of opportunity is less about converting others and more about staying true to ourselves. Will we speak of our unique community in the church, the God-intoxicating gathering on Sunday, the stirring time of meditation on Wednesday morning, and the quiet, soul stirrings of communion with God? Will we speak authentically about what matters most to us and of the meaningful events in our lives or will we prove inauthentic, dismissing these things from conversation, and along with them, dismissing our true selves? Will we refrain from honoring the Lord Christ as holy in our hearts because we hold in honor the passing frowns of men in our heads? Surely the gospel offers a deeper security than the approval of passing men and women? Does not Christ’s love run deeper, His acceptance purer, and His approval longer than the love, acceptance, and approval that any person could ever give? If so, apologetics is meant to spring from a deep security in the heart, our unshakable union with Christ—fully loved, fully accepted. Apologetics is a matter of the heart as well as the head.
Defending the faith, then, is as much about defending Christ as our Lord in our hearts as it is explaining the reasonableness of our faith. The goal of apologetics should never be to convert others (that is the Spirit’s job), but it is to honor Christ as Lord in our hearts. This happens, very often, with our mouths. And in the end, for everyone the bottom-line issue isn’t an intellectual objection but hope objection. We refuse to remove our hope from one thing and transfer it to the ultimate thing, the person of Jesus. A witness of our authentic hope in Christ will be more compelling than any intellectual argument we could ever articulate. People need to see our hope burn in our bones. They need to sense the Lord Christ set apart in our hearts. They need to see that the gospel not only makes sense but that it also works. Christian faith is intellectually satisfying and existentially rich. So let’s not put our hope in having right answers but have answers that reflect our hope.
[1] Ken Myers, All God’s Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular Culture (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1989), v.
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Jonathan K. Dodson (MDiv; ThM) serves as a pastor of Austin City Life in Austin, Texas. He is the author of Gospel-Centered Discipleship and has written articles in numerous blogs and journals such as The Resurgence, The Journal of Biblical Counseling, and Boundless. He has discipled men and women abroad and at home for almost two decades, taking great delight in communicating the gospel and seeing Christ formed in others. Twitter: @Jonathan_Dodson
Sharing Your Failures & Your Faith [video]
This part 3 in a series of video interviews about the book Gospel-Centered Discipleship. In this video, Jonathan explains an important concept in his book regarding the professional/novice discipleship distinction. He advocates that we should disciple by not only sharing our faith but also sharing our failures. He also addresses the challenges of introvert/extroverts in making disciples.
Messy Discipleship
In our house, we used to have a beautiful set of drinking glasses that were made of translucent artsy green glass. Notice I said we “used to"... A few weeks ago our house was full of the life, laughter, and mess of sharing our home and table with our community; after everyone left and my wife and I were cleaning up, we noticed one of our beautiful green glasses had a huge chip off the top. We now officially have only three of these nice glasses. They've moved from the threatened dishes list to the full-fledged endangered dishes list. I don’t have much hope for their survival either as they have yet to breed.
Just the other day a neighbor broke another one of our glasses, and as I was cleaning up the glittery shards, it hit me - if you have a complete set of dishes you just might not be on mission.
God’s mission is messy and costly. Think about it. In order for us to be a part of God’s family, to be his disciples, to get to live in eternity with him in his home, it cost him his comfort to the point of a dirty, torturous execution on a cross. Yet I often want to be his follower and have a life of comfort.
I want to do hospitality my way, on my time, around my schedule, with the people that are easy for me to be around, and I want to have a complete set of dishes when I am done. But this just isn’t the life God has called us to. God calls us to not just have hospitable events but to have an open door and hospitable life. Jesus was available for the sick. He fed the hungry crowds when it was inconvenient. He hung out with the drunks, tax collectors, lepers, and sinners. His way of discipleship was dirty and probably smelly.
I have a friend that has modeled this hospitality well and as a result often has men in his home that are so drunk and out of it they sometimes foul their pants. He and his wife have literally cleaned man-poop off their floor. This grosses me out and makes me want to think twice about the people I let into my house, but oddly enough it also inspires me. It looks so much like Jesus. A couple of weeks ago my neighbor’s daughter had a little present slip out of her diaper while they were visiting. We saw the log on the floor, and all of us wondered where it came from. I immediately checked my son's diaper, and people were diaper checking all around until we found the culprit. I instinctively cleaned up the poop, de-sanitized the floor, and went on with what turned out to be a wonderful evening.
Sometimes discipleship means people are going to poop on your floor. If we are servants like Jesus, we get to clean it up. Jesus modeled this when he washed his disciples feet. At the time, everyone traveled on dirty, smelly roads in sandals and often were hopscotching around camel dung. Washing smelly feet was reserved for slaves, yet Jesus, the master, took the lowliest task and washed his disciples' feet.
I like my things to stay nice, and I don’t like doing disgusting jobs. But I do want to follow Jesus, and I do want to be his disciple and make disciples. To do this all the time means I am going to have to do some things I don’t like and lose some things I do like.
So again, if you have a full set of dishes and nobody has ever pooped on your floor, you might want to stop and examine if you are really on God’s mission.
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Jake Chambers: A member of Jesus’ bride - the church, husband to his beautiful bride Lindsey, and a daddy to his boy Ezra. Jake is passionate about seeing the gospel both transform lives and create communities that love Jesus, the city, and the lost. He currently serves Red Door Church through leading, preaching, equipping, and pastoring. You can read more of his writing at reddoorlife.tv.
Why Gospel-Centered Discipleship? [video]
This part 1 in a series of video interviews about the book Gospel-Centered Discipleship. Over the next few weeks, we will post a series of video interviews by Matt Chandler with Jonathan Dodson about his new book Gospel-Centered Discipleship. You are welcome to repost them.