Before my readers proceed, I would like to state that this entry is actually for school, as well as about the ideas we've been discussion there. You are always invited to comment and discuss the content here, but on this occasion I would truly appreciate some discussion. (At least one of my professors is likely to read this, after all.)
That being said, lets dig in, shall we?
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Transforming into Christ-likeness: Boot Camp
Setting the Stage / Justifying the Logic
Christ's Birth: Less a Silent Night, more a spiritual equivalent of D-Day
Matt 2:1-12 – Herod's hostility towards a baby
Ephesians 6 – Armor of God. Verse 12: struggle is with powers and principalities
The word struggle here is παλη meaning “wrestle, struggle, or contest” (Analytical Lexicon to the Greek New Testament – Mounce). I used to wrestle. Its not a game of cards. It is an issue of straining, really struggling, a real strenuous commitment.
Matthew 11:12 - From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force.
Conclusion: God is at war. Christ faced hostility from the moment of his birth until his murder.
Great Commission
Matthew 28:19-20 – Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.
We call that a commission for a reason. Like a military commssion, we have been given, by our commanding officer, the authority and the responsibility to carry out a task on his behalf.
“make disciples” = μαθητευσατε which is the imperative form. This is an order, a command.
Conclusion: We are at war as well. We have been given a commission into the spiritual war God is participating in.
Our Role In This War
Matthew 28:19-20 is not a call to a passive existence. Neither is it merely “evangelism” as we have come to think of it. It is nothing short of a declaration of world-wide revolution. Christ's Kingdom has already been established and it is our responsibility to expand its borders into the hearts of all the world (all the nations).
None of us have a bit role, a marginalized place in this commitment. Commissions are given to officers. We are all Christian leaders in our own lives. Each of us is significant. But how are we to be effective?
Training
Leadership must be cultivated and trained. In the case of Christians, this comes in through our on-going transformation into Christ-likeness.
Dying to Self
Mark 8:34-35 (NIV) Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it."
Luke 9:23-24 (NIV) Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it."
Now, this sounds horrible. We should be mindful, however, of our own current conditions. Do you really like how you are living right now? Truthfully and honestly? Through sincere self-analysis we become aware of the fact that we are slaves to the “freedom” of this world and to our own selfish desires. There is no real fulfillment in lives like those.
John 10:10 - The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
This commission, this life that Christ is calling us to is only a deprived life that “misses out” on freedom by the standards you have now. But how well is living by your own standards working out for you so far?
Proverbs 14:12 - There is a way which seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death.
The truth is that we knew that already, we've just been refusing to admit it to ourselves. If we honestly appraise the fulfillment we have in our lives, as they currently exist, we know that we are already “missing out.”
The truth is that the transformation into Christ-likeness liberates us from the slavery we live in now, the slavery to our own selfish desires, and frees us to live the lives we truly desire: lives of purpose and meaning.
Its Actually Possible
This process has to be one of the greatest mysteries and miracles of our faith and of the human condition. We can actually change. We can want different things than we want now. We can desire to do what God desires. The truth is, we will fail miserably at the revolution Christ has charged us with if we do not. We will be trying to remove a speck from our brother's eye with the plank still remaining in our own.
If we do change, however, into men and women resembling Christ, that revolution cannot fail. Real Christians, living as Christ, will transform the world without even trying. Like some great divine cancer, our lives will effect everyone around us. The good news is, it can happen. We don't have to wait until we die to be changed into the person God wants us to be.
Challenge
That is where we must begin. It is foolish, doomed to failure, and the height of arrogance to try to save the world before we have even addressed our own natures. As leaders in Christ's world revolution, we have a responsibility to actually know ourselves and, in cooperation with the Holy Spirit, to cultivate ourselves towards His image. Our churches should be concentrating more on equipping the Christians we already have to face the spiritual realities of the world and less on just “getting more butts in the seats.”
If we start concentrating on quality, the quantity will take care of itself.
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The above would ideally be used as the first sermon or Bible study in a series concentrating on the cultivation of Christ-likeness in our lives and churches. If any of you are interested in immediately and further exploring the subject, I strongly recommend Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard. It is an excellent book, though one should be prepared for a mental workout going through it.
Information on the Book
Ordering
If you would prefer something more in the way of an overview of that book (and far less mentally taxing) I have uploaded a report I wrote on it here.
at first I didn't like the silent night to D-Day reference but after consideration, I changed my mind assuming the hours of planing of the invasion compares to the birth and concluding with the death of Christ compared to the actually invasion
ReplyDeletethe Great Commission - if the goal is easy to achieve, what's the challenge and drive to do better.
Darryl, I think there is a lot of good thought here. The soft spots in your reasoning, however, came with the last two sentences.
ReplyDelete"Our churches should be concentrating more on equipping the Christians we already have to face the spiritual realities of the world and less on just “getting more butts in the seats.” If we start concentrating on quality, the quantity will take care of itself."
1) The problem here is that your article did not address this specifically. That is, you did not discuss why getting more people in the pews is less desirable than growing them in Christlikeness.
2) Both of your final two statements presume that you cannot have it both ways. That is to say, you cannot concentrate on numeric and spiritual growth at the same time. You did not attempt to prove this in your discussion. I believe scripture teaches that you can, by the way.
That's about it.
Greg Malcom
Thanks, Greg. I guess I assumed a connection between the "divine infection" statement (Christ-likeness impacting the world simply by virtue of its nature) and the re-focus from outreach to growth. You are right, though, I should have structured the close a bit more logically.
ReplyDeleteAnd I completely concur that both forms of growth are compatible. The point I failed to make was really that numeric growth WILL happen as a byproduct of spiritual growth.
Darryl,
ReplyDeletePretty amazing piece of work! Amazing in the sense that it is a treaty that I envision a group of ministers young and old would huddle in a small room and discuss for hours (if not days). The thesis presented as I understand it, is a comparison of the Christian experience and existence with war. The choice of words including; revolution, D-day, violence, and military commission bring into mind all of the brutality of any world conflict current and past. As a sermon, you succeeded in tapping into all of the senses of your congregation (readers). Homiletically speaking, as a sermon, it achieved what I believe would be some desired goals. A follow up sermon would be to balance this with John 13:35 “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Though more passive perhaps than the afore thesis, it behooves us to examine this aspect of the Christian march as well. As a thesis for discussion, well I suppose, as already indicated by others, there would be much to be said on both sides of the aisle. If this was the goal, you succeeded very well.
Keep up the good work,
Rick Sutton
Darryl I would caution you against using militant language and the visuals of being at war when preaching. For one this language gives rise to behavior by groups to do behavior like this: http://www.recoveringalumni.com/2010/07/emmas-story-part-3.html
ReplyDeleteSuch a retreat does nothing to teach you about the goodness of life in Christ and can serve to push people who are chasing after Christ away.
Christ is clear that we need to be active when we go and make disciples of all nations however in other text he is clear that how we do that is by showing them the Love and Peace that is Christ. Our lives cannot be fully perfected. While it is good to protect your witness to a certain extent it is NOT a good idea to make that the push of a congregation over giving the Love to all. Jesus was CLEAR here: Love the lord your god with all your heart, soul and mind and love your neighbor as yourself. This is the personification of the law that is the 10 commandments. In saying this he showed clearly that our witness should be one of love not of perfection. I feel in this message that gets lost or even pressed into the background for a very dangerous and legalistic approach to religion instead of a relationship with Christ.
Grace is what we live on no perfection of ourselves could ever equate to the saving Grace that is the end game. The point is to have a fully love relationship with the father. If you push a militant set of works and Visual that Looks like Christ's life you get legalism and are endanger of being in the company of those who prophesied and spoke in Tongues for Christ but never knew him because they were so busy trying to be perfected on earth they missed the LOVE.
I think it's a solid argument from an academic paper point of view but it just really misses the point of Christ and faith in my opinion. If you were to preach something similar on a day when a newer believer were in the pews you would be in a large danger of loosing that person and that defeats the purpose of the great commission entirely.
Be at peace
Lisa Fuqua-LoPrete
Lisa,
ReplyDeleteThe text is predicated on the assumption that the congregation is already aware of what Christ-likeness is. The process of perfection towards Christ-likeness is function of the very grace you are suggesting that I've lost sight of. Which, clearly, indicates that the text should be revisited so I can ensure that misunderstanding is rectified.
I do not mean to suggest that man can attain perfection through will, neither do I mean to marginalize grace. What I mean to emphasize is that, through the body of believers truly committing themselves to the process, they can (and in fact, cannot avoid) change the world by functioning as natural emissaries of God's grace.
Rick,
ReplyDeleteHey, thanks for chiming in.
Yeah, I'm honestly a bit surprised at how strongly people have reacted to the war illustrations, since it seems pretty intuitive to me that we live in a state of spiritual conflict.
Any further exploration of the subject would simply have to include a discussion of love, grace, and compassion just because the process of growing more like Christ is predicated on those concepts.
I guess I hammered on the idea of the Great Commission as a revolution (borrowed from Willard's book) too much. I'm getting the idea that maybe I didn't communicate very well that the nature of that revolution is not military, but rather a spiritual revolution of the lives and communities that would be touched by a Church full of real Christ-likeness.