We Want Revolutionaries, Not Just Navel-Gazing Pansies

It seems like most churches believe their best selling point is that they can help those in search of comfort and inner peace... "Come to us and we'll help you find yourself."

Not us. We want revolutionaries. Or at least people willing to follow One.

While Jesus does give peace, comfort and fulfillment, He isn't into creating narcissists.

Of course, I'm not talking about political or violent revolutionaries, but revolutionaries like Jesus.  Jesus said that we must "violently" press into the kingdom of God, and then showed us what He meant by His substitutionary death for our sins. We are to be "violent" in our radical generosity and self-sacrifice for others. We go in not to conquer or kill, but to serve and die. 

Here's what I want people to understand about our church, in the words of Lesslie Newbigin:

"The church is an entity which has outlasted many states, nations and empires, and it will outlast those that exist today. The Church is nothing other than that movement launched into the public life of the world by its sovereign Lord to continue that which he came to do until it is finished in his return in glory. It has his promise that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. In spite of the crimes, blunders, compromises, and errors by which its story has been stained and is stained to this day, the Church is the great reality in comparison with which nations and empires and civilizations are passing phenomena. The Church can never settle down to being a voluntary society concerned merely with private, domestic affairs. It is bound to challenge in the name of the one Lord all the powers, ideologies, myths, assumptions, and world views which do not acknowledge him as Lord. If that involves conflict, trouble, and rejection, then we have the example of Jesus before us and his reminder that a servant is not greater than his master."

Comments

[jeff]

Get out your swords, we're going to the Holy Land to kill the infidels!

I think you might have overspoke here, my friend. "Navel Gazing Pansies"???

[Pastor J.D.]

Hey Jeff... thanks, but not so sure I did. Jesus spoke in such language.

Of course He was not talking about political or violent revolution... Jesus said that we must "violently" press into the kingdom of God, and then showed us what He meant by His substitutionary death for our sins. We are to be "violent" in our radical generosity and self-sacrifice for others. We go in not to conquer or kill, but to serve and die.

We should be going to the holy land, but not with swords--with radical, self-giving love, proclaiming Jesus as Lord and His death and resurrection as the hope of the world.

[JB]

Pastor JD,
Thank you for your insight and your words today, they were an encouragement to hear to those who may be disheartened or discouraged in our place here and what one single person can do to the glory of the Kingdom.

[Dave]

Those are inspiring words, J.D. Please keep them coming.

Jesus and Paul were model revolutionaries for us to follow. They were warriors of a different sort. I humbly pray for the wisdom and courage to be the kind of warrior that they were … to take back the ground that I have surrendered and to begin to advance the kingdom of God.