They Will Know we are Christians by our LOVE ????

Here is the message from this past Sunday's gathering. Our second week of our Body Politics.

Today we are continuing our series entitled Body Politics, looking at how the Body of Christ should do life together, or how we should “govern” the way we engage and interact with each other.

Last week we covered Matthew 18:15-17 which outlines the process of reconciliation that should happen when a brother or sister sins against you. We talked about the struggle we all have with this, as we have seen when this process blows up more than when it goes well. We talked about the need, in this process, to submit to one another, and to be Kingdom citizens who live under the rule and reign of King Jesus for this process to go well. We need to be a Kingdom community that lives in mutual submission to each other and to King Jesus.

Today we are talking about something that I believe goes hand in hand with not only last week’s theme of Conflict Resolution Jesus Style, but that is a thread that runs throughout our entire series and is the thread that runs throughout the whole of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. That of love. A group of people who live under the rule and reign of King Jesus, doing life together as a Kingdom Community should be known by that one thing….love. All too often, however, in our world, Christians aren’t known for their love for each other, or others in the wider world. Just think back to the video that we played earlier. And take a look at this humorous picture that is all too often true. “They will know we are Christians by our T-Shirts”. But what does it look like to be a Kingdom Community of disciples that truly love each other? What does it mean to love each other and what is the purpose of that love? Let’s turn to our text this morning and unpack it together, John 13:34-35.

John 13:34-35 says, ““A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

The first thing we need to understand in regards to this Scripture is the wider context in which Jesus is saying this. If you look at the beginning of John 13 we realize that this section of Scripture takes place in the Upper Room in the night before Jesus is crucified. We also see this is the section that contains, I believe, one of Jesus’ most subversive actions ever, that of taking on the role of the lowest of servants and washing the feet of his disciples, even Judas who was going to betray him, and Peter who was going to deny him. So when we talk about love, we need to realize that it is not an abstract proposition that is something outside of us. No. In fact, love is not an abstract proposition, but a person who embodies it. First and foremost that person is Jesus. He embodied love when he washed his disciple’s feet and so when he then calls all those who follow him to be known by love. To not just talk about love as a proposition, outside of oneself, but to actually be the embodiment of it. And when you have a community that embodies love, it is a holy and beautiful thing that not only makes a difference in the lives of the community of Christ Followers, but that it seeps out from the community into the wider world, and begins to impact the wider world with the love of Jesus. So much so that Lesslie Newbigin, a theologian and missionary said in his book ‘The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, “the only hermeneutic (interpretation) of the gospel, is a congregation of men and women who believe it and live by it.” And I would say that that the only interpretation of the gospel is a Kingdom community that lives under the rule and reign of King Jesus, and the outworking of that rule and reign in their lives, is a radical, self-giving, self-sacrificing, Jesus-infused love for one another.

Now when we look at the text in John 13:34-35 we see Jesus saying, “A new command…” Was he really giving a new command, to love each other? The specific ancient Greek word used here for the world new implies freshness, or the opposite of outworn rather than recent or different. The Old Testament demanded that men should love neighbors as yourself. The new law is that we should love each other better than yourself and die for your friends.

But where was this new command rooted in? Was it rooted in the abstract idea of love? Or that you ought to love one another? Or is there a deeper root for the new command to love one another? Well let’s look at the next part of the verse where it tells us where this new command is rooted. “As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” So the new command to love one another is rooted in Jesus. Love in human form. And what a beautiful place to talk about love and rooting it in himself. That just before this he was taking on the form of a servant, stooping down and washing the feet of his disciples, culturally the act of the lowest of lowest servants. So what does it look like to root the new command to love each other? It looks like Jesus.

And what does love like Jesus look like? We already mentioned what took place right before this part of the chapter, but we also need to scan ahead toward what would happen only 12 hours or so after he said these words. That of Jesus going to the cross, to defeat the powers of sin, death, evil, violence, and hell. Love looks like Jesus on the cross, with his arms outstretched, forgiving those who put him there, taking care of the needs of his mother, and welcoming a thief into the Kingdom. That is what loving like Jesus looks like. That is what it means for a Kingdom community of those who seek to live under the rule and reign of King Jesus to do life together. It means forgiving others within our community. It means taking care of the needs of each other. It means being a body that welcomes people, wherever they are on the journey, and loving them no matter what. And most of all it means dying to your self (your desires for the community to be exact what you want, your ideas, your way, etc…) and submitting to each other in community.

And so when this happens. When those of us who seek to live in the Kingdom of God, under the rule and reign of King Jesus, begin loving how Jesus loved, that is when people begin to say, “They must be disciples of Jesus, because they love each other.” To understand that more deeply, you have to understand where the term Christian originated in. In Acts 11:26 we read, “And when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch.” You see in the early church Christians were family, they called each other brother and sister, which led to the charge of incest. But you see that the early church was the only place in society where you would have Jews and Greeks, Slave and Free, Women and Men, Poor and Rich, children running around. All the social strata that people were so accustom to having in all the other areas of society, in the church they were broken down. And the love that flowed in between these people, whom wouldn’t be together in “normal situations”, could only be attributed to one thing, the love of Jesus that transcended all those social standings.

And the term “Christian” was something foisted on the early followers of Jesus, because they way they loved each other, could only be described as they looked like “little Christ’s.” So the watching word saw the way that the early church loved in other, despite all the differences that would normally separate and divide, and could only conclude that “those people are disciples because they truly love one another.” And so even in the midst of what seems like an internal community (IN) concept like loving each other as brothers and sisters, there is an OUT part of it as well. That when the world sees our community, will they automatically conclude that these people must be followers of Jesus because they love each other? Not a normal love for each other, but a Jesus-infused, self-sacrificing, radical, Kingdom of God, Calvary-type of love. Will the watching world see our community that way? That is my prayer and that is what should drive the politics of this body.

So we come to the how does this play out part of the time together. The part where we take time to unpack what it might look like for us, as a community, to truly live this out in our every day life. So we are going to dialogue together and we are going to be exceedingly practical and grounded in our discussion of what it might look like to have a body politic that is defined by this type of love that I have been talking about.

And here are the discussion questions that we discussed after the message:

1. What thoughts, comments, insights, questions, push back, etc.. do you have about the message and the Scripture? 2. If the watching world saw our community would they conclude that we must be disciples because we love each other? If so, why? If not, why not? What are some things and ways we can make this Scripture more of a reality in our life as a Kingdom Community? 3. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what are we going to do about it?

Conflict Resolution Jesus Style

So yesterday we began our series entitled Body Politics by looking at Conflict Resolution Jesus Style. So below is the text of the message and the discussion questions. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, insights, questions, etc....

Today we begin a 6 week series entitled Body Politics. But don’t worry we will not be talking about Politics, in the normal sense of Republican, Democrat, voting, etc…. And no we aren’t talking about the Human Body either.

We are doing a six week series entitled Body Politics centering on the Body of Christ and how Jesus calls his body to do life together, or in other words, how we “govern” our communal life together.

Today’s Body Politic that we will be unpacking together, is where I believe a community of Jesus followers need to begin, and one that is very difficult to truly live out. We have entitled this week “Conflict Resolution Jesus Style.” And we’ll be unpacking Matthew 18:15-17 together.

In the heading of Matthew 18, someone has entitled Matthew 18 in which our verses from today are located, as Qualities of a Kingdom Citizen. Meaning that if you are a citizen under the rule and reign of King Jesus, and that you are a part of his Kingdom, then this is how you are to be living your life. How you live under his rule and reign in all areas of life and especially in how you interact and engage with others who are also seeking to live under the rule and reign of King Jesus. And when multiple Kingdom Citizens are seeking to live under the rule and reign of King Jesus, we become a Kingdom community, and Matthew 18:15-17 says much about how we are to relate to one another in Kingdom communities.

Now before we get into the text for the morning, I have to say this. All too often this text and the application of this text in the life of a Kingdom community has been misunderstood and/or totally misapplied. This is to be a model of reconciliation but all too often these verses has been used for the very opposite thing, that of alienation. This Scripture is meant to give guidance towards restoring relationship and not as law. I am saying that of course we need to invite people to repent and put their lives back on a good track- good for the people involved and for the community of faith. But all too often however this text when applied badly, which many of us have seen so we feel like we can’t apply this text without screwing something up and we end up feeling like this picture. (Show slide)

So let’s jump into this text together. Matthew 18:15-17 is a model of reconciliation for Kingdom Communities, that are made up of people who live under the rule and reign of King Jesus. Matthew says this, ““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. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.”

So the first thing we need to see is the statement “if your brother or sister sins.” So we need to realize, as I said before, this is a model of reconciliation for those who are followers of Jesus. This model doesn’t apply to those who don’t live under the rule and reign of King Jesus. So please don’t try to apply this text word for word with someone outside the community of Faith. It normally won’t be received well, trust me. It is to family that this process is put into place for, not those outside the family of faith.

It is essential that we go to the offending party first- not griping, gossiping, etc.. to others, especially under the guise of ‘sharing a prayer request’ or ‘seeking counsel’. As hard as it is, as difficult as it is to do…we need to speak directly to the other person. And so if you do, it is possible then to gain a brother or sister back in 2 ways. First the problem has been cleared up and secondly you have gained them back because you have not wronged them by going to someone else.

So then what happens if they don’t listen, then you take 2-3 others with you. Why 2-3 others? It is a connection to the law of Moses in Deuteronomy 19:15 which says, “One witness is not enough to convict anyone accused of any crime or offense they may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.” But it is really important in who you take with you in this process. If you take the wrong people, it can easily look like ganging up, judging, and condemnation and not trying to resolve a matter. The people you choose should be persons of influence or authority and also they should be that person’s friend or those whom he or she could put their confidence in.

If they don’t listen or refuse to listen to the 2-3 witnesses, then you take it to the church. Now this is 1 of the 2 passages in the gospels where the word church is used and here denotes the local congregation. But I really believe that this doesn’t mean the entire congregation, but leadership which represents the local congregation. But know this the circle of people in the situation only becomes wider as the offending party refuses to listen, never before.

The last part of the process, if we get to that part is where, I believe, things can go haywire and we might have gotten the understanding of this part of the text wrong. First, we need to know something about the writer of this gospel. Matthew was a tax collector before he met Jesus and left it all behind to follow Jesus. This I am sure influenced the writing of this part of the text. You see everything in Jewish religious culture of the day said, “If you are a tax collector, you are not one of us.” But yet how was Matthew, the tax collector treated by Jesus? With love, grace, compassion, mercy and he stilled said to Matthew, “Follow Me.” You see the “unrepentant offender” should be treated as Jesus treated tax collectors and pagans- with great love, with the continued goal of bringing about full repentance and reconciliation.

And there is where I wonder if we have read this wrong. We have read this part of the text as this, “Treat him like a Gentle or Tax Collector. Which really means get him out of here. Having Nothing to do with him.”

What if, and I mean what if, we have read it wrong and forgot to focus on how Jesus treated tax collectors and pagans? What if Matthew was writing this because of exactly how he was treated by Jesus? What if the exact opposite reading is true? What if instead of “Get him/her out of here and have nothing to do with him/her” it means “Love them. Accept them. Invite them. Eat with them. Oh, and keep on challenging them to be transformed into a faithful disciple of Jesus.” That last part is super super important. Don’t stop challenging them to be transformed into a faithful disciple of Jesus. All too often I believe we come into a false dichotomy here. We say either we need to remove ourselves from them and have nothing to do with them until they repent. Or we say we’ll just act as if nothing is wrong, stop challenging them, and just move on with life. No. I would say when we stay in close proximity with someone loving them, caring about them, continuing to be in their lives, and continuing to help them in being a more faithful disciple, that is when I believe change in you and change in them can truly happen and be unleashed.

I believe that this sort of good treatment when we make our convictions about belief clear, has the potential to lead to genuine repentance and to a reconciled community. And isn’t that what we truly want? A reconciled community, that doesn’t ignore issues hoping they will go away, or pretend that those issues aren’t happening? We want a reconciled Kingdom community of followers of Jesus who live under the rule and reign of King Jesus. And sometimes to get that we need to go through some of the difficulties of community life with each other.

So let’s unpack what this looks like and what this means for our community today. What it means to be a reconciled community. And I also want to create space and time for some possible reconciliation to happen, if it needs to happen. So let’s take some time to discuss, share, confront, and love together.

1. What are your thoughts, comments, insights, questions, push back, etc.. to the Scripture and the message? 2. Share a story when this process went bad. Share a story when this process went well. What were the differences between the two? Why did one go bad and one go well? 3. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what should we do about it?

Surprised by Hope: The Hope of the Resurrection

Here is the text and discussion questions from yesterday's Easter gathering. If you have any questions, comments, insights, questions, etc.. we'd love to hear from you.

So today we come to the conclusion of our 6 week series entitled Surprised by Hope. Today we not only come to the conclusion but we come to the crux of the entire matter. The crux of our entire series, but not only that. The crux of the entire gospel, that of the resurrection of Jesus. Our entire series was based on the fact that the resurrection of Jesus was and is a reality and that a new reality was born on that first Easter morning.

Everything that we covered over the last 5 weeks (The Hope of the World, the Hope of Heaven, the Hope of Jesus second coming, the Hope of salvation, and the Hope of the church rests on our topic of conversation this morning…the Hope of the Resurrection. Without today, everything crumbles to pieces. There is no hope of the world. There is no hope of heaven. There is no hope of Jesus second coming. There is no hope of salvation, and there is no hope of the church, without the hope of the resurrection of Jesus. The Apostle Paul says it this way in 1st Corinthians 15:12-20, But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”

So let’s take a look together at that first Easter morning to see what it means that Jesus was raised to life. Let’s unpack what resurrection is all about, and what it means to have the hope of the resurrection.

To look at that first Easter morning we’ll look at the text found in John 20:1-10. John 20:1-10 says, “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) Then the disciples went back to where they were staying.” The first thing that we see, no pun intended, (and I know I’ve said this before) is found in the very first verse of John 20. The fact that John starts the resurrection narrative with these words, “Early on the first day of the week” should make us think of something. It should take us right to the beginning of the Bible where we see creation coming into existence on the 1st day of the week. So apparently John is making the connection that the resurrection of Jesus is connected to the act of the creation. Or should I say recreation. Jesus’ resurrection is the beginning of that new life, that new creation, the first grass growing through the concrete of corruption and decay in the old world. That final redemption will be the moment when heaven and earth are joined together at last, in a burst of God’s creative energy for what Easter prototype and source. Jesus death and resurrection began the process of new or re-creation. He went first, than we get to be recreated, and the entire creation itself will be recreated, and be as it once was and as it should be. Everything, including ourselves, the world, everything will be made right again. The Hope of the Resurrection is more than anticipating we will leave this world some day and go to heaven. Rather, it is a bold confidence that God’s Kingdom, presence and power are breaking into our world today and a whole new creation has begun. It’s what we see when we read Colossians 1:20 which spells out what took place by Jesus’ death and resurrection when it says, “and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” Resurrection is not an absurd event within the old world but the symbol and starting point of the new world. Jesus of Nazareth, by his death on the cross, and his resurrection ushers in not simply a new religious possibility, not simply a new ethic or a new way of salvation, but a new creation.

So on that first day of the week, the first day of re-creation, we see Mary coming to the Tomb to take care of Jesus’ body, as was the custom. Custom was that you anointed the body of the dead person, but because Jesus died so close to the Sabbath, they had to put him in the tomb without preparing his body. So Mary comes to the Tomb that first Easter morning, with no hope of a resurrected Jesus. No concept of the resurrection. She gets to the tomb and finds that the stone was rolled away. So she takes off and goes to the disciples. What is telling about her response to the disciples, is that she believes someone has taken the body of Jesus. She is Surprised by Hope. Surprised by the Resurrection of Jesus.

So after she tells the disciples, Peter and John take off running to the tomb, because you know you can’t trust the report of a woman. (I’m totally kidding but that is actually how people viewed it in that time. Women couldn’t be used in a court of law as reliable witnesses. Which to me proves the resurrection. Why have a great deal of woman report about the resurrection, if their reports wouldn’t be viewed as reliable. It goes against the common thought of the day.) So John gets there first, because he was younger than Peter, he stops outside the tomb, looks in and sees the strips of linen lying there, but doesn’t go in. Peter gets there finally, and as his personality is very brash, he just goes right into the tomb. He sees the linens lying there, neatly placed and folded and realized that it couldn’t have been a tomb robber, or someone who stole the body away because the linens would have been hastily thrown in place.

Finally after Peter sees these things, John goes in and sees the same things and believes. But what does he believe happened? It couldn’t have been that Jesus was raised from the dead because the text right after it says that John believed says that they still didn’t understand the Scriptures that said Jesus was to rise from the dead. So we need to go back to the context and see what he would believe and we find that more than likely he believed what Mary had told him, that something had happened to the body of Jesus. That someone took it, or moved it. But it wasn’t that Jesus had risen from the dead that first Easter morning. But that is exactly what happened that first Easter morning. Jesus had risen from the dead, conquering sin, death, and evil and setting in motion God’s new creation. And so the resurrection of Jesus is more than a belief that his body was dead and came to life again, though it is definitely that and that is true. It is an awareness that there was a cosmic explosion when Jesus rose again, and the power and the repercussions of this reality echo throughout the ages to our own day and into eternity.

But then what is the meaning of the resurrection for each of us and our world? What difference does it make that Jesus was raised back to life? I believe it is about a new bodily life in this world and for this world. God’s new creation, started on that first Easter Sunday, when Jesus rose from the dead, and we also have a job to do. The resurrection empowers us to live in new ways today, working with Jesus and the Holy Spirit in the act of new creation. Our calling then is to be advance foretastes of that new creation. To be signs and a lived out reality, of what Jesus calls the Kingdom of God, the way that it is when heaven overlaps earth, when God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven. To live in the power and the hope of the resurrection, that means a new way of being. A way of being fully human, fully the way that God has made us to live, which is in submission to the will of our Lord, King, and Savior Jesus. So when you live this way, hope is what you end up with when you realize that a different worldview is possible which is the same worldview shift that is demanded by the resurrection of Jesus and that worldview shift is the shift that will enable us to transform the world. But let’s spend time unpacking what it means when the rubber hits the road when it comes to the resurrection of Jesus. How does the resurrection of Jesus make a difference in our lives and in the world? What does it mean to live out new creation in our work, neighborhoods, family and the world? That is what we’ll be discussing together.

1. What thoughts, comments, insights, questions, push back etc.. do you have regarding the Scripture and the message? 2. What does it look like to live out, individually and communally, new creation? To be the advance foretaste of that new creation? 3. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what are we going to do about it?

Surprised by Hope: Hope of the Church

Here is the text to the next to the last message in our Surprised by Hope series. This one is on the Hope of the Church. So feel free to comment, ask questions, add your insight, push back, etc... Would love to hear from you.

So we are now coming close to the end of our series Surprised by Hope, but not before we hit two more major topics of conversation. Two weeks from today, of course, we are covering the crucial topic of resurrection. What is it? Why does it matter? And how we understand it in light of everything that we have been talking about during the last 4 or 5 weeks.

Today we are covering the topic of church by looking at the Hope of The Church. What is the Hope of the Church? What is the mission of the Church? What should we be doing together as the church? And what is the church anyway. So let’s dig into Surprised by Hope: The Hope of the Church and see what we might unpack together.

So before we go any deeper into our text for the morning and our conversation, let me ask you a question. Have you ever heard these words before, “The Local Church is indeed the hope of the world.”? What do you think about that statement? A large part of me disagrees with him, as I believe Jesus is the hope of the world. The church can’t redeem, save, renew, and put to right the world, at least not in its own power. But a part of me also says that if the church partners with Jesus, truly lives out the Kingdom calling, by being disciples, and the seeks to build for the Kingdom (cause only God can truly build the Kingdom) than we can be the hope of the world. In the heart of God, we are partners in bringing his hope to the world. But what is the hope of the church and what we are to be about? Let’s turn to a Scripture together that I believe answers that in some way. Now many of us when we talk about the purpose, hope and mission of the church would jump right to the text at the end of the gospel of Matthew, normally called The Great Commission, found in Matthew 28:18-20 which says, “Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” But I’m not going to use this text, save to put everything in the context, that the hope of the church, the mission of the church, is to be disciples that make disciples. And so with that foundational understanding of the mission of the church, that our community is to be a disciple making community, we can move on to, what I believe, being a disciple (and disciple making community) looks like, and how then that becomes the hope of the world.

The Scripture that we’ll be looking at together is found in Micah and is only one verse long. Micah 6:8 says, “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” According to this Scripture (and many others) the hope of the church is more than just what lies ahead some day when Jesus returns. It is our experience of God’s Kingdom breaking into our everyday journey of faith as we do justice, extend mercy, express love, offer compassion and celebrate beauty…all in the name of Jesus. The resurrection of Jesus does not move us to a passive and sedentary life of waiting for God to show up some day in the distant future. As I mentioned last week salvation means that you want to live under the rule and reign of King Jesus, and his rule and reign in your life, is then lived out through you. And what does it look like when the rule and reign of King Jesus gets lived out through you?

Just look at Micah 6:8. This is what God desires of those who call themselves followers of His. This is what the Lord requires of those who seek to follow after Him. The first think it says we are to be about (in the context of being a disciple) is about the work of justice. Now before we can go to the outworking of justice, we need to know what that really means. When someone says justice has been done, or where is the justice in that, they are appealing to the idea that things have either been set right, or they haven’t been set right. In fact, much of the time when you read the word righteousness, what it really means is this idea of justice being setting things to the right, making it the way that it once was, and how it should be. Back to the state of the Garden of Eden. So part of the Hope of the church is partnering with Jesus in the setting of everything to the right. To act justly is about using our lives for good in our world. All too often I believe we limit discipleship to inward things (spiritual disciplines like prayer and bible reading) while in fact discipleship is an inward and an outward journey. To be a follower of Christ means that we will work for justice in our world. Scripture bears this out. God has a heart for the poor, the needy, and the oppressed. There are over 2,000 verses of Scripture that deal with poverty, the poor, the needy, and the afflicted. In other terms this would be out missional, Kingdom life lived in the world. The hope of the resurrection inspires and empowers Christians to stand strong, work hard, pray more fervently, and live with compassion. As the power of the resurrection fills our hearts, homes, and churches, we stand firm, we let nothing move us, we always give ourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because we know our labor is not in vain!

But just working for justice isn’t enough, there is more to the hope of the church than just that. It also is about how we do it, and why we do it. And there is where the next part of the verse comes in. That we are to love mercy. Why do we need to love mercy within the church? Think about it. You have been shown so much mercy from God. Each day you live, each breath of air in your lungs, everything you have been giving is a gift because of the mercy of King Jesus. But what exactly is mercy? Mercy is defined as compassion or forbearance shown especially to an offender or to one subject to one’s power, a blessing that is an act of divine favor or compassion, or compassionate treatment of those in distress. As Christ followers we have been shown mercy- in that Christ has taken the penalty for our sake. In other words we don’t get what we rightly deserve. And as we have been shown mercy by God we in turn should show mercy to others. We realize that it is not anything we have done or will do. Titus 3:4-6 says this about our lives and God’s mercy, “But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior” As we grow deeper in our faith journey, one of the fruits that we should display more of is mercy. We should love mercy, because without it we would be lost. We should love to show others mercy, because we realize that we are no better off than anyone else. Someone once said that the ground at the foot of the cross is level. I believe this trait of discipleship is severely lacking in our world today. We need more Christ followers to show mercy, to not judge others, and to be filled with compassion, grace, and love for all people. When we see ourselves how we truly are (loved by God but sinners saved only by the grace of God) then we are able to show others mercy. But as I said above there is not only an external part of the hope of the church, there is also an internal part as well. There is definitely an external, outward focusing part of the Gospel, but at the same time there is an inward, internal focused part of the Gospel, and the hope of the church is to perfectly balance those two calls. If we are engaging in the work of new creation, in seeking to bring advance signs of God’s eventual new world into being in the present, in justice and beauty and a million other ways, then at the center of the picture stands the personal call of the gospel of Jesus to every child, woman, and man. Which brings me to the last part of Micah 6:8, which calls us to “walk humbly with our God.” This is the area of discipleship that we talk about the spiritual disciplines such as prayer, solitude, bible reading and study, silence, and fasting. To walk humbly with our God requires a humility that means that we don’t have it all figured out. We don’t have God in a box, because as soon as we think he is in our box, he breaks the side of the box and escapes. The Christian church needs to relook at this idea of walking humbly with God. You and I need to relook at this idea of walking humbly with God. That the life of a disciple is about a journey and not an end destination. That is about walking with God, traveling with him through life and learning to see things and people through his eyes. To be about his Kingdom and not building our own kingdom. To partner with him in what he wants to do in and through us, and not try to do it in our human power and strength (which can’t be done).

Putting it succiently the hope of the church is to live out Micah 6:8. To do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God. And I believe that if we take justice, mercy, and humility with God and putting them in terms of the anticipation of God’s eventual setting to rights of the whole world, we will find that they dovetail together and in fact that they are all part of the same larger whole, which is the message of hope and new life that comes with the good news of Jesus’ resurrection.

So what does it look like on the ground to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God? How do we do that as individuals, and more importantly, as a community? How can our church partner with God in building for His Kingdom? And what is God saying to you about the work of justice, mercy and humility and what are you going to do about it? And what is God saying to us about this and what should we do about it? Those are the questions that we’ll unpack together.

Here are the discussion questions that followed the message: 1. What does it look like on the ground to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God? How do we do that as individuals, and more importantly, as a community? 2. How can our church partner with God in building for His Kingdom? 3. What is God saying to you about the work of justice, mercy and humility and what are you going to do about it? 4. What is God saying to us about the work of justice, mercy and humility and what are we going to do about it?

Bounded Set vs. Centered Set Thinking

I've been doing a good deal of thinking around the idea of Bounded Set vs. Centered Set Thinking in relation to the missional church and in relation to what we are doing at Veritas. I first became aware of Bounded Set vs. Centered Set Thinking about 8 years ago (or so) when I was given the book that really changed a great deal in my life, and my trajectory in life. That book being The Shaping of Things to Come by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch.

Bounded Set and Centered Set (and Fuzzy Set...though we won't cover that) Thinking was originally proposed around 25 years ago by Paul Hiebert, in relation to a new way of understanding social groupings. Hiebert wrote about this in his book, "Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues" but found new life in Frost and Hirsh's book as well as the book "Missional Church" edited by Darrell Guder.

So what is Bounded Set vs. Centered Thinking? Frost and Hirsch use an analogy of fences and wells. If you are a farmer with a 3 acre ranch so to speak, you can build a fence to keep your cattle in and other animals out. This would be a Bounded Set. But if you are a rancher say with a huge amount of land and acreage you wouldn't be able to build fences around your whole property. So instead of building fences, you dig wells. So it is then assumed that animals won't go too far away from the well, because their life literally depends on them not wandering too far away from their water source.

So what does this have to do with the Missional Church? Frost and Hirsh unpack it this way, "The attractional church is a bounded set. That is, it is a set of people clearly marked off from those who do not belong to it. Churches thus mark themselves in a variety of ways. Have a church membership roll is an obvious one. This mechanism determines who's in and who's out. The missional-incarnational church, though, is a centered set. This means that rather than drawing a border to determine who belongs and who doesn't, a centered set is defined by it's core values, and people are not seen as in or out, but as closer or further away from the center. In that sense, everyone is in and no one is out. Though some people are close to the center and others far from it, everyone is potentially part of the community in it's broadest sense."

So in other words, a centered set is about direction. Which way are you headed? Are you heading towards the center, the core values of the community, or are you heading away from them? It reminds me of the C.S. Lewis quote, "[The] situation in the actual world is much more complicated than that. The world does not consist of 100% Christians and 100% non-Christians. There are people (a great many of them) who are slowly ceasing to be Christians but who still call themselves by that name: some of them are clergymen. There are other people who are slowly becoming Christians though they do not yet call themselves so. There are people who do not accept the full Christian doctrine about Christ but who are so strongly attracted by Him that they are His in a much deeper sense than they themselves understand…. "

So putting pictures to words the bounded set and the centered set would look like this....

So the question then becomes what is the center of the centered set, or what should be the center. Here I go back to Frost and Hirsch, who I couldn't agree more with, when they say, "For us the center should be Jesus himself. The gospel is the central imperative for Christian mission. Since at the core of a centered set is Christ, a church should be concerned with fostering increasing closeness to Jesus in the lives of all those involved. We believe that a centered-set church must have a very clear set of beliefs, rooted in Christ and his teaching. This belief system must be nonnegotiable and strongly held to by the community closest to its center. A centered-set church is not concerned with artificial boundaries that bounded-set churches have traditionally added. In bounded-set churches all sorts of criteria are determined for the acceptance or rejection of prospective members (smoking, drinking alcohol, living together outside marriage, differing views on Christ's return). In a centered-set church it is recognized that we are all sinners, all struggling to be the best people we can be. But we also believe that the closer one gets to the center (Christ), the more Christlike one's behavior should become. Therefore core members of the church will exhibit the features of Christ's radical lifestyle (love, generosity, hospitality, forgiveness, mercy, peace, and more) and those who have just begun the journey toward Christ (and whose lives ay not exhibit such traits) are still seen as "belonging" No one is considered unworthy of belonging because they happen to be addicted to tobacco, or because they're not married to their live-in partner. Belonging is a key value. The growth toward the center of the set is the same as the process of discipleship."

While these ideas might be clear in theory (and in the drawings above) I am struggling for what it means for Veritas, as a missional community as well as what it looks like for our community. I have done some thinking that if it is about core values and Jesus at the center, it could look something like this, for Veritas.

These are just some of the thoughts that have been scrambling around in the mind the last few days. I would appreciate any thoughts, comments, questions, insights, etc.. regarding Bounded Sets and Centered Sets and moving just beyond theory to practical, on the ground, application of these ideas.

Surprised by Hope: The Hope of Salvation

Below is the text and the discussion questions from our 4th week of our Surprised by Hope series looking at the Hope of Salvation. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, insights, etc....

Today we continue our Lenten journey towards the cross, and then to the surprise of that first Easter morning. From the grief and pain to the joy and the hope.

Our theme this last 4 weeks have been Surprised by Hope. We have taken a look at the Hope for the world. Matt did a great job making us aware that the Kingdom of God isn’t just a not yet reality, but that it is a present reality as well. That we are to be people of hope right now, right here, right in the present. We then looked at the Hope of Heaven, and talked about the fact that heaven and earth overlap, and that Jesus is moving and working to make earth look more and more like heaven. And we are called to participate in that work as well. Last week we talked about the Hope of the Second Coming. We talked about the hope of the second coming means that he will come and set the world right, and return it back to the way that it was truly meant to be. Not come down, scoop us off this doomed planet, and destroy it, as so many think.

So today we are talking about the Hope of Salvation. We will be spending time taking a good look at what is Salvation, what it isn’t, what we are saved from, and more importantly what we are saved for. I almost hesitate in using the word saved due to the almost negative connotation that it brings up in a lot of us. Images of hellfire and brimstone, heavy handed evangelist yelling “Are you saved?”, and the images of the movie called Saved that came out a few years ago. But if we are really honest, we realize that this is a biblical term, and that we need to unpack it from its cultural context (or at least the evangelical, fundamentalist context). Once we do that we will, I believe, realize that Salvation is a more beautiful, more wonderful, and more hope filled reality, not only for the future but also for right now in the present.

To look at the idea of the hope of Salvation we are going to look at a passage of Scripture that many use to talk about grace and the fact that we can’t “earn salvation” but we are going to include the very next verse, which is often missing when people talk about grace and salvation, and use this particular text. The text that we’ll be looking at this morning is Ephesians 2:8-10 which says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

The Apostle Paul in the first two verses is saying that the hope of salvation is Jesus. It is about his work, his life, his death, and his resurrection. Salvation is a work of Jesus and a gift given to us. Nothing we do can earn it. We can’t be good enough; smart enough, love enough, and follow Jesus enough to somehow have God in our debt. Only through God’s grace, are we able to have the hope of salvation. Salvation, according to Paul, has to do with people being rescued from the fate that they would otherwise have incurred. It answers the question as to how that rescue has taken place and who is ultimately responsible for it.

But, to me, that begs a question. What exactly is this thing called Salvation. The common idea is that salvation is because Jesus died on the cross, so that we could go to heaven when we die. But I don’t believe that is the entire story. In fact I believe salvation is not “going to heaven” but “being raised in life in God’s new heaven and new earth.” And it is more than just a one time shot either. The work of salvation, that was done by Jesus, through his life, death, and resurrection, is much more than just about an end destination. In its fullest sense, salvation is about whole beings, and not merely souls, about the present, not simply the future, and about what God does through us, not merely what God does in and for us.

It is pretty clear according to Paul that we aren’t saved by good works otherwise we would boast. But so often, people think that is the end of the story. That it ends at verse 9. Yes, it is quite clear that through the resurrection of Jesus, we are saved FROM sin and death. But there is more to salvation than just being saved from sin and death. God is saving and restoring all of creation (not just ourselves…..look at Colossians 1:20 which shows us what he saves by his death on the cross…”and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.”) and he is inviting each of us into his work of sorting out what is wrong in the world. God’s people aren’t saved by good works, but we aren’t definitely saved for good works.

So often if we read verses 8-9 and stop there, so much of what salvation truly is gets lost, or can get lost. Some people believe that salvation is a one time deal, done by God and all we have to do is accept it. So we accept Jesus as Savior and not King and Lord. We walk down an aisle, say a prayer and we are in. And then we go on living anyway we want, because salvation is about being saved from Hell and for heaven, and we have already “sealed that deal.” This type of understanding of salvation castrates discipleship and mission. Why follow Jesus as a disciple, why partner with Jesus in the work of his Kingdom, if salvation is only about Jesus as Savior? All we have to do is look around at the state of the church today to realize that so many people have bought what the church has sold them, this understanding that salvation is just about me, my forgiveness, my eternity with God. We quote the first two verses, without the third verse, and we change the entire meaning of the gospel to being about us.

When we buy into, what Dallas Willard calls the gospel of sin management, that it is about the individual’s personal forgiveness of sins, we lose the true hope of salvation. We lose the power of the gospel. We lose how the gospel and salvation can make a difference, not only in our own individual lives, but our corporate life together, and also out into the entire world. We true lose that salvation is truly a gift from God, and that then we are to embody that gift of salvation, in our lives, and through our good works, the world can begin to look more and more like heaven.

You and I, when we are a vessel of the gospel, filled with God’s salvation, we are his masterpieces. We become a song, a dance, a painting, a photograph, a poem of the Kingdom of God. Our lives then point to the beauty, the hope, the redemption, the setting things to right that only God can fully do, but calls us into that work nonetheless, and the hope of salvation.

So yes, as I said before, Jesus offers salvation from sin, death, and the evil of this world. At the same time, his salvation is a call to something. We are saved from sin and for good works. Just as Jesus is sorting out the brokenness in our lives and the world, we are called to help him in his work of putting things right in our lives, society, and even in the created order. God is not perched off on some heavenly throne, sitting on his hands and waiting to battle evil and sort out the wrong in the world at some future time. He is entering human history each and every day through you and me. Salvation and judgment are coming today as we lock horns with evil, battle against sin, and become agents of God’s new creation right where he places us.

But what does this hope of salvation look like on the ground? What does it mean for you and I each and every day as we wake up go to work, to school, as we interact with friends, family, neighbors, etc…? How are you and I called to be masterpieces of his salvation and Kingdom in this world? Let’s talk about these very things together…..

1. As you reflect on the Scripture text and the message this morning, what thoughts, questions, insights, ideas, etc.. come to mind that you would like to share with the community? 2. How are we being and how can we be songs, dances, paintings, poems, photographs pointing to the hope of salvation in Jesus both individually and corporately? 3. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what should we do about it?

Veritas: A Vision for Lancaster

The below video is a video that Chris Tress, a member of our community, put together to share the vision of Veritas as well as what God is doing in and through our community. Take a look at it and feel free to share it with others.

Surprised by Hope: Hope of the Second Coming of Jesus

Below is the text from the message from yesterday and the discussion questions that guide our conversation following the message. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, questions, push back, etc...

We are on our 3rd week of a 6 week series (over the course of 7 weeks….Palm Sunday March 24 we will take a week off from our series and participate in what we call The Table which is a simple meal, feet washing, and communion) entitled Surprised by Hope, which we are taking from the book by the same name by English Theologian NT Wright. And I would definitely encourage you that if you have a chance to read the book, do so. I read it and was deeply moved and challenged and now Kaytee has my copy. So either pick it up at a bookstore, on Amazon, library, or bug Kaytee to let you read it.

Over the course of these 6 weeks we are immersing ourselves in Hope. 2 weeks ago we covered the Hope for the World, and Matt lead us into discovering what the Hope of a Christian was. That it isn’t about escaping this world and going to the next, but that it is about the Kingdom of God and the rule and reign of Jesus in our lives and in the world.

Last week we talked about the Hope of Heaven and that Heaven and Earth are overlapping realities, which overlapped in Jesus, his life, death, and resurrection. And that the gospel isn’t the story of taking earth to heaven when we die, but bring heaven to earth while we live.

This week we are covering The Hope of Jesus’ Second Coming. And this is a tricky conversation to have. So many people have ideas and theories about the “end of the world.” And they hold tightly to that theory. And so many people try to come up with dates, time lines, etc… But I don’t really want to come up with timelines, etc… Because you see I really believe that all Christian language about the future is a set of signposts pointing into a mist. I do want to say this about the second coming before we jump into the Scriptures for the morning. The second coming of Jesus (along with the ascension) are vital Christian doctrines, because if you don’t hold to the belief in them, we have not rounded out the whole Kingdom of God’s theology.

So let’s look at 2 different Scriptures this morning and see how they might shed light on the Hope of the Second Coming and what that might say for us today for how we live our lives in our postmodern, ever-increasingly Post-Christendom world.

So the first Scripture we’ll be looking at is Acts 1:9-11, which says, “After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” Here we see Jesus gathering his disciples, giving them last minute encouragement, and the “game plan” to make disciples, and then ascending into heaven. And so Jesus is lifted up, indicting to the disciples not that he was heading out somewhere beyond the moon, beyond Mars, or whatever, but that he was going into God’s space, God’s dimension.” And so Jesus ascends into heaven and the disciples are all looking up into the sky when two angels drop the bomb that Jesus will come back in the same way that they saw him go into heaven. Jesus, having gone into God’s dimension of reality, will one day be back. Be back on the day that God’s dimension and our present one are brought together once and for all. That promise hangs in the air over the whole of Christian history from that day to today. This is what we mean by the second coming. It isn’t about God sweeping down and scooping up his people to rescue us from a dying planet. Rather, it is about Jesus returning to redeem the earth, heal his people, sort out all that is wrong, and reign in glory. And so you and I, the church, and all of creation awaits the return of Jesus and the final consummation of his work here on earth.

But there are two other things that are happening in this text, with connections to the Old Testament and to the culture of the 1st century that many, if not all, of Luke’s readers and hearers would immediately pick up on that many of us in the 21st century would totally miss out on. One of these connections would again show to the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah, Anointed One, Savior while the other connection would be to show that Jesus was true King, and that he came to subvert the current understanding that there were other sons of God’s, King’s, etc.. who we call Caesar.

One of the central OT promises for the early Christians was in Daniel 7:13-14 which says, “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.” For those who would have spent lots of time pondering this text, as the early Christians would have, the story of the ascension of Jesus indicate that Daniel 7 was fulfilled in Jesus.

Secondly, many of Luke’s readers would know that when a Roman Emperor died, it had become customary to declare that someone had seen his soul escaping from his body and going up to heaven. The message of this is clear; the emperor was becoming a god, thus enabling his son and heir to label himself as the son of god. The parallel is not that close, this time since it wasn’t Jesus soul that ascended into heaven, but his whole, renewed, bodily, and complete self. But what is really cool… is this. It is almost as if, Jesus is upstaging anything the Roman emperors might imagine for themselves. Jesus is the reality and the emperors are the parody. Not the other way around.

And so you might ask, what does all this have to do with the second coming? A few things. First, we see that Jesus is to come again in the same way that he ascended. Which means returning again in a whole, renewed, bodily, resurrected and completed self. Also just like the early disciples who were tempted to stare off into heaven, and were questioned by the angels, so can we be questioned. We aren’t to peer up into the sky wondering when Jesus will arrive. We are not to create fanciful scenarios about how Jesus will come. Instead, we are to invest our energy and time in caring for his creation, loving each other, sharing his grace, seeking justice, celebrating beauty, and living with confidence that Jesus will return one day. Until that final consummation, we live each day with a profound awareness that Jesus is King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

Which brings us to our next Scripture which fits perfectly in the discussion of the final consummation and the fact that the consummation will show that Jesus is truly King of Kings and Lord of Lord’s. The next Scripture that we’ll unpack a little bit together is Philippians 3:20-21 which says, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.”

The first thing we see is this idea that we are citizens of heaven. This doesn’t mean that our true home is in heaven and we are just waiting around until the day we die so that we can go there. To properly understand this idea we need to understand the 1st century and what it meant to be a citizen of a country (or empire), mostly the Roman Empire. The task of a Roman citizen, who didn’t live in the city of Rome, but in another colony of Rome, say Philippi for instance (since we are reading out of Philippians) was to bring Roman culture and rule to Philippi and to expand Roman influence there. And if a Roman colony, like Philippi were under attack, the emperor himself, often called Savior or Rescuer, would come from Rome to change the situation, defeat the enemies and establish the colony as firmly and gloriously as Rome itself. This is the exact picture of Philippians 3:20-21. The church is at present a colony of heaven, with responsibility for bring the life and rule of heaven to bear on earth. Our hope then is that the true Savior, the true Lord, King Jesus himself will come from heaven and change everything. He is going to transform the entire world so it is full of his glory, full of the life and power of heaven. And so the hope of the second coming is based on the biblical confidence that Jesus will 1 day return to this world, restore creation, heal his people and make all things new. So what does that mean for you and me today in the way we live as individuals and as a community of Jesus followers? How does or should the hope of the second coming affect the way we live today? Let’s spend some time talking about how we apply these Scriptures to our lives today in the 21st century.

1. What thoughts, comments, insights, questions, etc.. do you have regarding the message and the Scriptures? 2. How can you and I live as citizens of heaven individually and as a colony of heaven corporately? Give me some concrete examples and ideas 3. What is God saying to you? What are you going to do about it? 4. What do you think God is saying to us? What should we do about it?

Surprised by Hope: The Hope of Heaven

Below is the message from yesterday's gathering along with the discussion questions that took place following the message. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, insights, questions, etc.....

Last week we began a six week series entitled Surprised by Hope, based off of the book of the same name by English Theological powerhouse N.T. Wright. Over the course of the 6 weeks we will be or have looked at issues like the Christian’s hope, the hope of heaven, the second coming of Jesus, salvation, the church, it’s mission and finally leading up to Easter Sunday with the Hope of Resurrection.

Last week Matt walked us through Surprised by Hope: Hope for the world. He looked at what the hope of the Christian really is. That the hope of the Christian isn’t about escaping this place and going to the next place. It is ultimately about the Kingdom of God and his rule and reign in our lives and in this world.

Today, I am going to follow that up, by talking about the Hope of Heaven. And I want to start our discussion with a question and than a statement that I want to make, that I want you to think deeply about before jumping to any conclusions about that statement.

The question that I want to pose this morning to you is this…what comes to mind when you think of heaven? (Short time of discussion)

And here is the statement. The point of Christianity isn’t “to go to heaven when you die.” Now let that sink in awhile. Let’s look at some Scripture and see what the NT says about the hope of heaven and what heaven is like. Hopefully we’ll come to the point and see that the gospel is not a story of taking earth to heaven when we die. But that it is about bringing heaven to earth as we live.

Let’s revisit a passage of Scripture that we talked about a few short weeks ago, when we were talking about the Lord’s Prayer, that being Matthew 6:10 which says, “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” What does this Scripture say to us about the hope of heaven?

Before we get too much into that, we need to look at the 3 most prevailing understandings of how God and the world are related that will help us to see what the hope of heaven is really all about.

Option 1 is that God and the world are basically the same thing already overlapping more or less entirely. The Pantheist seeks to get in touch or in tune with the divine impulse present within the world and within oneself.

Option 2 is that God and the world are a long way apart from one another. This is best expressed by Deist who believe God doesn’t interact with the world, that the world is a closed system.

Option 3 and the biblical one (even though many American Christians essentially live their lives more under the option 2 reality) is that God and the world are different from one another but not far apart. There were and are ways in which, moments at which, and events through which heaven and earth overlap and interlock.

I believe, all too often, in our American and western mindset, we tend to box, separate, divide and keep things apart that aren’t really separated. We tend to think earth is here, and heaven is exclusively another reality, another place, and another time. But the early Christians didn’t think that way. Heaven is not a far away place we hope to go to some day. Through Christ it is very near, it is the control room of earth, and as we follow Jesus, the reality of heaven comes alive in us and is unleashed through us. Heaven and earth are overlapping realities and the resurrection of Jesus has connected these two spheres more closely than we know.

Just look at what the Apostle Paul says in Ephesians 1:7-10, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.” What the Apostle Paul is getting at is that Jesus is the ultimate place where heaven and earth meet. Paul is telling us the story of the cross of Jesus in such a way that we can hear, underneath it, the ancient Jewish story of the Passover. Passover was the night when the angel of death came through the land of Egypt and the blood of the lamb sprinkled on the door posts rescued the Israelites from the judgment that would otherwise have fallen on them. True redemption has occurred. Forgiveness of sins is the real deliverance from the real slavemaster. And it’s been accomplished through the sacrificial blood of Jesus.

The last verse of Ephesians 1:7-10 continues the New Testament references which pick up from the Old Testament that God intends, in the end, to put the whole creation to rights. Earth and heaven were made to overlap with one another, not partially as they do at the moment (one only has to look at the newspaper each day to realize that earth and heaven don’t completely overlap yet), but completely. Jesus started the process of bringing the two realities of heaven and earth back into totally alignment, he calls for us to continue the process, and ultimately, as Ephesians 1:10 says, “to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.” Or as an old hymn says, “This is my Father's world, The battle is not done; Jesus who died shall be satisfied, And earth and heaven be one.”

Going back to the verse that we started with, Matthew 6:10, we can see this reality that heaven and earth are meant to overlap, even now, and more fully when all shall be resurrection, renewed, and redeemed. God who dwells in “heaven” and longs to see his sovereign and saving rule come to birth ‘on earth.” This is, in fact, a prayer for the Kingdom of God to become fully present and not for God’s people to be snatched away from earth to heaven, but for the glory and beauty of heaven to be turned into earthly reality as well.

Listen, I am not downplaying the reality of heaven after you die. I believe in a heaven that is outside our reality, but it isn’t just somewhere else, for sometime else, but that it is also for here, and now. Just like the Kingdom of God, there is a now and not yet part of heaven. Heaven is now and designed to be experiencing now, and at the same time not yet. Heaven is breaking into our present circumstance with each passing moment. And if we look and pay close attention we will see that heaven and earth are overlapping and 1 of the ways that that happens, is through God’s people who not only pray, “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” but live out a heaven-infused reality right now, right where we live. So the hope of heaven is not something we are waiting for, but it is what we enter each day as we follow Jesus and let his heavenly plan unfold in and through each one of us, and through communities such as ours.

But what does this concretely look like? What does it mean that heaven and earth overlap and interlock? What does it look like when heaven and earth overlap and interlock? What does it mean for you and me and our community to live a heaven-infused reality right now? And what implications are there for us and communities of faith everywhere if heaven and earth truly overlap? These are the questions that we’ll be spending the rest of our time today talking about and unpacking together.

1. What thoughts, comments, questions, insights, etc.. do you have regarding the Scriptures and the message? 2. Share with us a story of a time where you saw or experienced heaven and earth overlapping and interlocking. 3. What does it look like for you and I to live a heaven-infused reality right now? What does it look like for our community to live a heaven-infused reality right now? 4. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what should we do about it?

Surprised by Hope: Hope for the World

At Veritas this past Sunday we started our new series entitled "Surprised by Hope" based off of the book by the same name by N.T. Wright. My family and I were away on vacation, so Matt Wheeler shared instead. Below are his notes/outline. Take some time and read his notes and we'd love to hear your thoughts, comments, insights, questions, etc....

“Surprised By Hope: Hope For The World”

• New series inspired by British bishop N.T. Wright’s book Surprised By Hope. • Quote from N.T. Wright: • “Most people, in my experience—including Christians—don’t know what the ultimate Christian hope really is. Most people—again, sadly, including many Christians—don’t Christians to have much to say about hope within the present world. Most people don’t imagine that these two could have anything to do with each other. Hence the title of this study: hope comes as a surprise, at several levels at once.” • ? – What is the ultimate Christian hope? o Going to Heaven o Resurrection o How does it relate to life now? • ? – Name some world events that have made people lose hope. o 9/11 o Indian Ocean Tsunami o Newtown • These events beg the question – “In what should we hope?” • Two approaches that “go astray” o The “Secret Code” approach o The “Escape the World” approach • In a Hebrew context, “judging the world”—with righteousness & truth—means putting things right & bringing justice, not condemnation on the earth itself. • Psalm 96:13 • Isaiah 11:1-9 • What things look like when God is in charge • Revelation 21:1-5 • God isn’t tossing the world in a “celestial trash bin”—He makes Heaven & earth new & brings New Jerusalem down to earth. • Jesus teaches us not how to leave earth, but how to bring the Kindgom of Heaven. • ? – What does the word “kingdom” mean to you? • Kingdom=God running the show. Jesus describes what this is like in parables, such as the parable of the seeds & the prodigal son. • God sorts things out; Jesus started it moving on earth. • Christians=people who help make that hope happen. • Jewish & pagan rulers were shocked—they were being called to account. • Romans 15:13—Paul’s letters speak of hope. • Christ-followers—the church—a people of hope. • Hoping in God, hope for the world • Things can be put right. God will do it. That is the reason for hope despite pain & injustice. There are things we can do.

Disarming our World: The Lord's Prayer Week 6

We have come to the end of our Lord's Prayer series and below is the text for the message from yesterday along with the questions for discussion. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, etc.. about the message, the Scripture and the conversation that followed.

So we have finally come to the end of our six week series on the Lord’s Prayer. This amazing, upside-down, Kingdom prayer which we have many times called The Disciple’s Prayer, because it gives us such a picture of what following Jesus and being part of the Kingdom of God is all about.

These past weeks for me have been challenging, encouraging, convicting, and seem to be right where I’ve been living. I pray that you have felt the same thing and that through this experience your discipleship and following Jesus has taken another step.

But today we are wrapping up the Lord’s Prayer and this part of the Lord’s Prayer is no less radical, subversive, and counter-cultural than any of the others that we looked at. But the interesting thing about this part of the prayer is that it isn’t found in our reading of the text this morning. This part however does show up in later manuscripts and is wholly consistent with how many Jewish people would close their prayers during Jesus day and before. In fact this part of the prayer might be a rewording of 1 Chronicles 29:10-13 which says, “ David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying, “Praise be to you, LORD, the God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Yours, LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, LORD, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all. Wealth and honor come from you; you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all. Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name.”

So while we don’t read it in our text this morning, we normally close the Lord’s Prayer with these words, “for yours is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.” This closing affirmation isn’t about us, about our ministry accomplishments or our spiritual maturity. It is about HIS Kingdom, HIS Power, and above all else HIS glory. So we come full circle. The Lord’s Prayer begins and ends with God’s goodness and greatness, affirming the centrality of his Kingdom, and his will over all things.

Now the ending of the prayer, as I mentioned, is as radical and counter cultural as all the other words. But I also believe this part of the prayer is very very subversive and would have been seen that way to Jesus’ hearers. You see Declaring God’s Kingdom, power and glory was a direct affront to the Roman emperor. The language of Kingdom, power, and glory were to be used for the self-proclaimed god-King of the empire. This part of the prayer is not only a declaration of devotion to God, but a subversive rejection of authority of this world. We are to denounce the authority of the empires of the world that demand our allegiance, whether that be individualism, materialism, nationalism, or something else. But we aren’t to be subversive just for the sake of being subversive. Not, our subversion of the empire is a by-product of our obediently following Jesus as the one and only Lord and King, to whom we swear our absolute allegiance.

Now the amazing thing about this declaration that we say at the end of the Lord’s Prayer, that it is about God’s Kingdom, His power, and His glory is in relation to the words Kingdom, power, and glory and how one (one person, one nation, etc..) would go about having a Kingdom, the power, and the glory. You see, in Jesus day, and our day as well (even though we really don’t have Kingdom’s per se) one obtains these things normally through violence, top down power, and threats of more punishment. But Jesus however took another route when it came to Kingdom, power and glory, the path not won through violence, pain, and power (or at least not to others, but having it done to him). Think about it. The Pax Romana, the Peace of Rome, was not brought about by peace and love and justice. No, the Pax Romana was a peace made possible by the cross: people so feared crucifixion that they would think long and hard before rising up against the emperor. So the Kingdom (or empire), the power, and the glory for the Roman Empire came through doling out violence, especially using the cross. The Pax Christi (the peace of Christ), the Kingdom, the power, and the glory, came not through the peace of conquest but of true reconciliation. The King achieves peace not by shedding the blood of rebels, but by- and I hope you hear the scandal and wonder of this in the midst of familiar words- shedding his own blood. Jesus Kingdom, power and glory came through the cross. The Apostle Paul in Colossians 2:12-15 puts it this way, “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” The cross, an instrument of torture, pain, and death became an instrument of peace, reconciliation, defeat and life. Not only did the cross bring about forgiveness of our sins- “canceled the charge of legal indebtness” (sounds connected to the Lord’s prayer- Forgive us our debts….) but also brought about the defeat of sin, death and evil and has brought forth the Kingdom. What seemed like the biggest, most crushing defeat in the world became the biggest, most astonishing win in the world. Jesus disarmed the powers and authorities, not by physically resorting to the same violence that they had inflicted upon him, not by buying into the myth of redemptive violence, but by triumphing over them by their own instrument of violence and death. Talk about a reversal of fortune.

You see the rulers and authorities of Rome and Israel, the best government and the highest religion of the world of that time had ever known- conspired to place Jesus on the cross. These powers, angry at his challenge to their sovereignty, stripped him naked, held him up to public contempt and celebrated a triumph over him. In one of his most dramatic statements of the paradox of the cross, and one moreover which shows what physical detail could envisage the horrible death Jesus had died, he declares that on the contrary, on the cross God was stripping them naked, was holding them to public contempt, and leading them in his own triumphal procession- in Christ, the crucified Messiah.

Our world tells us that if you want to build your Kingdom, be powerful, and have all the glory that you need to put yourself first, step on the back of others to get up in the world, when someone slaps you in the face, you hit them back, that you need money because money=power, that it is all about you. Jesus, and his upside down Kingdom, as we have been learning over the last six weeks tells us that it is about God the Father, His Kingdom (on earth as it is in heaven), about his provisions for us (and not trying to do it ourselves), about forgiveness and not grudges, about not giving into temptation, and most of all, that the Kingdom is primary not about ourselves, our ideas, our power, our glory. Most of all the life of a discipleship of Jesus, means that the Kingdom, the power and the glory is all about Jesus. And that the Kingdom, the power and the glory came through the upside down way of the cross.

But what does all this talk about Kingdom, power, glory and the upside down way of the cross, have to do with each of us gathered here today? What does it say to our community about how we do life and engage in our world around us? These are the very things that we are going to take time to discuss together.

1. What thoughts, comments, insights, questions, etc... do you have regarding the Scriptures and the message? 2. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what are we going to do about it? 3. What take away are you taking away from our 6 week series on the Lord's Prayer?

Escaping Temptation Island: Week 5 Lord's Prayer

Below is the text from our 5th week looking at the Lord's Prayer. Feel free to respond, engage, ask questions, and push back after you read it. Also below the text of the message is the questions that we dialogued around following the message.

This week marks our 5th week in our 6 week series looking at the Lord’s Prayer found in Matthew 6:9-13. This prayer, which probably should be better entitled The Disciple’s Prayer as I believe it is a prayer that encompasses much of what it means to be a disciple and to live out the Upside Down Kingdom of God.

Over the last 4 weeks we have looked at such Kingdom issues as the Fatherhood of God, being Adopted as sons and daughter’s of God, dreaming about what it would be like if heaven touched down on earth, God’s provision for us, and through us, and forgiveness (from God, towards each other, and in relation to the word Debt and Debtors).

Today we cover Matthew 6:13. Let’s look at the entire prayer and then zero in on verse 13. “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’ It is the last part, “And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one” that we’ll be looking at together this morning by using this verse and also Luke 4:1-13. The first thing that should catch our attention is the same thing that stood out to us when we looked at verse 11 and 12, the usage of the word us. As I mentioned before, the concept of the individual is a modern understanding. The Hebraic worldview, of which the Bible is a part, doesn’t have the understanding of the individual as we do. In fact, most of the usages of the word “you” in the Bible are in the plural form and actually refer to “you all,” as in the corporate church family. The fact is that the ancient culture in which the Bible was written tended to think collectively rather than individually. They thought first in groups of people and community rather than in individual terms.

So this prayer, as I mentioned before, is not so much an individual prayer as it is a communal prayer that the community of follower’s of Jesus need to be praying, and living together. Secondly, we have to understand what is meant by temptation. It literally means a test, and not always a solicitation to do evil. God has promised to keep us from any testing that is greater than what we can handle (1 Cor. 10:13). In fact, tradition throughout early Christianity is that testing of one’s faith is a necessary part of discipleship. In fact Jesus whole public “career” was marked by trials of one sort or another. So what Jesus is doing in this prayer, is inviting us to share his own struggles and to experience the same deep of faith that sustained him. You see there is an intimate connection between this part of the prayer, and the ministry of Jesus. With the prayer about deliverance from temptation and the evil one of Matthew 6:13 we are back again with Jesus. Immediately we think of the temptation narratives of Matthew 4:1-11, and Luke 4:1-13, as well as the scene at Gethsemane. We see in those other stories Jesus praying this part of the Lord ’s Prayer to be lead out of temptation, and delivered from evil.

In fact there is a deep connection that I found between the Lord’s Prayer, the subjects that that have been dealing with each week and the story of the temptation of Jesus found in Luke 4:1-13. Let’s go to Luke 4:1-13, read the narrative, and see where the temptations that Jesus faced are the temptations that we face, and how the Lord’s Prayer speaks directly to those temptations. “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’ The devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him, “I will give you all their authority and splendor; it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. If you worship me, it will all be yours.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’” The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down from here. For it is written: “‘He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’ Jesus answered, “It is said: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ When the devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time.” So the first temptation that we find in this text is the temptation to turn stones into bread. Jesus, being hungry, after not eating for 40 days, was surely starving, and Satan knew that. This is why he went that route first. But what is Satan really tempting Jesus with? Is it just to turn stones to bread, or to just eat? Is there more to it? I believe the temptation is the temptation to become our own provider, our own Father if you will. To base our identity in our own power, provision, and position instead of, as we talked about the first week, upon our status as an adoption son or daughter of our heavenly father. And there in lies the connection. Satan wanted Jesus to provide food for himself, and not trust in the provision that God had for him. Satan wanted to have Jesus pray, “I’ll give myself this day my daily bread”, as he wants all of us to pray that. But Jesus was rooted in the prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Jesus knew that ultimate provision (and not just in relation to bread, but also in temptation and strength) comes from the hand of God the Father and not from the self. The second temptation that Satan tested Jesus with was in relation to Jesus giving worship, rule and reign to Satan. Satan says, ““I will give you all their authority and splendor; it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. If you worship me, it will all be yours.” What is Satan tempting Jesus with? With being King, and ruling and reigning over the earth, by not going to the Cross, and putting Satan before God the Father. If Jesus would have fallen for that temptation, his prayer later wouldn’t have been, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” It would have been the Kingdom of Satan and not the Kingdom of God if Jesus would have worshipped him. It would have been on earth as it is in hell. No, the rule and reign of Jesus had to go through the temptation, and the trials, and all the way to the cross. Not circuited by worshipping Satan. The last temptation that Jesus had to endure, in this narrative, is the temptation to not trust God’s protection. And in this temptation Satan is smart, and even uses Scripture, to get Jesus to not trust in his heavenly Father. Satan tells him to throw himself off the temple, because after all Scripture does say, “He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’ And this gets at the heart of two parts of the Lords’ prayer, the very beginning, “Our Father who art in heaven.” And the part that we are looking today, “Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.” Jesus needed to trust his Heavenly Father and have the strength through His Heavenly Father (and the word of God) to ward off the evil one and the temptation to test the love of His Father. When we look at the root of these temptations that Jesus faced, we notice something about them. It isn’t something that just Jesus faced. No these temptations strike at the heart of what it means to be fully human (as Jesus was). These temptation strike at the heart of what we have been praying together this entire series. Our temptations are no different than Jesus’ temptations. I believe, but I can’t prove it that the words in the Lord’s Prayer came because of his testing in the wilderness as they directly speak to the temptations. You see we all struggle with the temptation to be our own Father, so to speak. To base our Identity and self preservation on ourselves, our power, our wisdom, our positions, instead of praying, “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name.” Secondly, we don’t want to live under the rule and reign of Jesus and his Kingdom. We want to live under the rule and reign of King Me. We want to pray “My kingdom come, my will be done.” We want to worship ourselves, instead of worshipping the true King, King Jesus. When we pray, “Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” it is directly confronting the very issue of whose rule and reign are we living under, our own (and by definition, the evil ones) or under the rule and reign of Jesus. Pray that part of the Lord’s Prayer means calling Jesus not only savior but also King and Lord. Thirdly, when we pray “Give us this day our daily bread” we are directly confronting the temptation to provide for ourselves, and think we can do it all. That we are in control. That we don’t need anyone else whether than anyone else is God or even other people. We want to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps, and make it on our own. Life in the Kingdom of God, and in living out the prayer means trusting that God will give you your daily bread, and also means that he trusts you to also provide that daily bread for other people. So in the Lord’s Prayer we see Jesus directly confronting the struggles and temptations that all humans, including him, face. And in the Lord’s Prayer he has given us words to use to confront the evil one when we are tempted. But what does this mean when the rubber hits the road? What can we learn and apply to our lives about escaping from temptation island through the Lord’s Prayer and the Temptation of Christ in the wilderness? Let’s spend sometime unpacking these stories and their relevance and application to our lives for the next few minutes.

1. What insights, questions, comments, push back, etc.. do you have regarding the Scriptures and the message? 2. What other connections do you see between the Lord’s Prayer, the Tempation of Christ and our own temptations? 3. In what ways, and how, can you resist temptation when it comes? Is there something in the Lord’s Prayer that can help? 4. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us as a community and what should we do about it?

Jesus: A Theography

So a few months ago I received the book "Jesus: A Theography" by Leonard Sweet and Frank Viola to review through the blogging program booksneeze. Normally it doesn't take me 4 months to review a book, but due to a combination of busyness, holidays, and the depth (and length) of the book, I am finally getting around to reviewing this book.

The first thing you need to know is just what a theography is. A Theogrpahy is basically the combination between the words Theology and Biography. It can be defined as writing about God. Or a Theological Biography. And in the case of this book a Theological Biography of Jesus and reading Scripture through the lens of Jesus and finding Jesus in both the 1st and 2nd Testaments (words that the authors use instead of Old and New Testament.)

According to the authors, their purpose in writing this book is that, "the Bible is the narrative of Jesus- the Christ, the Savior, the living Lord, and our All. On every page of the First Testament, God poured out his heart. He bled with his people long and hard before He entered earth through the womb of a young virgin girl in Bethlehem."

The book helped me to see the author's premise that the Bible,from beginning to end, is the story of creation, revelation, redemption, and consummation and that Christ is present in every word, every book, and every narrative. Even in sections that I struggle with understanding or struggle to fit into my theology, that Jesus is working this overarching redemptive narrative.

Even the way that the author's structure their chapters pushed their premise of Christ in the Old and New Testament. They started with Christ before time, than Christ in Creation (both in Macro and Micro), and then entering into the stories and narratives of the New Testament including his birth, his boyhood, the missing years, and into his ministry years of healing, teaching, and finally his death, and resurrection.

I would probably say that the most helpful part of the book for me dealt with Chapter 14 entitled, "The Atonement and the Harrowing of Hell." and how it helped me to again understand, in some small way, what took place that fateful day over 2,000 years ago when Jesus hung on the cross. It helped me to see that our human theories of atonement (cristus victor, penal substitution, ransom, non-violent, etc...) all have some basis in Scripture but in the end they all come up short in fully explaining the cross and Jesus death on the cross for all of humanity. Or as the author's put it, "Because the work of Jesus Christ at Calvary is too enormous in its scope and too rich in its meaning to be captured by a single image or definition."

I would say that overall, while this book is a long read, and took me some time to wade through, overall I am glad that I did. It helped me to wrestle with Jesus in the books of the Old Testament, with the overarching narrative of redemption that God started even before time, and will bring into consummation when he remakes heaven and earth (and all those who call on his name). It helped me to reframe the way that I see the Bible, not as a series of books held together by glue and binding, but a series of books held together by Jesus, his redemptive narrative, and his blood.

The Real F Word: The Lord's Prayer Week 4

Below is the text from this past Sunday's worship gathering dealing with the 4th part of the Lord's Prayer along with the questions that we discussed. Would love to hear your thoughts, comments, insights, etc..

Today we continue our 6 week series looking at the Lord’s Prayer found in Matthew 6:9-13. Or as an author has said that we should call the Lord’s Prayer, the Disciple’s Prayer, due to its significance and what it teaches in respect to being followers of Jesus Christ.

We started 3 weeks ago with the Lord’s Prayer at the beginning (which is a really good place to start). We started with Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be thy name. We spent time talking about the struggle that some of us have in praying to God the Father, due to our struggle with our earthly Father’s. We also talked about the beautiful fact that we are adopted as sons and daughters of God the Father, and how he has redeemed our past, and give us an inheritance in the Kingdom of God.

Two weeks ago we covered the next part of the prayer “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We talked about the idea of what it would look like if heaven touched down on earth, and the fact that heaven did touch down on earth 2,000 years ago with the person, work, ministry, and mission of Jesus. We also talked about the mission of Jesus found in Luke 4 and talked about that it was his mission, that by definition, if we are followers of Jesus, it should be our mission as well. Things like preaching good news to the poor, setting the oppressed free, proclaim freedom for the prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Last week we talked about the third part, “Give us this day our daily bread.” We talked about the communal nature of this prayer, and that we can be the answer to this part of the prayer for others who need their daily bread, especially when we have 365 daily breads all ready stored up for ourselves. We talked about God’s provision that happens daily whether that would be food, or encouragement, or whatever sustenance that can get us through.

Today we cover the next part of this radical, Kingdom of God, upside down, prayer. The part that says, “Forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors.” So let’s look again at the prayer and then we’ll unpack it together using a parable that Jesus told that I believe connects nicely to this part of the prayer. Matthew 6:9-13 says, ““This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’

So the first thing that I noticed about this part of the prayer is the usage of the word debt and the word debtor. In the Lukan account in chapter 11 we see Luke rending the prayer, “Forgive our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” So right there we notice a tension between the two texts. But I believe this goes to show the fact, that as we learned and talked about every week of this series that try as you might you can’t separate spiritual needs from material needs.

In fact all 3 Aramaic versions of this text, Jesus uses the Aramaic words Khuba, which means both material debt and sin. Jesus knew how all-consuming financial debt was for people. Debt, in Jesus time, could land a person in indentured servitude or even prison. When people become slaves to debt, they forfeit their freedom and will. Jesus also knows that sin, can also be all consuming. When we become slaves to sin, we end up as indentured slaves and in prison and when we become slaves to sin; we forfeit our freedom and will. The bondage of sin and material debt limits our ability to be faithful and submitted servants of God. This just goes to show again that our physical conditions and situations impact our spiritual conditions and situations. That you can’t separate the flesh from the spirit, even though many others in the past and even now try to. I wonder if we have so easily resorted to the words trespasses and sins instead of the word debt and debtors because it is easier to talk about my own sins and God’s forgiveness instead of talking about the idea of physical debt. Plus if taken this way, this text becomes exceedingly countercultural and super radical. More radical than we realize.

What if and this is a what if. What if this text means that we are literally to forgive people’s material debts? And trust that God will provide for us and the ones we forgive. What if Jesus, in this text, is calling communities of Christ followers to work to help each other get freed from debt? Be freed from the bondage and enslavement to Money. What would it be like if the Christian community would literally help someone get out of material debt (and help them stay out of it) by using the pulled resources of the Christian community? If this is true, then he is calling his people to live counter culturally. To do otherwise in this respect is not only an act of disobedience but an active step into the very bondage that robs us of our freedom to live obediently. To forgive people their debts frees people to live with that same single-minded devotion to God, which would otherwise be compromised.

Another thing I noticed was it’s placement in the prayer, right after the commitment to trust God with the daily bread that he gives to us. This statement, “Forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors” is first and foremost a declaration of our absolute dependence on God’s grace and forgiveness, daily and ultimately. Further, it is a reminder that our forgiveness is entirely undeserved, extended to us before (or whether) we asked for it. Therefore, for us to expect the gracious forgiveness of God while holding back forgiveness from others is absolutely unacceptable to God. Jesus goes so far as to say that forgiveness for our own sins is contingent on our extending entirely undeserved forgiveness to those who have wronged us, before (or whether) they ask for it. In fact Jesus tells a story that helps to unpack this idea of forgiveness of debts and sins. That story can be found in Matthew 18:21-35.

“Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go. “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded. “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’ “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened. “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

So in this text we see the connection that Jesus makes between debts, forgiveness, and sin. He tells this story, which while it was a parable; no doubt it was played out many times through Israel in the first century (as far as debts). Peter comes to Jesus and asks him how many times he should forgive someone who sin against him. We don’t know if Peter had someone in mind who had wronged him, and if he wanted to have an excuse to not forgive this person. And so that begins the story that Jesus uses to show Peter (and us) that our debtedness and forgiveness is intrinsically linked to our forgiveness of others debts that they owe us. That story is what we call the Parable of the unmerciful servant.

What we see in this parable is the story of a servant of the king who had a 10,000 bag of gold debt to be paid to the King. He couldn’t pay the debt no matter how much he promised. It clearly represents an unpayable debt. So he begs for forgiveness and also for patience from the King, and the King compassionately and mercifully wipes away this servant’s debt. But apparently this act of grace, mercy, and forgiveness shown to the servant from the King didn’t have a huge, lasting impact on the servant as you think it would. No, instead the servant turns around, finds another servant that owes him a fraction of what he owed the King, and proceeds to try to beat it out of him. The other servant has the exact same plead that was used by the servant with the greater debt, but to no avail. Instead he threw the man into prison until the debt could be paid. Well of course, if you were witness to this lack of mercy from someone who received even greater mercy, you would be flabbergasted and would say something to the King. So that is what the other servants did. And the King went off on the servant and threw him into prison to be tortured and until he could pay off his debt. Jesus ends the story by saying this is exactly how Jesus will treat you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.

Think of it this way, any debt that you have owed to you is absolutely insignificant in relation and in comparison to the debt that God has forgiven you. If Jesus, while having been beaten, abused, whipped, scorned, and then hung on the cross, could, from the cross, utter these words, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.”, how much more should we be able to forgive someone when they wrong us. And this isn’t to minimalize, negate, or say what someone has done to you is right, okay, or you should just forget about it. But none of us has been crucified, beaten, whipped, etc….

The truly repentant truly understand the radical nature of God’s grace and their own undeserving nature. Knowing this, how can we refuse to extend to others what he has give to us so freely? In other words, when we refuse to extend forgiveness to others, our own supposed repentance comes into question.

Let’s spend some time together discussing the implications of these texts on our everyday lives. Let’s discuss the ideas of debt forgiveness, forgiveness of sins, and the difficulty we face with applying these things to our lives.

1. What questions, ideas, thoughts, comments, insights, push back, etc... do you have regarding the text and the message? 2. What are your thoughts regarding the use of the word Debt and Debtors in the Lord's Prayer? How might these ideas be played out both in the world stage (nations, jubilee etc..) and also personally and communally? 3. Are there people in your life that God is calling you to forgive and if possible reconcile? What steps might you take in making this a reality? 4. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what are we going to do about it?

Needing the Dough: Lord's Prayer Week 3

Below is the text from this past Sunday's message and the discussion questions as well. Would love to hear your thoughts, feedback, etc...

Today we continue our six week series looking at the Lord’s Prayer, found in Matthew 6:9-13, which sits right in the middle of, what I believe, is one of the most significant teachings of Jesus, and one of the best descriptions of what life in the Kingdom of God is truly all about, the Sermon on the Mount.

Right smack in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, the crucial teaching about life in the Kingdom, is probably the most recognized prayer ever recorded in history, and a prayer that encompasses so much of a disciple’s life in the Kingdom of God, and what each of us should really be all about, and put our hope, time, energy, effort, and all of our life into. As I said last week it might be best called The Disciples prayer.

So 3 weeks ago we kicked it off with the first part of the Prayer, focusing on where all prayer should be focused on, “Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name.” We spent time talking about the difficulty that we sometimes have in calling God Father, due to the struggles many of us have in our relationships with our earthly fathers. But we also talked about the great fact that because of God’s redemptive work through the life, death, and resurrection of His son Jesus, we are now adopted sons and daughters of our heavenly Father and we can literally cry out to him Daddy or Abba Father. We are adopted into a new family with our past wiped clean, and a new slate and a new inheritance, a Kingdom inheritance.

Last week we talked about the second part of the prayer, “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” We spent time looking at what can be called the Mission of Jesus that he lays out in Luke 4, which is based off of Isaiah 61. We talked about what it looks like when heaven touches down on earth, that it looks like Jesus, and as disciples and followers of Jesus, we are called to continue his work and his mission. And that by continuing his work of proclaiming good news to the poor, freedom for the prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind, to set the oppressed free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s Favor, we are partnering with Jesus to see his Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. That is what it looks like when heaven touches down on earth.

Today we turn the corner from looking out to God and the world, to the part of the prayer where it turns internally into our own lives but at the same time even while it is internal, much like everything in the kingdom, it also has an external part of it as well. The 3rd part of the prayer where we focus on thoughts, and prayers on God and his provision for us. Let’s turn to Matthew 6:9-12 and look at the prayer again. “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’ Jesus says we are to pray, Give us today our daily bread. With this part of the prayer we realize that our provision comes from Him and not from ourselves, our hard work, our “pulling ourselves up from our own bootstraps” but they are a gift from our Heavenly Father. There are a few things that stand out with this part of the prayer, besides the fact that it’s about God’s provision for us. First it is daily bread, which is enough to get us through or as someone once said earlier in the Scriptures, give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, 'Who is the LORD?' Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.” Secondly, the first word in this part of the prayer is give. Our daily bread, our sustenance, our provisions are a gift from God. We can’t earn them, we can’t work for them, and we can’t put God in our debt so that he has to give us our daily bread. No, it is a free gift because God the Father wants to provide the needs of his children. I find it that he provides all I need, not all I want or hope for. We provides enough for us. Like the Israelites in the wilderness where God would send enough manna for the people for the day, and if they tried to save it, it would get moldy. God provided enough daily bread for his people Israel, and he continues providing enough for his people today. This is where I believe the rubber hits the road, we want and have more than enough, but we worry and we sweat and we yell, scream, swear, and get angry that it isn’t enough. And so we focus on money and our wants and our materialism, and not primarily on the Kingdom of God. Jesus honestly cares a lot about our everyday things, and wants us to come to him in prayer and give over these things to him, and then we can live freely in the Kingdom, and not worry about stuff (easier said than done) but just have a simple trust that God knows and God will provide. But it’s also not just about our own needs, but the third thing I noticed is that I find it very interesting that this part of the prayer doesn’t say “Give me today my daily bread.” This prayer, as most of the Bible “commands” are meant more for communal application, than individual application. Also I believe that the community can be the answer to their own prayers and “give us today our daily bread.” This means that we can provide for each other in the community, and also others in the wider community and the world. So this is where this part ties in with the part we talked about last week. That bringing heaven to earth, means being the vessel of God to provide daily bread for others.

Apparently this was supposed to be what I was speaking on today because as you know 2013 hasn’t been a great year in relation to money for the Braught’s. Seems like money is like water through a sieve right now due to some stupid things, garage door, car, hospital visit, and this week our furnace went and needed to be replaced. So I worried, I yelled, I got angry, I got frustrated, Kim and I were on edge with each other, all because money became the focus, or more like the lack of money became the focus. And then I remembered what I was speaking on and the text that I am about to read, and realized that this message is for me, and if you hear something that applies to you (which I am sure we all have this issue) than I am thankful. I am preaching the gospel to myself this morning. I am preaching that when we focus on the Kingdom of God and seek it first, everything else will be taking care of. That doesn’t mean it will go according to your plan, the way you want it to go, or have exactly everything you could ever want. No, but we are invited to know a freedom from worry and anxiety that comes from undue concern for material things.

Let’s go a few verses later in Matthew chapter 6 and see what it might say about God and our daily bread. Matthew 6:31-34 says, “So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Honestly, this is probably once of the most challenging passages in the entire Bible to truly live out. Especially in the midst of the consumer culture that we find ourselves. But this is also where the first part of the Lord’s Prayer gives us some help. The first part places our identity squarely on being children of God, adopted sons and daughters and not on things that can be bought, sold, manufactured, and worn (or driven, or lived in, or etc..). When our identity is wrapped up in all the wrong things, all the material stuff, than we truly worry about looking a certain way, eating at the right places, living in the right place, having the right car, etc…. But when our identity is wrapped up in being adopted sons and daughters, and our focus is seeking first his kingdom and his righteousness, than God will provide the daily bread that we need. And tomorrow will worry about itself, instead of us taking on this worry that most of time we have absolutely no control over anyway.

So my question to each of us is this: What Kingdom are we living? Under whose rule and reign do we live? Do we live under our own rule and reign and seek out our own Kingdom? Trying to buy, consume, and wear an identity as King and Queen? Which then, by definition, we then believe we are the ones who work for the daily bread. We are the ones who worry, not about having enough, but worry about not having everything that everyone else has and what we want. We place our Kingdom ahead of the Kingdom of God and wonder why we are more stressed out, more unhappy, sleeping less, worrying more than those in other countries who have far less than we do but are far more well balanced and happy. Because I believe many of those people have learned what Kingdom they want to live for, the Kingdom of God. They have learned to seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and God continues to provide. Or are you seeking first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, praying each night “Give us this day our daily bread”, and trusting that he will indeed answer that cry of dependence of his children?

So let’s talk about the Lord’s Prayer, daily bread, God’s provisions, and which Kingdom we are seeking to put first in our lives. And let’s share stories of how we have seen God provide our daily bread lately.

Discussion Questions: 1. What are your insights into these passages of Scripture? What are your thoughts, comments, questions, etc.. about this part of the Lord’s Prayer? 2. Share an experience or a story when you have seen God provide for your “daily bread.” How did this experience deepen, challenge, convict, etc.. you and your faith? 3. What is God saying to you and what are you going to do about it? What is God saying to us and what should we do about it?