The Compelling Case for Spiritual Giants--Part 2

As I wrote last week: what the world desperately needs today are Spiritual Giants; Spiritual Redwoods; people of deep faith.  In part, they need people of spiritual depth because all too often life for many is lived on the surface.  Many nibble on life rather than feast on it.  So when life gets tough, nibblers have no substance to stand on.  That’s when they need in their lives people with some depth in their life-outlook.  They need someone who can bolster them from the depths of life.

I also think those outside of faith are tired of seeing so many people of shallow faith—judgmental faith, easy-answers faith, low commitment faith.  They reason, rightfully so, that if someone embraces a faith, that that faith ought to set the agenda for his/her life.  It ought to mean something meaningful.

In a consumer culture, where everything can be bought in a moments notice and tossed the next, where our self-worth is based on what we have and on getting the next thing (the latest I-phone or big screen TV or Coach purse or jeans or car or designer puppy, etc.), where everything is experienced in the shallows—including, too often, relationships—depth of faith becomes a surprisingly refreshing, liberating, transforming, eye-opening two by four to the head—an “I could have had a V-8” moment: This is what life looks like! 

My first foray into this topic last week generated some interesting responses from “I want to know more” to “what prompted you to write that?” to “what does it look like?” to “fascinating…what does it mean?”  To be honest, it started out as a gut instinct.  So over the next several weeks lets see where that instinct takes us by teasing out some “characteristics” of Spiritual Giants.

Paul writes in Colossians 2:6-7: As you have therefore received Christ Jesus, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

Characteristic 1:  Spiritual Giants Know their Subject

The other day one of our kids at the Lake Pleasant Estates rattled off her knowledge about her favorite Boy Band: One Direction.  These are the stats she shared with me from their latest Take Me Home Tour:

·      They performed 134 shows in 20 countries

·      The shows were held in 68 cities

·      1,635,000 tickets were sold

·      7 babies were born while on tour

·      They utilized 86 crews

·      3,680 cups of Yorkshire tea were consumed

My point: Think about all of the stuff that we know—without really knowing anything useful!  Some of us are experts on the Kardashians.  Some of us know every NFL player backwards and forwards.  Some of us are so articulate in all things Shades of Grey that we can enter into the big debate on who should play the main characters.  Some of us are obsessed with our favorite celebrity.  Some of us with the news (from the left or from the right). 

We know a lot of stuff…and that stuff is neither good nor bad.  I’m the kind of person who thinks that any kind of learning is good as it exercises our brains (I’m proud to say, for example, that I know a lot about Victor Mature, BJ Thomas, and Barry Manilow and am pretty good at movie-focused trivia!).  

But, at the same time, all too often we fill our brains with empty calories.  We know stuff…but we really don’t know a lot of stuff steeped in substance.

When it comes to faith, many Christians sadly know about as much about their faith as non-Christians.  Many Christians are Biblically illiterate.  They’ve not read more than a few verses in the Bible.  They don’t know the great stories of the Bible.  They don’t know important “doctrinal” truths about Jesus or the Spirit.  Their life story doesn’t really connect with the Jesus story.  So we’re afraid to talk about our faith because we’re afraid we can’t answer the questions that may be asked.  Or when tough times happen, we get angry at God or fall away from God because we don’t really know the Subject of our faith; we have no substance to draw on.

Spiritual Giants are theologians.  Theo means God.  Theologians wrestle with the things of God.  That’s the call of every Christian.  To follow Jesus is to know him—to know the stories about him; to know what he’s passionate about; to know his heart. 

Like everything else we want to know more about, we have to spend time learning about him to know him.  This can’t happen in one hour a week (or, for most church-goers, in one hour once a month or twice a month). 

If our faith is going to be deep and transformative, we need to make the study of God a priority in our lives—to read the Bible every day (even the hard parts); to worship regularly; to take a class or seminar that helps us dig deeper. 

Think of it this way: Do you know as much about the God of your Faith as you do:

·      Politics?

·      Sports?

·      Hollywood?

·      The “characters” in your favorite “Reality TV” show?

·      Cars?

·      Sewing?

·      Painting?

·      Your career?

Again, there’s nothing wrong with knowing stuff about stuff, important stuff or even stuff that doesn’t really matter.  It can help us connect with life and expands our field of vision—even though that field of vision can, at times, be fairly shallow.  But life is lived in the depths.  And Spiritual Redwoods have roots that go down deep into the ground.  The deeper the roots, the more established the faith, the deeper the life.

No matter where we are in our spiritual journey, we can continue to live our lives in Jesus, growing through learning as much as we can about him.  Because ultimately Spiritual Redwoods never stop growing.  No matter how deep our roots go into the things of God, we’re never anywhere near the bottom.

And that depth will not only serve you well…it may very well transform the lives of those around you.

What Makes Grace Grace?

Even though I played hooky from Grace this past weekend, I did attend worship.  I visited a church I have been reading about for years.  This church is doing incredible things in terms of serving their community and in terms of being an inclusive church.

I hesitate to critique any church but this church was such a mixed and challenging experience for me that I wanted to use it to say some things about Community of Grace.

I arrived 30 minutes early so I had a chance to talk with one of the ushers.  While it is a denominational church, he said, they are open to anyone and everyone.  He mentioned that they serve free meals three times a day (they are in the heart of downtown San Francisco) for over a million meals a year.  After the first song the leader announced that the church needed 5 people to volunteer immediately to pack lunches for the homeless--that's immediate mission!  The choir was made up of a variety of people and sexual identities.  I've never seen that kind of living picture of an inclusive church before.  It really is a magnificent mission--one that is embraced by the city of San Fran. Almost 2000 worship there per weekend, with about half being visitors!

The usher mentioned that they took down the cross from the worship center so as not to offend anyone.  The opening prayer was a further demonstration of that desire not to offend.  They prayed to the God who is known by many names, who is found through many paths, and a special prayer of thanks was given for the truth of God found in the Hindu scriptures.

The music was amazing--a large choir backing up vocalists with a strong Black Gospel feel (one of the soloists was probably in his 70's and he sang a couple of spirituals in a Louis Armstrong vibe including Amen!).  In between the songs the pastor or others would talk--and they always talked about the congregation and the great work they were doing.  Again and again they upheld their openness, their often radical take on inclusiveness, and, after awhile it seemed to me--did a lot of patting themselves on the back.  I understand the importance of a congregation owning its mission and feeling good about what they are doing.  But after awhile it got a bit much for me.

That's the critique.  It seemed to me to be all about them.  About their mission.  About how unique they are among churches.

What was missing (and I missed the message--I could only stay an hour; the service was 90 minutes) was that this is all about God in Christ.

I came to this conclusion: When your vision of God is squishy (and in my opinion, this church has a squishy view of God--all paths lead to the same God, God is known by many names, all religious texts are equal to the Bible, the cross has been removed from the worship center so as not to offend anyone, etc.), then promoting the church becomes the focal point--because the church and its mission becomes concrete while God remains somewhat abstract.

This is in no way meant to demean the amazing work this world-class church is doing.  But I disagree with their theological center.  And at the same time, I was deeply challenged by how we talk about Grace and what makes Grace Grace.

If we claim to be Christians, or a Christian Church, then Jesus is not optional. The cross is not something we remove from the worship center so as not to offend.  Paul says the cross is the great offense. The cross means God isn't squishy.  He isn't known by many names.  He's known only by the name Jesus.  His inclusive grace doesn't come to us through many paths, all of them equal, it comes to us through the cross and only the cross.   God isn't squishy.  God comes to us on a rugged cross with nail holes in his hands and a wound in his side.  And that can be a stumbling block for many.  But that's how God chose to make himself known to us--using the scandal and recklessness of the cross.

And so, with Paul, as a church we should ultimately be known for one thing and one thing only: Christ and him crucified.

While it's important to hold up how God is at work through us as Community of Grace to inspire us to continue to follow him, ultimately, if we aren't known for our passion for Christ, for being a faith community gathered around the cross of Christ, then we've lost our way.

What makes Grace Grace? The cross of Jesus.  The call of Jesus to take up the cross and follow him.  Following him on the bold, daring, reckless adventure of bringing grace to the world.

This is going to be increasingly important these next 10 years as we begin to transition to the next generation of leadership.  It's not about Tim Wright.  It's not about the staff or worship team or volunteers. It's about Jesus the crucified one, using us to bring his grace to the world for generations to come.

My prayer is that Grace increasingly gains a reputation in the community for being a church that really believes in Jesus and really follows the Crucified One.

Wrapping up Outrageous Grace

For the last five weeks we've been looking at the 5 most outrageous stories Jesus tells about grace.  You can view the various messages here.

In these stories Jesus makes several outrageous claims about God's grace:

1) God's grace is far more expansive than we can ever imagine.

2) God's grace is only offered to sinners/losers/spiritually dead people.

3) God's grace is always unfair.

4) God's grace will go to death and hell to find the "lost."

5) God's grace covers and embraces us before we can ask for it.  In fact, we can't ask for it because we are spiritually dead.

6) Faith in God's grace is a result of God's grace--God's grace resurrects us, breathing faith into us.

7) It is not our job to determine the parameters of God's grace.  That's God's job.  And as all of these grace stories remind us, this grace is far more expansive than we can ever imagine (see point 1).

One final word on grace...for now.  Grace is never forced on us.  It wouldn't be grace if it was.  We can never do anything to get God to grace us.  It wouldn't be grace if we could.  But grace is ultimately an irresistible force.  It is a power, a love, a compassion, a hope that keeps on calling to us until finally we can resist the gift no longer.  As I said this past weekend: Every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess, (in heaven and on earth and under the earth) that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:9-11).  This is not a threat.  This is not coercion.  This is a promise of grace.  It is the reality of an irresistible grace.  No one can resist that powerful, sacrificial, unconditional, transforming gift forever.  It's too explosive.  It's too combustible.  It's too overwhelming.  It's ultimately too good.

And that irresistible grace will lead us into life and it will lead us home!