We've had Jim Belcher with us in London for the past few days. If you're not familiar with Jim, I'm happy to introduce you. Jim is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach, CA, and the author of Deep Church: A Third Way Beyond Emerging and Traditional (http://www.thedeepchurch.com/). Jim and I were at Fuller Seminary in the late 80s, and have gotten to know each other better over this past year. He's taking a writing sabbatical over this next year, and we were happy to host him while he was scouting a place for his family to live. Jim preached at the American Church in London on Pentecost Sunday, and the next day sat in on two conversations among church planters and other leaders here in my part of the world.
If you've read this blog over the last few years you know that London is a challenging place to do ministry. Without devaluing in any way my own seminary and practical training, it's safe to say that in order to be effective here, I had to learn a new set of skills to go alongside what I brought with me. It's the church planters who are teaching me what I need to know.
In my role as the pastor of a local church, some of the challenges to doing ministry come from within the congregation itself. It's a largely transient group; many of our families are here for 2-3 years and then are reposted to another country or back to the US. Our congregation is also made up of different denominational traditions--there isn't much shared knowledge or understanding of how to think about (or govern) a local church. Mostly, though, London itself can often pose the most daunting challenges to leading an effective, growing congregation.
In Southern California you often hear about the growing sense of secularization in the culture, made worse by the way church members move around. It's hard to say this without sounding dismissive, but in comparison London can make LA look like a stable community of unified Christian believers. (I'll pause to let that sink in.)
Here's an example of what I'm talking about. A church planter from Camden Town, an under-churched, poly-cultural, bohemian part of London with a tiny fraction of residents identifying themselves as Christians, said that many of the people in his area move every 12 months. Why? Because the standard length of a lease for a flat is one year, and after that many people move in search of more affordable housing. How do you do ministry in a community like that? The need is there, to be sure, but there is little chance to get a foothold.
Partly our conversations focused on staying theologically healthy as we reached out to our various communities. The rest became a free and wide-ranging discussion of what might work in some places (or, as it turned out, not in others), to share the gospel in a way that draws people into healthy relationships with God, with themselves, with each other and with the earth. There weren't any miracles or magic conclusions reached, but it was good to hear where people were struggling and, in some cases, seeing fruit in their ministries.
For me this past week has revealed a new and unexpected part of my own ministry here. My church is relatively stable organizationally, and that allows me to offer a gathering place for those who are out on the front lines. Just today another young church planter (from LA, no less) came by for a chat and we ended up making some tentative plans to offer space for one of their projects, and also to get together from time to time for prayer and conversation.
This convening and supporting of missionaries and church planters is becoming a part of my ministry beyond my work with ACL. It occurs to me today that I couldn't be more surprised...or happier about it.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
The Electromagnetic Radiation of a Wavelength, Visible to the Human Eye
Matthew 5:14-16
Two men were arguing over which one knew the most of the Bible. The debate went on for a while and then the first guy said to the second guy, “I’ll bet you $10 you don’t even know the Twenty-Third Psalm.”
The second man said, “I’ll take that bet.”
They put down their ten dollar bills, and the first one said, “All right go ahead, say the Twenty-Third Psalm.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, the second man began, “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom...”
And at that point, the first man handed the money over and said, “Here’s the $20. I never thought you would have known it.”
Clearly neither one of these guys knew their Bible very well, which is too bad. The Scriptures represent the most important part of God’s plan to communicate with his creation. They are the centerpiece of God’s revelation—his revealing of himself—to all of us. Knowing the Bible is an important part of how we know God—how we know his mind and heart—and how we prepare ourselves to be the light of the world—to share what we know and believe with anyone and everyone.
We’ve been talking over these past few weeks about the idea of the ‘active ingredient.’ The active ingredient is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
We continue our series on what it means to be the active ingredients—to live our faith in a way that make our communities better, healthier, more shalom-filled places. Active ingredients that bring the message of the gospel in authentic ways to the places where we live and work and study and shop.
This is a journey through what it means to be missional people in a missional church. Those are the terms we’re going to use over these next weeks and months.
We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live as God’s people in the world.
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
Our text is the flipside of the passage last week about salt. In the 1-2 punch that Jesus was delivering to his listeners, this is the second strike. People came to Jesus to find out what he was offering—what was in this faith business for them, and Jesus turns it around so that the point was how this faith made a difference in how they treated others—what they were willing to share with the world.
He starts by appealing to their egos. ‘You are the light of the world.’
Who wouldn’t love to hear that? Who doesn’t want to be the star of the game, or the head of the class, or the life of the party. ‘You are the light of the world.’ I can see the crowd feeling pretty good about that.
But it might have started to turn with the second line. ‘A city on a hill can’t be hidden.’
That one might have made them squirm a little. If you’re going to be a source of light, then there’s nowhere to hide—nowhere you can’t be seen. This is one of the mixed blessings in battle of using radar. It helps you find what you’re looking for, but it also let’s other people find you. Nowhere to hide. I wonder how many people got up and left after that part.
Then Jesus breaks the tension with a joke. ‘No one lights a lamp and then puts a bowl over it.’
People would have chuckled about that one. Of course no one would do that—what a dumb thing that would be. Lighting a lamp and covering it with a bowl would be, well, it would miss the point of having the lamp in the first place.
Jesus would have agreed. ‘When you light a lamp you hang it up so that everyone in your house can benefit from the light.’
And then he drops the bomb. ‘Let your light shine where everyone can see it, so that they can see the way you live and give their own praise to your Father in heaven.’
Meeting Jesus in a meaningful way and not sharing it with someone else is like lighting a lamp and covering it with a nice big bowl. It just doesn’t make any sense. It misses the point of having the light in the first place.
Meeting Jesus in a meaningful way brings with it the call to share and to live that story with the people around us.
We finally got around to seeing the movie, ‘The Blind Side’, last week. As a matter of fact, we saw it on Friday night and liked it so much we watched it again on Sunday.
The movie was based on a book that was about the changing economics of football. In 1985 Joe Theismann, the quarterback for the Weashington Redskins, was hit so hard by a guy he never saw coming that he shattered his leg and never played again. Even now I can see some of you wincing—you remember how many times they replayed that tape. 'The Blind Side' partly tells the story of how NFL teams had to rethink the value of each player on their squads. Eventually, while the quarterback remained the highest-paid player on every team, the left tackle—the one who protects a right-handed QB’s blind side—is now often the second-highest paid player.
But the book and movie also follow the story of Michael Oher, a poor kid in Memphis who has the physical ability to thrive in this new era of football, but who needs some help in getting his life in order.
The movie also tells the story of a Christian family and their response to a young person in need. The focus is really on the mom in the story, Leigh Ann Touhy, played by Sandra Bullock. The mom’s story—and the story of the way her family responded—is pretty compelling. What surprised me, and one of the things I’m loving about the book, is that in this upper-middle-class white evangelical Republican cast of characters, person after person does exactly the right thing…explicitly because of their Christian faith.
The principal of the private Christian high school that took Michael in, a man named Steve Simpson, had a plaque on his desk with a verse from Second Corinthians. It read:
‘God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in his good works.’
One of the amazing things that comes out in both the book and the movie is that the administrators of the school thought it was more important to give Michael Oher an education than to make a sports hero out of him. Principal Simpson, the one who had that plaque about sharing our abundance, admitted Oher to the school with the provision that he wasn’t allowed to play sports until he could function on his own as a student.
Simpson didn’t have to do that. In a part of the US that is football-crazy he probably seemed like he’d lost his marbles for keeping this potential star off the field.
‘No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bowl. They put it on a stand and it gives light to everyone in the house.’
In the end these people acted as the light of the world—they believed and prayed and agonized over whether or not they were doing the right thing. Teachers, parents, administrators all seemed to care deeply that what they believed would somehow help them make the right decisions about what to do to help this poor kid.
The family at the center of the story did their best to share the light of their love for Jesus with Michael Oher—and with the world. The point is that they started with their own home. They had two kids of their own—a young son and a daughter who was Michael’s age. They were successful and respected in the community. They were proper Southerners who’d been educated in Mississippi and gotten rich in Tennessee.
The movie plays this part for laughs, but anyone who knows the South knows what kind of a social risk they took.
This conservative, white, wealthy, socially prominent family opened their home to a kid in need who happened to be an orphaned black teenager who was 6-foot, 5-inches tall and weighed 350 pounds…at 16 years old.
Here’s the point—other than that you should go and see this movie and read this book today. Here’s the point. Whatever else made up the values of this Southern family, everything was secondary to doing what their faith called them to do.
When they were presented with the need of Michael Oher, the Touhy family chose to fire up that lamp, hang it on a stand, and let it give light to everyone in their house and neighborhood.
‘No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
So back to this idea of being ‘the light of the world’.
The scientific definition of light goes like this: It's the electromagnetic radiation of a wavelength, visible to the human eye.
Now I don’t know what most of that first part means, but the second part makes perfect sense to me—the part about it being visible to the human eye.
So much about our faith is personal. We wonder and study and pray, mostly to ourselves. So much of our faith is personal.
But right in the middle of our private search for some kind of a connection with Jesus we get confronted by this little verse—so easy to breeze right past while we’re looking for something else.
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
That’s what was happening in the story of ‘The Blind Side’. The book described how the economics and values of professional football were transformed through a terrible injury and a need to protect the most important player on the team.
But the real story wasn’t about how the values of football changed. The real story was about how the values of a family were transformed through their faith in Jesus Christ. How they took the gift of light that came from their encounter with the Messiah, and shared that light in their home and with the world.
Try this version of that same text.
‘You are the light of the world. You can’t hide it, and no one should even try. When you get a little light going in your own life, make sure your own house is lit up. Then let someone else experience it too. That’s how they’ll know that the God you talk about is real, by your actions, by the way you share your light.’
Our faith becomes real when it begins to generate some light.
Our faith becomes real when we live it and share it and make different decisions because of it.
Our faith becomes real when it is visible to the human eye.
Whatever it is that we believe about God, about the work of Jesus Christ to redeem and restore our lives, about the role of the Holy Spirit to empower us to be the people we were made to be. Whatever it is that we struggle to believe as Christian people, what matters is how it offers light to people who think that the darkness in this world is all there is.
“You are the light of the world…let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
As we think about what it means to be missional people—to work and worship together as a missional church—keep those words in mind.
As we take a few moments to recognize the way some special volunteers here share their light with others, keep those words in mind.
Our faith becomes real when it is visible to the human eye.
How will you share that light with your world?
That was the point of that joke about the two guys who didn't know much about the Bible. Being the light of the world begins with knowing God’s word, where we see what that light means and what it promises. It begins with entering the Scriptures and wrestling with what they teach. It’s in that act of faith that we’re refined into the disciples God made us to be.
My prayer for all of us is that we’ll allow the refiner to enter in, to make his values our values, and send us out as agents of his light for everyone to see.
Amen.
Let’s stand and sing together: ‘Refiner’s Fire’
Two men were arguing over which one knew the most of the Bible. The debate went on for a while and then the first guy said to the second guy, “I’ll bet you $10 you don’t even know the Twenty-Third Psalm.”
The second man said, “I’ll take that bet.”
They put down their ten dollar bills, and the first one said, “All right go ahead, say the Twenty-Third Psalm.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, the second man began, “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom...”
And at that point, the first man handed the money over and said, “Here’s the $20. I never thought you would have known it.”
Clearly neither one of these guys knew their Bible very well, which is too bad. The Scriptures represent the most important part of God’s plan to communicate with his creation. They are the centerpiece of God’s revelation—his revealing of himself—to all of us. Knowing the Bible is an important part of how we know God—how we know his mind and heart—and how we prepare ourselves to be the light of the world—to share what we know and believe with anyone and everyone.
We’ve been talking over these past few weeks about the idea of the ‘active ingredient.’ The active ingredient is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
We continue our series on what it means to be the active ingredients—to live our faith in a way that make our communities better, healthier, more shalom-filled places. Active ingredients that bring the message of the gospel in authentic ways to the places where we live and work and study and shop.
This is a journey through what it means to be missional people in a missional church. Those are the terms we’re going to use over these next weeks and months.
We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live as God’s people in the world.
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
Our text is the flipside of the passage last week about salt. In the 1-2 punch that Jesus was delivering to his listeners, this is the second strike. People came to Jesus to find out what he was offering—what was in this faith business for them, and Jesus turns it around so that the point was how this faith made a difference in how they treated others—what they were willing to share with the world.
He starts by appealing to their egos. ‘You are the light of the world.’
Who wouldn’t love to hear that? Who doesn’t want to be the star of the game, or the head of the class, or the life of the party. ‘You are the light of the world.’ I can see the crowd feeling pretty good about that.
But it might have started to turn with the second line. ‘A city on a hill can’t be hidden.’
That one might have made them squirm a little. If you’re going to be a source of light, then there’s nowhere to hide—nowhere you can’t be seen. This is one of the mixed blessings in battle of using radar. It helps you find what you’re looking for, but it also let’s other people find you. Nowhere to hide. I wonder how many people got up and left after that part.
Then Jesus breaks the tension with a joke. ‘No one lights a lamp and then puts a bowl over it.’
People would have chuckled about that one. Of course no one would do that—what a dumb thing that would be. Lighting a lamp and covering it with a bowl would be, well, it would miss the point of having the lamp in the first place.
Jesus would have agreed. ‘When you light a lamp you hang it up so that everyone in your house can benefit from the light.’
And then he drops the bomb. ‘Let your light shine where everyone can see it, so that they can see the way you live and give their own praise to your Father in heaven.’
Meeting Jesus in a meaningful way and not sharing it with someone else is like lighting a lamp and covering it with a nice big bowl. It just doesn’t make any sense. It misses the point of having the light in the first place.
Meeting Jesus in a meaningful way brings with it the call to share and to live that story with the people around us.
We finally got around to seeing the movie, ‘The Blind Side’, last week. As a matter of fact, we saw it on Friday night and liked it so much we watched it again on Sunday.
The movie was based on a book that was about the changing economics of football. In 1985 Joe Theismann, the quarterback for the Weashington Redskins, was hit so hard by a guy he never saw coming that he shattered his leg and never played again. Even now I can see some of you wincing—you remember how many times they replayed that tape. 'The Blind Side' partly tells the story of how NFL teams had to rethink the value of each player on their squads. Eventually, while the quarterback remained the highest-paid player on every team, the left tackle—the one who protects a right-handed QB’s blind side—is now often the second-highest paid player.
But the book and movie also follow the story of Michael Oher, a poor kid in Memphis who has the physical ability to thrive in this new era of football, but who needs some help in getting his life in order.
The movie also tells the story of a Christian family and their response to a young person in need. The focus is really on the mom in the story, Leigh Ann Touhy, played by Sandra Bullock. The mom’s story—and the story of the way her family responded—is pretty compelling. What surprised me, and one of the things I’m loving about the book, is that in this upper-middle-class white evangelical Republican cast of characters, person after person does exactly the right thing…explicitly because of their Christian faith.
The principal of the private Christian high school that took Michael in, a man named Steve Simpson, had a plaque on his desk with a verse from Second Corinthians. It read:
‘God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in his good works.’
One of the amazing things that comes out in both the book and the movie is that the administrators of the school thought it was more important to give Michael Oher an education than to make a sports hero out of him. Principal Simpson, the one who had that plaque about sharing our abundance, admitted Oher to the school with the provision that he wasn’t allowed to play sports until he could function on his own as a student.
Simpson didn’t have to do that. In a part of the US that is football-crazy he probably seemed like he’d lost his marbles for keeping this potential star off the field.
‘No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bowl. They put it on a stand and it gives light to everyone in the house.’
In the end these people acted as the light of the world—they believed and prayed and agonized over whether or not they were doing the right thing. Teachers, parents, administrators all seemed to care deeply that what they believed would somehow help them make the right decisions about what to do to help this poor kid.
The family at the center of the story did their best to share the light of their love for Jesus with Michael Oher—and with the world. The point is that they started with their own home. They had two kids of their own—a young son and a daughter who was Michael’s age. They were successful and respected in the community. They were proper Southerners who’d been educated in Mississippi and gotten rich in Tennessee.
The movie plays this part for laughs, but anyone who knows the South knows what kind of a social risk they took.
This conservative, white, wealthy, socially prominent family opened their home to a kid in need who happened to be an orphaned black teenager who was 6-foot, 5-inches tall and weighed 350 pounds…at 16 years old.
Here’s the point—other than that you should go and see this movie and read this book today. Here’s the point. Whatever else made up the values of this Southern family, everything was secondary to doing what their faith called them to do.
When they were presented with the need of Michael Oher, the Touhy family chose to fire up that lamp, hang it on a stand, and let it give light to everyone in their house and neighborhood.
‘No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
So back to this idea of being ‘the light of the world’.
The scientific definition of light goes like this: It's the electromagnetic radiation of a wavelength, visible to the human eye.
Now I don’t know what most of that first part means, but the second part makes perfect sense to me—the part about it being visible to the human eye.
So much about our faith is personal. We wonder and study and pray, mostly to ourselves. So much of our faith is personal.
But right in the middle of our private search for some kind of a connection with Jesus we get confronted by this little verse—so easy to breeze right past while we’re looking for something else.
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
That’s what was happening in the story of ‘The Blind Side’. The book described how the economics and values of professional football were transformed through a terrible injury and a need to protect the most important player on the team.
But the real story wasn’t about how the values of football changed. The real story was about how the values of a family were transformed through their faith in Jesus Christ. How they took the gift of light that came from their encounter with the Messiah, and shared that light in their home and with the world.
Try this version of that same text.
‘You are the light of the world. You can’t hide it, and no one should even try. When you get a little light going in your own life, make sure your own house is lit up. Then let someone else experience it too. That’s how they’ll know that the God you talk about is real, by your actions, by the way you share your light.’
Our faith becomes real when it begins to generate some light.
Our faith becomes real when we live it and share it and make different decisions because of it.
Our faith becomes real when it is visible to the human eye.
Whatever it is that we believe about God, about the work of Jesus Christ to redeem and restore our lives, about the role of the Holy Spirit to empower us to be the people we were made to be. Whatever it is that we struggle to believe as Christian people, what matters is how it offers light to people who think that the darkness in this world is all there is.
“You are the light of the world…let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
As we think about what it means to be missional people—to work and worship together as a missional church—keep those words in mind.
As we take a few moments to recognize the way some special volunteers here share their light with others, keep those words in mind.
Our faith becomes real when it is visible to the human eye.
How will you share that light with your world?
That was the point of that joke about the two guys who didn't know much about the Bible. Being the light of the world begins with knowing God’s word, where we see what that light means and what it promises. It begins with entering the Scriptures and wrestling with what they teach. It’s in that act of faith that we’re refined into the disciples God made us to be.
My prayer for all of us is that we’ll allow the refiner to enter in, to make his values our values, and send us out as agents of his light for everyone to see.
Amen.
Let’s stand and sing together: ‘Refiner’s Fire’
Friday, May 14, 2010
Salt and Other Necessities
Matthew 5:13-16
In the Financial Times last week there was an article about the ‘European Christian Equity Index’, a new investment opportunity that is trying to earn competitive returns without trading in shares that involve alcohol or firearms or gambling, among other things.
It’s probably easy to poke fun or to be cynical about this. But I see it as an attempt to join what some people believe with how they invest. Whatever you might think about it, if the last few years have taught us anything it’s that we should pay more attention to how and where we earn our money.
13"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled.
14"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.
We’re going to spend two Sundays in this brief passage. This week we focus on the salt in the passage, and next week we’re going to talk about the light.
We’ve been talking over these past few weeks about the idea of the ‘active ingredient.’ The active ingredient is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
The technical term for the active ingredient in a medicine is pharmakos, which originally described a drug or even a magical substance. That same word also described the ‘scapegoat’ in ancient Greece, part of the practice of placing whatever harms the health of a community on an animal, and then sending it out into the desert. The hope was that the scapegoat would restore the health of the community—of the people and of the land.
We continue our series on what it means to be the active ingredients that bring the message of the gospel to the places where we live and work and study and shop.
Along the way we’re going to see how living what we believe can be a way to help restore health to our communities—to help take away whatever threatens the life and shalom of the world around us—to bring reconciliation and justice and even peace to the places we go and live in every day.
This is a journey through what it means to be missional people in a missional church. Those are the terms we’re going to use over these next weeks and months.
We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live as God’s people in the world.
The Christian faith is a missional faith. The church, meaning everyone who follows Christ in faith—the church of Jesus Christ has a mission, and the mission of the church is to wrestle with what it believes and teaches about what God is doing in the world, and to be instruments of God’s love and plan everywhere we go, and in everything that we do.
That two-part definition is the sole mission of the church. Knowing God and living what we know is what we’re called to do and to be as missional people in a missional church. That’s the point for all of us as we move through the spring season.
What does that mean?
In one sense, being mission-minded and mission-hearted means understanding the gospel and what it offers for us and for the world.
It also means that we allow that gospel to season everything that we do, everywhere that we are.
The guiding text for this series is as familiar as it is crucial. It gets at the heart of what the life of Jesus teaches us about being the Body of Christ.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
Knowing about God is important. Living what we know is the rest of the story.
It’s in living what we believe about Jesus Christ that makes us active ingredients in our homes and lives and schools and jobs and neighborhoods.
So back to our text. It’s hard to imagine our lives without salt, and yet it’s a strange sort of relationship. Mark Kurlansky wrote a book a few years back about salt and its role in history. (I’ll pause for you to snicker at the idea of reading a history book about salt.)
He helps us understand the origins of the salt we take for granted on most of our tables. He writes:
"When sodium, an unstable metal that can suddenly burst into flame, reacts with a deadly poisonous gas known as chlorine, it becomes the staple food sodium chloride, NaCl, from the only family of rocks eaten by humans."
He also mentions a booklet produced in 1920 by the Diamond Crystal Salt Company of St. Clair, Mich., that listed a mere 101 uses, from ''keeping the colors bright on boiled vegetables'' to ''making ice cream freeze,'' from ''removing rust'' to ''sealing cracks,'' from ''cleaning bamboo furniture'' to ''killing poison ivy.'' And that's not to mention all the medicinal applications, like treating ''dyspepsia, sprains, sore throats and earaches.'' Today, Kurlansky writes, the salt industry boasts more than 14,000 uses.
An ancient Egyptian document makes the claim that ‘there is no better food than salted vegetables’.
The Romans thought salt was an aphrodisiac, and used the term ‘salax’ to describe a man in love. We get the term salacious from the same place. I’m still trying to figure out how that part works its way into the sermon.
And salt has had a whole range of other important properties and roles in the history of civilization.
Preservative: The use of salt as a preservative for food transformed civilization and made it possible for more people to eat healthier food than they could before. Until the advent of the freezer, salt was the primary tool for preserving food and making it possible to distribute it around the world.
Medicine: Salt was used to clean out infections and heal any number of illnesses. Salt itself has been the active ingredient in a range of medicines right up to modern times.
Defining value: At one point salt was the major economic unit of the civilized world. It was used to pay employees and soldiers, and for a while functioned as the exchange rate mechanism between nations. It’s where we get the word ‘salary’.
Seasoning: This last use of salt is the one most familiar to us. It tastes good. We put it on food and whatever we’re eating comes to life. We get the word ‘salad’ from an old word for ‘salted vegetables’. Can you imagine eggs or French fries or even a steak without salt? Candy makers know that even sweet things taste better with a little salt.
How does this help us to be missional people? To be a missional church?
How does an understanding of the role of salt help us to become the active ingredients in our own places and lives?
Think about the properties of salt that we just talked about. There are four principles here about salt that can help us become the people and the place God calls us to be.
Preservative: We’re supposed to be deeply involved in the world around us, keeping it fresh and preventing it from getting rotten. God made this world to be nourishing—not just in food but in culture and commerce—family and political life, too.
Medicinal: As followers of Christ we’re called to be agents of healing and comfort, figuring out ways to offer cures or solutions to whatever makes our communities and cultures sick. The gospel has important things to say about personal and social morality. Just because we’ve done it poorly in the past, doesn’t mean we can surrender the field. Being active ingredients in our communities is how we share Christ’s work with the world he came to redeem.
Defining value: We don’t get paid in salt anymore, even if we’re worth our salt. But as Christians we’re called to claim our voice in defending the value of everyone and everything God has made. That’s why we work for economic and social justice in the world—it’s why we give and serve in efforts to stop the abuse of God’s people wherever it happens.
Seasoning: I love this one, because it reminds us that this business of being disciples of Jesus is supposed to be enjoyable—it’s supposed to make life better, more flavorful. It’s not right that meeting the savior of the universe in a transforming way somehow dooms us to being the stick in the mud at a party. Life is a gift, and enjoying life honors the gift God gave us all. When we become people who enjoy our lives not in spite of our faith, but because of it, we become salt to the world around us—people whose very lives make other people’s lives better.
If you don’t believe me on that, read the 8th chapter of Nehemiah. God’s people are back in their homeland and they gather to hear the Scripture read out loud. They start to weep and worry, but God tells them through a prophet to stop their crying, to get their best food and drink and to throw a party. He tells them to find people who don’t have enough and share it with them so they can celebrate too.
It should be a source of joy to know us. It should be a source of happiness and anticipation for our neighbors to see us and spend time with us. Does it work that way for you and your neighbors?
The invitation to all of us as we seek to live as salt in our communities is to reflect the joy of being forgiven, transformed people. As we move through this series of messages, that’s going to be our focus.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’ The call is on us to do the same.
That European Christian Stock Index I mentioned before is just one example of how to do this in the world. It’s not the whole answer, and it may or may not work in the long run. But it’s an attempt to enter into the broader world—into the culture around us—and to live and thrive as an example of Christian values.
Jim Belcher, who will be preaching here in two weeks, makes a case for living in a way that is connected to our communities—being agents of the gospel in the culture. He writes:
“We should be known as those who create culture for the common good, for all people and not just fellow believers, culture that makes life better, more whole, for the entire city. While we are distinct from the surrounding culture, we also engage it. Add to this the mandate to seek the welfare of the city, and we get a powerful recipe for cultural transformation.”
I’ve said this before, but the people in this room on any given Sunday have enough influence and control enough resources to change the world. Will you?
It’s in joining what we believe to what we do—allowing our faith to call us to action—it’s in seeing how what we believe informs how we live—it’s in all of that that we become salt—the active ingredients in our homes and jobs and communities that communicate and spread the gospel of Jesus Christ in meaningful ways.
Next week, as we honor our teachers and youth volunteers, we’re going to shift our focus to the ‘light’ part of this passage—the part about how we take in and reflect the word of God in our lives. We can bridge the gap between the two with our song of response. Let’s stand and sing together, ‘Thy Word is a Lamp Unto My Feet’.
In the Financial Times last week there was an article about the ‘European Christian Equity Index’, a new investment opportunity that is trying to earn competitive returns without trading in shares that involve alcohol or firearms or gambling, among other things.
It’s probably easy to poke fun or to be cynical about this. But I see it as an attempt to join what some people believe with how they invest. Whatever you might think about it, if the last few years have taught us anything it’s that we should pay more attention to how and where we earn our money.
13"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled.
14"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before all people, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.
We’re going to spend two Sundays in this brief passage. This week we focus on the salt in the passage, and next week we’re going to talk about the light.
We’ve been talking over these past few weeks about the idea of the ‘active ingredient.’ The active ingredient is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
The technical term for the active ingredient in a medicine is pharmakos, which originally described a drug or even a magical substance. That same word also described the ‘scapegoat’ in ancient Greece, part of the practice of placing whatever harms the health of a community on an animal, and then sending it out into the desert. The hope was that the scapegoat would restore the health of the community—of the people and of the land.
We continue our series on what it means to be the active ingredients that bring the message of the gospel to the places where we live and work and study and shop.
Along the way we’re going to see how living what we believe can be a way to help restore health to our communities—to help take away whatever threatens the life and shalom of the world around us—to bring reconciliation and justice and even peace to the places we go and live in every day.
This is a journey through what it means to be missional people in a missional church. Those are the terms we’re going to use over these next weeks and months.
We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live as God’s people in the world.
The Christian faith is a missional faith. The church, meaning everyone who follows Christ in faith—the church of Jesus Christ has a mission, and the mission of the church is to wrestle with what it believes and teaches about what God is doing in the world, and to be instruments of God’s love and plan everywhere we go, and in everything that we do.
That two-part definition is the sole mission of the church. Knowing God and living what we know is what we’re called to do and to be as missional people in a missional church. That’s the point for all of us as we move through the spring season.
What does that mean?
In one sense, being mission-minded and mission-hearted means understanding the gospel and what it offers for us and for the world.
It also means that we allow that gospel to season everything that we do, everywhere that we are.
The guiding text for this series is as familiar as it is crucial. It gets at the heart of what the life of Jesus teaches us about being the Body of Christ.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
Knowing about God is important. Living what we know is the rest of the story.
It’s in living what we believe about Jesus Christ that makes us active ingredients in our homes and lives and schools and jobs and neighborhoods.
So back to our text. It’s hard to imagine our lives without salt, and yet it’s a strange sort of relationship. Mark Kurlansky wrote a book a few years back about salt and its role in history. (I’ll pause for you to snicker at the idea of reading a history book about salt.)
He helps us understand the origins of the salt we take for granted on most of our tables. He writes:
"When sodium, an unstable metal that can suddenly burst into flame, reacts with a deadly poisonous gas known as chlorine, it becomes the staple food sodium chloride, NaCl, from the only family of rocks eaten by humans."
He also mentions a booklet produced in 1920 by the Diamond Crystal Salt Company of St. Clair, Mich., that listed a mere 101 uses, from ''keeping the colors bright on boiled vegetables'' to ''making ice cream freeze,'' from ''removing rust'' to ''sealing cracks,'' from ''cleaning bamboo furniture'' to ''killing poison ivy.'' And that's not to mention all the medicinal applications, like treating ''dyspepsia, sprains, sore throats and earaches.'' Today, Kurlansky writes, the salt industry boasts more than 14,000 uses.
An ancient Egyptian document makes the claim that ‘there is no better food than salted vegetables’.
The Romans thought salt was an aphrodisiac, and used the term ‘salax’ to describe a man in love. We get the term salacious from the same place. I’m still trying to figure out how that part works its way into the sermon.
And salt has had a whole range of other important properties and roles in the history of civilization.
Preservative: The use of salt as a preservative for food transformed civilization and made it possible for more people to eat healthier food than they could before. Until the advent of the freezer, salt was the primary tool for preserving food and making it possible to distribute it around the world.
Medicine: Salt was used to clean out infections and heal any number of illnesses. Salt itself has been the active ingredient in a range of medicines right up to modern times.
Defining value: At one point salt was the major economic unit of the civilized world. It was used to pay employees and soldiers, and for a while functioned as the exchange rate mechanism between nations. It’s where we get the word ‘salary’.
Seasoning: This last use of salt is the one most familiar to us. It tastes good. We put it on food and whatever we’re eating comes to life. We get the word ‘salad’ from an old word for ‘salted vegetables’. Can you imagine eggs or French fries or even a steak without salt? Candy makers know that even sweet things taste better with a little salt.
How does this help us to be missional people? To be a missional church?
How does an understanding of the role of salt help us to become the active ingredients in our own places and lives?
Think about the properties of salt that we just talked about. There are four principles here about salt that can help us become the people and the place God calls us to be.
Preservative: We’re supposed to be deeply involved in the world around us, keeping it fresh and preventing it from getting rotten. God made this world to be nourishing—not just in food but in culture and commerce—family and political life, too.
Medicinal: As followers of Christ we’re called to be agents of healing and comfort, figuring out ways to offer cures or solutions to whatever makes our communities and cultures sick. The gospel has important things to say about personal and social morality. Just because we’ve done it poorly in the past, doesn’t mean we can surrender the field. Being active ingredients in our communities is how we share Christ’s work with the world he came to redeem.
Defining value: We don’t get paid in salt anymore, even if we’re worth our salt. But as Christians we’re called to claim our voice in defending the value of everyone and everything God has made. That’s why we work for economic and social justice in the world—it’s why we give and serve in efforts to stop the abuse of God’s people wherever it happens.
Seasoning: I love this one, because it reminds us that this business of being disciples of Jesus is supposed to be enjoyable—it’s supposed to make life better, more flavorful. It’s not right that meeting the savior of the universe in a transforming way somehow dooms us to being the stick in the mud at a party. Life is a gift, and enjoying life honors the gift God gave us all. When we become people who enjoy our lives not in spite of our faith, but because of it, we become salt to the world around us—people whose very lives make other people’s lives better.
If you don’t believe me on that, read the 8th chapter of Nehemiah. God’s people are back in their homeland and they gather to hear the Scripture read out loud. They start to weep and worry, but God tells them through a prophet to stop their crying, to get their best food and drink and to throw a party. He tells them to find people who don’t have enough and share it with them so they can celebrate too.
It should be a source of joy to know us. It should be a source of happiness and anticipation for our neighbors to see us and spend time with us. Does it work that way for you and your neighbors?
The invitation to all of us as we seek to live as salt in our communities is to reflect the joy of being forgiven, transformed people. As we move through this series of messages, that’s going to be our focus.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’ The call is on us to do the same.
That European Christian Stock Index I mentioned before is just one example of how to do this in the world. It’s not the whole answer, and it may or may not work in the long run. But it’s an attempt to enter into the broader world—into the culture around us—and to live and thrive as an example of Christian values.
Jim Belcher, who will be preaching here in two weeks, makes a case for living in a way that is connected to our communities—being agents of the gospel in the culture. He writes:
“We should be known as those who create culture for the common good, for all people and not just fellow believers, culture that makes life better, more whole, for the entire city. While we are distinct from the surrounding culture, we also engage it. Add to this the mandate to seek the welfare of the city, and we get a powerful recipe for cultural transformation.”
I’ve said this before, but the people in this room on any given Sunday have enough influence and control enough resources to change the world. Will you?
It’s in joining what we believe to what we do—allowing our faith to call us to action—it’s in seeing how what we believe informs how we live—it’s in all of that that we become salt—the active ingredients in our homes and jobs and communities that communicate and spread the gospel of Jesus Christ in meaningful ways.
Next week, as we honor our teachers and youth volunteers, we’re going to shift our focus to the ‘light’ part of this passage—the part about how we take in and reflect the word of God in our lives. We can bridge the gap between the two with our song of response. Let’s stand and sing together, ‘Thy Word is a Lamp Unto My Feet’.
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
The Life of Jesus and the Body of Christ
John 1:1-14 (esp. v14)
If you look very closely on a container of medicine you’ll see something listed as the ‘active ingredient.’ The technical term for the active ingredient in a medicine is pharmakon, which originally described a drug or even a magical substance.
The pharmakon—the active ingredient—is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
Keep that in mind as we explore this familiar—and crucial—passage from Scripture.
1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.
3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.
6There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 9The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.
10He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.
14The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
That’s such an important passage for helping us understand who Jesus Christ was…and is. John builds this case that describes Christ as being in the center of things since before time began, and then screeches everything to a halt with the most amazing, audacious, revolutionary statement ever written in any language.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
We begin a series today on what it means to be missional people in a missional church. We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live. Put another way, we're going to spend a few months exploring what we learn from the life of Jesus about being the Body of Christ.
The Christian faith is a missional faith. The church, meaning everyone who follows Christ in faith—doesn't 'do' mission. The church doesn't simply have a mission, the church is a mission. The mission that defines the church is the sole mission of the church. That’s important as we move ahead through these next 8 weeks or so.
What does that mean?
In one sense, being mission-minded and mission-hearted means understanding the gospel and what it offers for us and for the world. It also means that we allow that gospel to season everything that we do, everywhere that we are.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
Knowing about God is important. Living what we know is crucial.
It’s in living what we believe about Jesus Christ that makes us active ingredients in our homes and lives and schools and jobs and neighborhoods.
Remember that word for the active ingredient…pharmakos? I was pretty happily surprised this week to learn that the other meaning of that word in the ancient world was scapegoat.
The pharmakos, or scapegoat, in ancient Greece was someone who was chosen or forced to take responsibility for a plague or famine or war that threatened the community. The scapegoat was saddled with all of the blame and sent out of the community—they took the punishment for whatever was happening in the hopes that the rest of the city or nation could be saved.
I hope the parallels to the gospel are pretty clear here.
In the 16th chapter of Leviticus we learn about the origins of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement in the Jewish tradition. One of the symbols of God’s atoning work in that holiday is the scapegoat. The goat is presented as a living sacrifice, saddled with the sin of the community, and then released into the desert.
The core of the gospel, of the Christian message, is that Jesus takes on that scapegoat role—that in order to complete his work of atoning for our sins, he takes all of that sin on himself so that we don’t have to.
But the story of Jesus turns the old scapegoat story on its head. The main point of the Jesus story isn’t that he went out into the desert and never came back. In fact, the point of the gospel is exactly the opposite.
The point of the Jesus story is that ‘the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
That’s the lesson in this passage for how the church is designed and called to live. In the life of Jesus we see him going out and living with people, with the ones who needed to know him, with the ones who were in desperate need of forgiveness and reconciliation and atonement.
Jesus came and went out into homes and neighborhoods and public squares and offered his life-changing power to whoever would listen.
Jesus came and went out into the world as the active ingredient that takes away sin and death and whatever else threatens us. It’s in the message of Jesus that we find something that makes us whole and healthy again—that restores the shalom we were meant to enjoy in the first place. It’s the message of the gospel that makes it possible for God, people and creation to live together in justice, fulfillment and delight.
So what do we do about this?
If the life of Jesus is the model for how the Body of Christ is called to live and serve, then there are some marching orders for us as we begin this journey together.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
If part of the point of Jesus’ ministry was that he came and lived his real life out among real people, then we’re called to do the same.
To put it very simply: The mission of the church isn’t about being in church. It’s also not only about going to foreign countries to serve, although that’s an important part of our ministry.
The mission of the church—what it means to be a mission-minded, mission-hearted family of people—the mission of the church is to live the gospel of Jesus Christ wherever we are—whatever we’re doing.
It’s about being the active ingredient in our homes and families and jobs and schools and neighborhoods—the active ingredient that makes Jesus real to the people we come into contact with.
When we look at it that way, coming to church isn’t really the point. The real point is coming to church so that we can be inspired and equipped to go out into the world as God’s messengers.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us,’ and the call on our lives is to do the same.
To go out and put flesh on the message of Jesus—to be the active ingredient that brings health and healing—to bring the message to life as we live our lives among the people God loves and wants to restore.
Over the next few months we’re going to circle this topic as we grow together in our understanding of what it means to be the people of God. We’ll use terms like ‘missional’ and being mission-minded and mission-hearted, we’ll talk about joining together the words of or message to the actions in our lives.
We’ll talk about a lot of things, but whatever we say here it all comes back to the way the life of Jesus shows us how to be the body of Christ.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us,’ and the call on our lives is to do the same.
Amen.
If you look very closely on a container of medicine you’ll see something listed as the ‘active ingredient.’ The technical term for the active ingredient in a medicine is pharmakon, which originally described a drug or even a magical substance.
The pharmakon—the active ingredient—is the substance in medicine that makes the drug work—that makes us feel better. Whatever else makes up the rest of the pill or liquid, it’s the active ingredient that makes it work—the part of a drug that actually heals us, that makes us feel better, the part of the medicine that’s designed to restore our health.
Keep that in mind as we explore this familiar—and crucial—passage from Scripture.
1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.
3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.
6There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. 8He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. 9The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.
10He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.
14The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
That’s such an important passage for helping us understand who Jesus Christ was…and is. John builds this case that describes Christ as being in the center of things since before time began, and then screeches everything to a halt with the most amazing, audacious, revolutionary statement ever written in any language.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
We begin a series today on what it means to be missional people in a missional church. We find our missional habits and practices at the intersection of our minds and hearts—where what we know and believe about God, about the gospel of Jesus Christ—where all of that comes together in how we live. Put another way, we're going to spend a few months exploring what we learn from the life of Jesus about being the Body of Christ.
The Christian faith is a missional faith. The church, meaning everyone who follows Christ in faith—doesn't 'do' mission. The church doesn't simply have a mission, the church is a mission. The mission that defines the church is the sole mission of the church. That’s important as we move ahead through these next 8 weeks or so.
What does that mean?
In one sense, being mission-minded and mission-hearted means understanding the gospel and what it offers for us and for the world. It also means that we allow that gospel to season everything that we do, everywhere that we are.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
Knowing about God is important. Living what we know is crucial.
It’s in living what we believe about Jesus Christ that makes us active ingredients in our homes and lives and schools and jobs and neighborhoods.
Remember that word for the active ingredient…pharmakos? I was pretty happily surprised this week to learn that the other meaning of that word in the ancient world was scapegoat.
The pharmakos, or scapegoat, in ancient Greece was someone who was chosen or forced to take responsibility for a plague or famine or war that threatened the community. The scapegoat was saddled with all of the blame and sent out of the community—they took the punishment for whatever was happening in the hopes that the rest of the city or nation could be saved.
I hope the parallels to the gospel are pretty clear here.
In the 16th chapter of Leviticus we learn about the origins of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement in the Jewish tradition. One of the symbols of God’s atoning work in that holiday is the scapegoat. The goat is presented as a living sacrifice, saddled with the sin of the community, and then released into the desert.
The core of the gospel, of the Christian message, is that Jesus takes on that scapegoat role—that in order to complete his work of atoning for our sins, he takes all of that sin on himself so that we don’t have to.
But the story of Jesus turns the old scapegoat story on its head. The main point of the Jesus story isn’t that he went out into the desert and never came back. In fact, the point of the gospel is exactly the opposite.
The point of the Jesus story is that ‘the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
That’s the lesson in this passage for how the church is designed and called to live. In the life of Jesus we see him going out and living with people, with the ones who needed to know him, with the ones who were in desperate need of forgiveness and reconciliation and atonement.
Jesus came and went out into homes and neighborhoods and public squares and offered his life-changing power to whoever would listen.
Jesus came and went out into the world as the active ingredient that takes away sin and death and whatever else threatens us. It’s in the message of Jesus that we find something that makes us whole and healthy again—that restores the shalom we were meant to enjoy in the first place. It’s the message of the gospel that makes it possible for God, people and creation to live together in justice, fulfillment and delight.
So what do we do about this?
If the life of Jesus is the model for how the Body of Christ is called to live and serve, then there are some marching orders for us as we begin this journey together.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us.’
If part of the point of Jesus’ ministry was that he came and lived his real life out among real people, then we’re called to do the same.
To put it very simply: The mission of the church isn’t about being in church. It’s also not only about going to foreign countries to serve, although that’s an important part of our ministry.
The mission of the church—what it means to be a mission-minded, mission-hearted family of people—the mission of the church is to live the gospel of Jesus Christ wherever we are—whatever we’re doing.
It’s about being the active ingredient in our homes and families and jobs and schools and neighborhoods—the active ingredient that makes Jesus real to the people we come into contact with.
When we look at it that way, coming to church isn’t really the point. The real point is coming to church so that we can be inspired and equipped to go out into the world as God’s messengers.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us,’ and the call on our lives is to do the same.
To go out and put flesh on the message of Jesus—to be the active ingredient that brings health and healing—to bring the message to life as we live our lives among the people God loves and wants to restore.
Over the next few months we’re going to circle this topic as we grow together in our understanding of what it means to be the people of God. We’ll use terms like ‘missional’ and being mission-minded and mission-hearted, we’ll talk about joining together the words of or message to the actions in our lives.
We’ll talk about a lot of things, but whatever we say here it all comes back to the way the life of Jesus shows us how to be the body of Christ.
‘…the Word became flesh and lived among us,’ and the call on our lives is to do the same.
Amen.
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