TheDeSocios.com

I am beginning to realize the difference between a disjointed, individualistic and incomplete understanding of the Gospel, and its holistic and biblical alternative is made with one small word – “a”.  This is clearly seen in the two similar but vastly different phrases “God is saving people for himself”  vs. “God is saving a people for himself.”

One creates lots of individuals Christians, the other creates and extends the kingdom.

This will not make me a popular person with many people, but I think that there might be some really dangers associated with using a liturgy in worship.
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A survey just came out from Ireland saying “65% of those surveyed would choose to help the world as a whole, such as putting an end to poverty, bringing about world peace and stopping global warming.” At first read this might be seen as a good thing, but I think that it reveals a profoundly sad state. It reveals that people think that God should be a cosmic nanny–running behind us to pick up our messes, so that we are never inconvenienced by them. Afterall, when people say how they would do someone else’s job they are in effect saying they think he/she is not doing a good job. We want a God who will let us be lazy. We want a God who will pick up after us. While the Christian Faith does say that God needs to work for us to be reconnected to him, it also says that God also calls us to participate with him in cleaning up the mess that we have made.

God should be a cosmic nanny–running behind us to pick up our messes, so that we are never inconvenienced by them.

In the Christian faith, God invites us to participate rather than simply watch from the comfort of a cozy chair. God deeply cares for the poor (Jeremiah 22:3), He is Call the Prince of Peace(Isaiah 9:6), he even makes special rules for how we should treat the forests(Deuteronomy 20:20)–but rather than snapping his fingers and making the problem go away he says to us “come help me with this.”

For all our calls to action and our high respect for social justice, would we prefer to watch things get repaired, than actually help in the clean-up efforts?

Ive been reading Total Church, by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis, and starting to ask myself–should we be churches with communities or churches that are communities? Here is what I mean–is “community” another program that is offered by the church? Just one of the list of things a church offers to people trying to decide which church to attend.

It seems like the churches of the New Testament were communities, they didn’t offer some program called community, its just what they were. The early church spent its life together, and we know that by the end of the first century they were also together in the deaths.

Though Ive not finished Total Church, I would at least recommend the first section of the book – it is a simple and accurate examination of what a church should look like.