There is much to be said for the actions of the Church over the past 2000 years. Many things done in the name of Jesus that we ought to boast in, yet there are many things done in the name of Jesus that we ought to be ashamed of. The Church, as Jesus said he would build it upon Peter in Matthew 16, should consist of those who gather in Jesus name to proclaim the Good News. The proclamation of the Good News, then, is what Jesus commissioned his disciples to do when he left; literally his witnesses of what had happened (Acts 1).
Proclaiming the Good News of Jesus Christ has often been limited and surrendered to the pulpit on Sunday mornings, and occasional encounters throughout the week. Yet this is not what we see of Jesus’ disciples in last verses of Luke, nor the beginning chapters of Acts. In the account at the end of Luke, after Jesus has spent time with them, they go to and do not leave the temple because they are praising God, awaiting the Spirit. The account in Acts describes the time after the Holy Spirit comes down upon them as a time of continual preaching, healing, driving out demons, and baptizing. This is the proclamation of the Good News.
Throughout early the early Church was this passion for proclaiming the Good News. Christians would cancel debts, live in voluntary poverty, live communally so that all would be provided for. They took seriously what Jesus had taught them about the Kingdom of God. His whole lifetime was an physical example of how to proclaim this Good News about the Kingdom of God being here and now. A key component of this is the Kingdom of God and what that means.
If you cannot give an answer about what the Kingdom of God is or what it means, or even if you can, it is imperative that you seek out what that means. Donald Kraybill, in his book The Upside-Down Kingdom, analyzes the Kingdom of God from multiple angles. He says that Jesus began the re-creation of earth, known as the Kingdom of God. In his life, he made things right again, socially, economically, racially, physically, and spiritually. He restored the sight of the blind man. He restored a heartless tax collector into a heartfelt giver. He restored life to a dear friend and a young girl. Jesus was in the business of restoring and reconciling things. That was his example of how to proclaim the Good News. And now it is the disciples turn to begin to proclaim the Good News that Jesus showed, by proclaiming the Good News itself.
Man alone cannot proclaim the Good News adequately. It is only an imitation. That, in fact, is what we have been teaching children all along to do, is to imitate Jesus. We realize that this cannot be done, so then we begin to water him down by putting bracelets on our wrist to remind us what we would if we were Jesus. Nothing inherently wrong with this, but it boils down to what kind of gum would Jesus choose? There is a need now, more than ever, to recapture this Good News and proclaim it loud in our communities through the power of the Holy Spirit! We need to teach our children and those around us we believe in Jesus, not simply just to act like him. We need to re-learn, ourselves, the gravity of the Kingdom of God, and then the church can do work.James A. Harding and David Lipscomb described a way of life in which we should live in the “Shadow of the Second Coming.” Living this way does call us to live in a sense of urgency.
Jesus’ disciples knew for a fact that Jesus was coming back again SOON! As in tomorrow. They were confident of this. We have simply lost that call. We know all too well that Jesus isn’t really going to come again for a long time. We are going to live till we’re in our 70s or 80s, and our purpose for living is to set up a comfortable life for the future generations to live in.
This call to live as if Jesus is coming back tomorrow is abrasive! It’s uncomfortable! And if we truly believe this message that Jesus is Returning to restore the world, then it will dramatically affect how we live. When we stop and look through this lens, we know longer see a need for governments, for political systems of any kind, to hate, for racism, to judge, to segregate. We are unified in the fact that we live for the moment, because the moment is all that we’re guaranteed.
“Live as if the future is already present.”
what text is God-inspired/God-revealed?
does it end with revelations? augustine? c.s. lewis?
is all truth revealed by God? yes. so how do we determine what is and what isn’t?
the “church” was kicked out of the Holy city.. their city.
Jesus was disowned and kicked of His city.
Christians went back into their city to fight for it.. thus the crusades.
Jesus wiped the dust from his feet and continued on.
this poem is extremely helpful to me in envisioning creation. actually knowing the words of this poem is imperative to its gravity. think you know cypress.. look it up on google images. think you know jasmine.. look it up on google images. think you chigil.. look it up on wikipedia. think you know a pomegranate flower.. http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3067/3027174287_08f336a1e9.jpg here goes…
what was said to the rose - rumi
what was said to the rose that made it open
was said to me here in my chest.
what was told the cypress that made it strong
and straight, what was
whispered the jasmine so it is what it is, whatever made
sugarcane sweet, whatever
was said to the inhabitants of chigil in
turkestan that makes them
so handsome, whatever lets the pomegranate flower blush
like a human face, that is
being said to me now. i blush. whatever put eloquence in
language, that’s happening here.
the great warehouse doors open; i fill with gratitude,
chewing a piece of sugarcane,
in love with the one to whom every that belongs!
what if i were to sit down every night to celebrate and remember the life of Jesus in that day? it seems so convenient that we happen to eat a meal every night, and Jesus even used this meal to “institute” the LORD’s supper. the meal that we are asked to remember consistently. how much more can we be re-centered and re-focused on our reason for living as Christians?
