students of jesus

From February, 2010: 
Hearing the Gospel for the First Time

I have a confession to make: I had been a Christian for five years before I ever heard the gospel.  One night at summer camp I listened to the story of a God who loved the world so much that he sent his only son to pay the price for other people’s sin.  My sin.  I believed the message, I prayed the prayer and asked Jesus into my heart--and five years later began to discover that the good news was so much better than I had been told.

Jesus didn’t proclaim the gospel of forgiveness and heaven, he proclaimed the gospel of the Kingdom of God.  His gospel of the Kingdom of God differs radically from the gospel of go-to-heaven-when-you-die.

Why not take a few minutes and check out these passages:

• John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus by preaching the Kingdom (Matthew 3: 1-2).
• The very first message Jesus shared was the Kingdom of God (Mark 1: 14-15).
• Jesus said the reason he came to Earth was to preach the Kingdom of God (Luke 4:43).
• He said the new birth was the way to enter the Kingdom of God (John 3: 5).

That’s all four gospels, and we’re just getting started:

• The book of Acts opens and closes with the Kingdom of God (Acts 1: 3 & 28: 31).
• The Kingdom of God was Paul’s message from Corinth to Ephesus to Rome.
• The book of Hebrews describes a kingdom that can never be shaken (12:28).
• Peter and James depict the Kingdom of God as the calling of all believers.
• The Holy Spirit inspired more than 150 references to God’s Kingdom in the pages of the New Testament.  And don’t even get me started on pictures of the Kingdom in the Old Testament.

If the words “Kingdom of God” seem awkward when they appear after the word “gospel” perhaps it’s because we have shortened the gospel to mean exclusively redemption from sin and going to heaven. The rediscovery of the gospel of the Kingdom, along with Jesus’ commission to “make disciples and teach them to obey” stand as the greatest need in the North American church today.  Discipleship under the Masters’ hand and maturity in Christ depend on the gospel of the Kingdom of God.

We have confused Heaven with the Kingdom.  Heaven is a great place.  I’ll get there someday because Jesus paid the price, but in the meantime Heaven is breaking into the here and now.  I believe we have become preoccupied with an arrow pointing to Heaven when we should be looking for how God is bringing the Kingdom to Earth.  In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught us to pray, “Let your Kingdom come, let your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”  (Matthew 6: 10, emphasis added)  Jesus said plainly that God’s Kingdom should be our highest priority: “Seek first the Kingdom of God.” (Matthew 6:33)  Do we really think he meant that we should place going to heaven after we die as our highest earthy priority?

Consider his actions and words at the very end of his earthly ministry.  Jesus chose to remind his friends about the message he had announced from the very beginning: the gospel of the Kingdom of God. He spent the 40 days after his resurrection teaching about the Kingdom of God (Acts 1:3)  In the few days remaining with his friends, the Kingdom of God was still his passion.

The Kingdom of God is the true context for discipleship.  No serious student of Jesus ignores his teaching or demonstration of the Kingdom.  Yes: demonstration.  Jesus explained his actions in terms of the Kingdom of God.  Healing, deliverance, and feeding the masses were all signs of the Kingdom of God.  The world longed for the rule and reign of God to come to Earth, they received their answer in the actions and teaching of Jesus.  In his absence, Jesus expects us to demonstrate and explain God’s Kingdom today.  To be about the Kingdom is to be about the Father’s business.

Perhaps one reason the church struggles in the area of spiritual formation is that we are not making disciples of the Kingdom.  In our enthusiasm over God’s forgiveness and mercy, we have overlooked his purposes and plans.  Everyone who trusts in God can expect to go to heaven, but Jesus is after more than eternal reward.  He wants us to join him in the family business.

This week is vacation time for the Hollenbach clan, so we invited friends to stay in our home and we hit the road: 13 states in 10 days (3,000 miles!). So this week is retro-post “One True Thing Week,” in which I share previous posts about the truest things I know. Today: Worship.

From September, 2010: Worship in the Midst of Doubt

Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.  (Matthew 28: 16-17)

Why doesn’t everyone include verses 16 and 17 in the “Great Commission?” I suspect because these two verses include topics rarely discussed in the lives a disciple: obedience, worship, and doubt. Can we worship in the midst of doubt?

Imagine the scene around the resurrected Jesus: his best friends giving him worship in a private setting, yet in some minds and hearts there was still doubt. Yet their doubt did not disqualify them. He still received them, and he gave the “Great Commission.”

Doubt is a solitary struggle. Most expressions of worship are outward: we sing, kneel, pray, dance, bow, read, listen, and fellowship. Others see our actions, but this passage reminds us Jesus knows our hearts and thoughts as well. What kind of doubts did some of the disciples have? Matthew does not tell us. We are left to speculate: perhaps, “I don’t belong here . . . I denied the Lord . . . Have I gone mad? . . . Is this really Jesus? . . . What will he require of me?” I believe their worship was sincere; so were their doubts.

The doubting disciples had obeyed. They had made their way to Galilee, just as Jesus instructed. Jesus did not turn away the doubters, he received their worship and included them in his mission. Disobedience would have kept them from hearing his voice; doubt did not.

What if worship is giving all of ourselves to God--even the parts that struggle to believe, to trust, to surrender? Perhaps that day the doubters discovered Isaiah’s description of Jesus was true: “A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.” (Matt. 12:20)

Earlier in his ministry Jesus told his friends, “true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.” Some people have interpreted "truth" to mean "doctrine," but what if Jesus also meant the truth about ourselves? Here’s a meditation worthy for the week: can I bring my doubts as an act of worship?

This week is vacation time for the Hollenbach clan. We invited friends to stay in our home and we hit the road: 13 states in 10 days (3,000 miles!). So this week is retro-post “One True Thing Week,” in which I share previous posts about the truest things I know. Today: Thankfulness.

From November, 2010: The Thanksgiving Diet

There are just 10 shopping days left until Thanksgiving! If that sounds strange, perhaps it’s because everywhere you look retailers have moved on from Halloween to Christmas. I don’t blame them--their job is to sell product, and retailers promote Christmas in November because they understand it's hard to sell stuff to people filled with thankfulness and contentment.

I promise this isn’t the standard “isn’t it a shame Christmas starts so early” rant. It’s not a rant at all, it’s the non-standard “do we understand the importance of giving thanks” meditation.

There are more than a hundred scriptural references to giving thanks. Consider just two Old Testament verses:

Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. (Psalm 100: 4)
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever (Psalm 107:1)

These verses are more than poetry. There reveal the crucial importance of the spiritual discipline of giving thanks. Yes--giving thanks is a spiritual discipline, a practice, a habit, developed by those growing in God’s grace.

We enter the gates of God’s courtyard by giving thanks. The image is drawn from the Temple in Jerusalem: a massive structure whose courtyard was open to nearly everyone. The Psalmist instructs us, though, that the only way in was through thanksgiving. Not the mere attitude of gratitude, but the active giving of thanks: outward, vocal, and communal.

The Psalmist also teaches us that the proper response to God’s goodness is giving thanks. If we can catch the smallest glimpse of his goodness, it will generate thanks. Conversely, if we are not in the habit of giving thanks, perhaps it’s because we have not seen his goodness. And since his love endures forever, our thanks should be unending, and always new.

Thanksgiving is where Students of Jesus begin. The measure of our spirituality is not how much scripture we can recite. It’s not whether we can heal the sick. Nor is it prophetic insight worthy of Jeremiah. It is, simply, to see God’s goodness and respond in the appropriate way: with thanksgiving.

Finally, the good news gets better. In the U.S. we have a holiday devoted to the giving of thanks. Why wait until the fourth Thursday of November? Our Thanksgiving diet can begin today, by meditating on his goodness and giving thanks.

There are sixty-six books in the Bible and that’s too many for me.

Just because we can carry a Bible in one hand we are tempted to think it is only one book--when in fact we carry around an entire library. iPhone apps distill the collected wisdom of centuries into a tap and touch guided tour while we wait for an elevator. Sixty-six books, forty-plus authors, three continents and at least 1,500 years: how many gigabytes do you need for that?

The reason this collection is too big is not because of some flaw in how the Bible has been safeguarded and delivered to us today. The problem is me. I cannot take in the bedazzling array of God’s creativity in the written word. Let me flash my orthodox credentials for a moment: of course, all sixty-six books are inspired by the Spirit of God. I trust the inspired judgment of the church fathers in setting the canon with these very books and not some others.

I am aware of through-the-Bible-in-a-year reading plans, but I find myself hanging out again and again in the same neighborhoods of the scripture. How about you? Again and again I return to the epic life stories in Genesis, but wouldn’t be caught dead hanging out with those wild-west Judges just a few books over. My heart is moved by the Psalms but I feel scolded by the Proverbs. I could read the gospels every day but when I read Paul I find myself asking, “Who made you the boss of me?” And don’t get me started on Revelation--I read it late one night and didn’t sleep for a week.

There was a time when I would feel guilty about playing favorites in the Bible. But perhaps my heart is pre-disposed to receive certain input more easily that others.

Let me be clear: it’s all the word of God. We should do our best to receive it all. We should not gainsay the books that do not yield their fruit as easily. We should desire to drink from every fountain he provides, yet we should not feel guilty if our hearts come again and again to a familiar spring.

Quite the opposite: we should ask the Spirit to reveal what this tells us about ourselves. Here are some questions to help us hear his voice in the Bible:

• What books of the Bible speak to me most clearly?
• What does this say about me--how am I postured to receive his instruction?
• Has the Bible changed for me over the years? Are the words which spoke to me in my youth the same ones that speak to me now?
• Are there treasures undiscovered in the books I read again and again?
• Are there treasures undiscovered in the books I rarely read?

These questions (and others like them) will lead us into discovery of his written word--and ourselves.