Tag Archives: gospel

LifeView: Part-y of God [from iHack]

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Over on my professional blog iHack, I’ve been working through the excellent book Designing Your Life. In addition to articulating a philosophy of work (WorkView), they challenge us to write down a philosophy of life (LifeView).

Since that obviously overlaps with my spiritual journaling here, I decided to repost it.

To move forward Together

We must internalize And reconcile

The excluded pain That enabled us

To become Us By creating Them

LifeView (Designing Your Life)

Fruit of the Spirit vs Veggies of the Law/Jellies of the Flesh

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My mind was blown a couple months ago when our preacher that week pointed out, almost as an aside, that the Fruit of the Spirit was primarily something we gave other people.

Perhaps like you, I had subconsciously assumed that Fruit meant I was feeling more love, joy, peace, etc. But once I reimagined Fruit as “experiences we give others that contain the seed of Christ,” I started to get really excited.

For three reasons: Revival, Metrics, and CounterFruit.

Continue reading →

Socrates Evangelion (Beyond “Apology”)

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[The sequel to Socrates Repents. Hat Tip to Socrates Meets Jesus by Peter Kreeft, and Til We Have Faces by CS Lewis. Dedicated to my friend and muse, David Huffman, the Plato to my Socrates.]

A powerfully-built young man stands on the walls of Athens. His face is torn between Hope and Sorrow. He has clearly been there a while, staring into the west as the sun sets. Finally he sighs and turns to return home.

Just before he descends he glances back for one last forlorn look. Then freezes. He dashes to the wall, straining to make out distant details. Suddenly seized with certainty, he claps his hands and jumps for joy. He barely restrains the impulse to jump directly down the wall, but dashes back to the stairs and out the gate. His gleeful shouts trail in the air behind him. “He’s back! He’s here! Socrates has returned!”

Continue reading →

TGR-S2E5: Unlearning Idolatry

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Next Tuesday, June 16, 2020 our Biastes public discipleship men’s group will continue using The Great Reset in Education as a lens to explore issues of racism and repentance in the wake of the Killing of George Floyd.

The Great Reset, Season 2, Episode 5

Question

How can we retrain ourselves to measure everything against the reality of Jesus Christ — instead of our own understanding?

Cf. Peter rebuking Jesus — and vice versa (Matthew‬ ‭16:21-25‬)

Perspective

Create systems where we are repeatedly:

  1. Emptied of our shame via the cross
  2. Submitting ourselves to be filled with power by the Holy Spirit
  3. Using those to connect transformationally with the Other
Continue reading →

Paleo-Evangelical Christianity

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I consider myself a “Paleo-Evangelical” Christian. Like my counterparts in the first century, I have had transformational encounters with the person of Jesus Christ and am devoted to making him known as the Risen Lord; but am still working through which of my inherited cultural understandings and religious teachings are worthy to bear His name.

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The Sinners Prayer, 2.0

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Dear God,

Thank you for creating me in Your image, and for loving us like Jesus.

Make me more and more like Jesus as I listen to your Word, your Spirit, and your Body.

Heal the wounds in my spirit that keep me from loving You, myself and others as Jesus did.

Help me show Your love to the world by practicing the generosity and vulnerability Jesus showed on the cross.

Teach me to always rejoice in the privilege of being your child.

I ask this because of everything Jesus did for me. So be it!

Anjali’s Catechism: A Childlike Invitation to Spiritual Christianity

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Anjali’s Catechism: The Book is coming in Summer 2019.  Preview now.

The Invitation

Are you ready to:

  1. Embrace the One who created the universe as the Heavenly Father who loves you like Jesus?
  2. Submit your awareness, values, and goals to becoming more like Christ’s?
  3. Receive God’s Spirit, Word, and Body to reveal and heal the wounds in your spirit that hinder you from becoming like Jesus?
  4. Value God’s happiness, glory, and relationships more than your own?
  5. Practice generosity and vulnerability so others can see Christ in you?
  6. Surrender childlike happiness for the grown-up joy of loving like Jesus?

Lessons

Continue reading →

From the Kingdom to the Cross: A Confession

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I feel like I need to repent of something.

For the last decade or so, I have been focused on understanding and promoting Transformational Christianity, which is based largely on Kingdom theology.  I believed — and still  believe — that the Kingdom of God is a powerful Biblical metaphor for understanding what the church and Christians are supposed to be doing on the earth.

But I think we’ve missed something.  To be fair, everyone else in the gospels — the crowds, the disciples, even John the Baptist — also missed it.  But that’s still no excuse. Especially since we have their example.

We have forgotten the cross of Christ. We have preached the life of Jesus in the gospels, and the power of the Holy Spirit in Acts, but overlooked the crucifixion that made both of those meaningful.  We have sought the glory of Christ without sharing in His sufferings.

We want to bring the Kingdom of God — which is a good thing.

But we have tried to bring the Kingdom without first going to the cross. Which is a bad thing.

Oops.

Dear God,

Forgive me for falling into the same trap your early followers did, of getting so excited over the promise of the Kingdom I totally missed what you were actually doing. I confess that I still do not understand the cross of Christ, or why you had to die.  Which is why I resist the fact that I have to die. And forget to tell people that they have to die, as Jesus did.  We have — forgive the pun — watered down Baptism to an empty ritual, instead of a way to share in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

I am sorry. Please forgive me by your grace, by that very same death on a cross I have so foolishly neglected.  Have mercy on those I may have misled or failed to help along the way.  Help me to do my part in bringing back the fulness of the gospel to your people.

And, um, please let me know if there’s anything else important that I’ve missed…

I ask this in Jesus name, Amen.

God Loves Us Like Jesus: A Six Syllable Gospel (Childlike Theology)

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[Now part 1 of 6 in a series on Childlike Theology]

Since my son’s second set of seasons, I’ve sought a scalable summary of the gospel. Something simple enough to be sung by a six-year-old, yet sufficiently sophisticated to stun seminarians for centuries. Here’s my most successful statement so far:

God Loves Us Like Jesus

Simultaneously saying, in short, that the Father loves in the way:

  • Jesus loves us
  • He loves Jesus
  • that makes us more like Jesus

Submitting to that sort of Savior is a sweet smell to our spirit, but a shocking scare to our sin! Continue reading →