The Church & The Gospel
by Dale on May.18, 2012, under Church, Discipleship, Gospel, Theology
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If you are a sincere follower of Christ, a disciple of His ways, baptized and committed to sharing the Good News of God’s redemptive love, whether near or far, in a box or in a car; with a chicken or a fox … well, the Church is you; you, plus all the others around you who are also committed to living and loving yourself and other in the way God demonstrated in the life of His son, Jesus Christ.
The Church regularly gathers to worship the One who makes us the Church, God. The Church also gathers to study the record of God’s providence in the ancient nation of Israel[1], the record of Jesus’ life as God living among us[2] and stories about the beginnings of His-Spirit filled Church[3].
We study and learn in order to better understand God’s ways so that we may live in the Spirit of Godliness. We practice this godly kind of life and love among ourselves (The Church) so that we may more effectively perfect it with those who do not yet know God or understand that His redemptive love is meant for us all.
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If you do not yet know God or understand that His[4] redemptive love is meant for us all; have you not committed your life to this pursuit? Then you are not yet a member of The Church. However, I invite you to walk into the light;
“For God is light and in Him is no darkness at all” (1st John 1.5).
I have Good News for you::There is a cosmic creator who may be known and He is God. He created human beings in His own image to be sparkling reflections of Himself in creation. And while the perfection of creation has been corrupted by the results of human waywardness, God has provided a way for our imperfections, our mistakes and rebelliousness to be rectified through His own redemptive love in Christ Jesus, who is His own physical manifestation in time and space.
God is at work in our world to redeem human relationships, so that all mankind may fulfill a perfect kind of love for one another – just as we may also envision a perfect heavenly peace and tranquility. That work began in Christ Jesus’ perfect life and by whose violent death at the hands of injustice God would not withstand; therefore God set things right by raising Jesus from the dead!
The Church today are those who respond positively to a divine call extended to everyone toward the kind of perfection seen modeled in the human life of God Himself, Christ Jesus. This response includes turning away from naturally self-centered lifestyles in order to permit an ongoing Spiritual regeneration/ transformation evidenced by an active pursuit of an openly professed and Christ-like lifestyle commonly referred to as “Christian discipleship.”
[1] Commonly known as The Bible’s Old Testament
[2] Commonly known as the Gospels which are the first four collected records of The Bible’s New Testament
[3] Found in the remaining writings of The Bible’s New Testament
[4] In the best interest of truth, you should know that God is neither male nor female, yet God exhibits characteristics of both. The limitations of most languages simply do not offer an adequate pronoun for God, but rather than using an impersonal “it” or switching back and forth between gendered pronouns, I’ve chosen to use masculine pronouns consistently to avoid further confusion.
Choosing Service Over Self-Interest
by Dale on Feb.02, 2012, under Church, Discipleship, Life, Philosophy, Theology
“A poignant metaphor of “stewardship” has emerged. Especially recently—the idea that humans are the caretakers of the Earth, put here for the purpose, accountable, now and into the indefinite future, to the Landlord.”
—Carl Sagan, atheist, regarding the environment
“God said, ‘Let us make man in our own image, in the likeness of ourselves, and let them be [stewards] of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven, the cattle, all the wild animals and all the creatures that creep along the ground.’”
—Genesis 1.26, God, via Moses, et al
The idea isn’t so new, but it has taken some time to begin understanding the text. In most translations, King James’ rendering of the Hebrew רָדָה (rada) as “have dominion” and the modern corollary, “rule”, carry western philosophical baggage that confuses the predominantly eastern concept in rada’s latent implication “to have responsibility/ accountability for…” i.e., “be stewards of….”
An elevated understanding of stewardship holds the possibility of shifting our expectations of pastors and other leaders. The meaning of stewardship, at least in part, is to hold in trust the well-being of some larger entity — our organization, our community, etc. However, the scope of stewardship is not hierarchical, but flat! A pastor or deacon is not any more important, no more or less responsible than any given layman, which calls for all members (including leaders) to place servicing the well-being of the Church ahead of even leading or controlling — and more pointedly, for members to no longer insist that leaders “take charge” (manage administrative tasks) as if that is more important than the general well-being of the Church.
