Out of the Boat

“Lifemessage” July 19 2004 by David Orton from Melbourne [Out of the Boat: Jesus and the Contemporary Church] recounts the story at the end of Mark’s gospel chapter 6.  After a hectic day with the disciples and the crowds, the disciples get into a boat to row to Bethsaida on the shore of Lake Galilee and Jesus goes up onto the mountainside to pray.  As night wore on, the disciples were having real trouble against the wind and not making progress.  They were beginning to worry.  In the early hours of the morning, seeing them in difficulty, Jesus goes to them walking on the water.  The disciples are terrified thinking they have seen a ghost and begin crying out – what, we are not told.  It appeared to them that this ‘apparition’ was walking right past them.  I think I’d be terrified too.

Mark records that Jesus spoke to them and said, ‘It’s me; don’t be afraid’.  They recognised his voice and no doubt the terror left them and gave way to utter relief.  Jesus climbed into the boat, and as he did, the wind and the waves ceased and it became calm.  It seems they were very confused about what was going on: a few hours ago they had seen Jesus multiply a boy’s picnic lunch and feed thousands of people with it; now he was walking on water like a ghost; and just as he climbed into the boat, the bad weather ceased.  I think if I were there, I would just have been happy to row to the safety of shore and discuss things later.  Perhaps that is just what they did; they anchored at Gennesaret and still the crowds pursued them.

But Matthew’s account of the same incident adds a bit extra.  When Jesus spoke and said, ‘It’s me; don’t be afraid’, Peter replied, ‘If it really is you, tell me to come to you on the water.’  According to Matthew, Jesus said, ‘Come’, so Peter got out of the boat and started walking to Jesus on the water.  Part way there, he began to panic (no surprises there!), took his eyes off Jesus and began to sink.  Jesus reached out and caught him and said to him, ‘You of little faith – why did you doubt?’

Matthew’s account then re-joins Mark’s and the story goes on.

“Out of the boat”.  Orton sees this event as “A picture of the Western Evangelical / Pentecostal church” in the 21^st century, in the following terms:

“With the winds of a post-modern world blowing against her she is ‘straining’ on the oars. Despite their ability as seasoned fishermen, accomplished in boatmanship and experienced in storms, the winds are too strong. Like the disciples the contemporary church is exerting all her strength, training, and skill to fulfil the commission given her. But with all the resources available she cannot move forward. Over recent times the church in Australia (measured by Sunday attendance) has shrunk by 12% and in the UK by 26%.  North America is not faring much better.  By any measure, the contemporary western church is in ‘distress’.

“And so, Jesus is coming to her in the fourth watch (between 3-6 AM) – in the darkest hour before dawn (see Mk 6:48).  The night has been spent in a toilsome and futile labour.  Exhausted, the disciples are at their wits end. But it is the watch when Jesus comes, the watch before the dawn, before the new day.

“My question is twofold – from where does He come, and how does He come?

“The answer is that He comes from ‘outside the boat’ through a ‘new thing’.

“This is, for the church, the worst of times, and yet the best of times.  An hour of great testing and darkness on one hand, but on the other, one of great visitation and new beginnings.

“In her darkest hour Jesus is coming to her in a new manifestation of divine power and purpose.  But she is constrained by her own strength and structures.  She is self-reliant and secure in her man-made systems.  She is so mired in these and so focussed on the storm, on her own effort – on physical and sensate things, that she is caught by total surprise.  Jesus appears walking on the water.  This is so outside their frame-of-reference they immediately conclude that it is a ghost!  How could this be of God?  It is outside of their ‘boat’ – their man-made vessel – outside the design, engineering, and structures of man!

“Not only that, it is a completely ‘new thing’ – Jesus healing the sick they knew, feeding the five thousand was OK, but what was this?  It was unfamiliar and impossible, defying all the natural laws on which they were depending for their survival. Boats were designed to float on water and that’s where they were staying!  And so, they concluded that it was a ‘phantom’ – a ‘ghost’ (Gr ‘phantasma’). This manifestation was not only not of God, it had no ‘substance’ – it was not real – it was either a figment of the imagination, or from the ethereal world of the spirit.

“Not only do they misconstrue this new visitation of God as having no substance; their response was one of fear.  In a moment of time these self-assured sea-salts are reduced to abject terror shrieking for fear! (see Mk 6:49, 50).

“The parallels are obvious. There is a new visitation coming to us from ‘outside the boat’.  A sudden and surprising manifestation of Christ is coming toward us.  And it is coming from the storm-tossed seas of people – from the tumult of the nations...”

I have no problem with Orton in this matter.  He begins this article by noting that it is “A Prophetic Teaching”.  And if you read through the new testament book of Acts, you will see that such a thing is not outside the gamut of the life and experience of the disciples of Jesus post-Pentecost AD 30.  I myself have been in this stream of ‘prophetic teaching’ since the early 1990s and I concur with the parallels he draws.  My personal journey for over twenty years has been one of “outside the boat”.

My question, though, is different from Orton’s double question.  My focus is on the boat.  What is the boat?  What happens when Jesus gets into the boat?  What is the nature of their life and their journey after this ‘boat’ incident?  And for twenty years or more this has been my interest, since Jesus called me to get out of the boat (metaphorically speaking) and come to him, leaving behind all the support structures of the boat, what it represented and what it was connected to.

¤

Now hold that thought for a moment while we visit a later time and a different part of the new testament record.  Researchers and professors are uncertain of the exact authorship of the new testament book of Hebrews.  Some say it was the apostle Paul; some say it may have been Barnabas; some say it might have been a sermon Paul gave transcribed by Luke.  Many options have been suggested.

And who was it written to or for?  Its title appears clear, but in the original, there is no salutation or greeting.  The phrase “To the Hebrews” was a later addition.  However, the content makes it quite clear that it was, at least in part, intended for an audience of Hebrew (Jewish) believers.  It also seems quite clear that the fall of Jerusalem (AD 70) had not yet transpired.

Most probably, it was a letter or a ‘sermon’ written by an eyewitness to the events surrounding Jesus and immediately following his death and resurrection as a kind of treatise for Jewish people but with an eye to Gentiles who converted to Jesus but not to Judaism.  The central theme of the writing is the superiority in every way of Jesus over Abraham, Moses and David; of the new covenant over the old covenant; of grace and the Spirit over the law and the book and the letter of the law.

Now against that background, read Hebrews 13:7-14.  You can see traces of this ‘comparison’ and the superiority of the way of Jesus in this short extract.

Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you; and considering the result of their conduct, imitate their faith.  Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.  Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings; for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, through which those who were so occupied were not benefited.  We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.  For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high priest as an offering for sin, are burned outside the camp.  Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate.  So, let us go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach.  For here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come.

“Outside the Gate” or “Outside the Camp” is the emphasis here.  Just like the animals sacrificed for the temple offerings and religious rites, Jesus was sacrificed (read murdered) outside the city walls as a criminal the authorities were glad to get rid of.  And his blood was spilled on the ground, not collected and taken into the city for the temple rites as was the animal blood.

The early disciples of Jesus were instructed in the profound significance of this.  Their ‘city’, their spirituality, their future, lay not inside the walls and gates of the city of man, but outside the gate; outside the camp; out where all that is not holy belongs.  How could this possibly be the place for them?  How could outside the walls and gates of Jerusalem possibly be the true city of God?  Because that’s where Jesus was; and that’s where the ‘common people’ who ‘heard him gladly’ lived and moved and had their being.  Jesus made it perfectly clear he did not come for the righteous but for the unrighteous.

Inside the walls and gates they are righteous in their own eyes; out here, now, with Jesus, the unrighteous are granted righteousness before God on His terms; they are Christ-righteous; they are righteous in Christ.

That is why the writer to the Hebrews says clearly, “So, let us go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach.  For here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come.”  The City of God is “outside the gates”; “outside the camp”.  But those inside continue on blissfully ignorant, thinking they are in the city of God.

To me, the parallels here are also obvious – at least as obvious as the parallels around the ‘out of the boat’ story.  So, my strategy is to join the two sets of parallels together.  In my left eye, I have the ‘out of the boat’ story; in my right eye I have the ‘outside the camp’ story.  And like our natural vision is best when we have both eyes, to me our spiritual vision is best when we have both stories – when we see through both lenses.

¤

The boat and the walled, gated city-camp are analogies for the same thing.  And I believe there has been a long continuous line of “prophetic teaching” reaching all the way back to Jesus and the first apostles – and possibly back much further too, linking Joshua and Caleb, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Nathan, Micaiah and many others to the first century AD ecclesia and to present-day apostles, prophets and teachers who are the foundation of ecclesia in every generation.

The boat and the walled, gated city-camp are where religion lives; they are the home and the spawning ground of Pharisees – in every generation.  They are safety, security, normalcy to all who want to preserve the past and make sure everything they believe in is maintained and perpetuated into the future.  They represent that mood and habit that actually changes nothing but adopts and co-opts the language of what they want but want on their own terms in their own forms with their own prescriptions and decrees.

The boat and the walled, gated city-camp are ‘church’, ‘Christianity’, ‘Christendom’, and ‘Christian City’ as Robert Burnell put it in Escape From Christendom (Bethany House Publishers, 1980) [http://awildernessvoice.com/Escape.html]; while ‘out of the boat’ and ‘outside the camp’ represent ecclesia, The Way and ‘The City of God’ in Burnell’s analogy.

The boat and the walled, gated city-camp have “the gospel” (their own preferred story of God); while ‘out of the boat’ and ‘outside the camp’ have “the good news of the Kingdom of God in Jesus Christ.”

Inside is the old covenant; outside is the new covenant.  Inside is what Orton describes in the quote at the top of this piece; outside is his “new visitation”.

But the really important thing is this: ‘the church’ is not ‘the ecclesia’ now (presently) sick and that sickness healed by this “new visitation”.  The church has never been the ecclesia and never will be; the ecclesia has never been the church and never will be.  They have always been, are now and ever will be two distinct things.

In Jesus’ day, for a Pharisee to be joined to ecclesia, he had to follow the direction of the letter to the Hebrews (Pharisees were usually Hebrews): “Let us go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach.  For here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come.”

In Matthew’s record, when Jesus finished his damning discourse with the Pharisees and Scribes, this is what he said: “Therefore, behold, I am sending you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city, so that upon you may fall [the guilt of] all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. ‘Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.’” (Matthew 23:34-36)

Dr Luke the new testament historian says pretty much the same thing – Luke 11:45-52.  This is very damning and not at all pretty.

This puts me in mind of the old testament account in Ezekiel 34.  While addressing the ‘shepherds of Israel’ in similar condemnatory tones, God (through his prophet Ezekiel) declares that He will appoint new shepherds over His people who have a heart after His own heart.  And the people whom He will personally shepherd are out in the mountains away from those who injure, insult and harass them – ‘outside the camp’.

In reality, the outsiders are the insiders to God, as the insiders are the outsiders to Him.  ‘Inside’; the boat; the walled, gated city-camp – these are not God’s intention plan or future.  And the “New Jerusalem” coming down out of heaven in John’s revelation is not the old Jerusalem made new, restored or healed but a new creation in Christ Jesus – made up of foreigners, strangers, aliens: “outsiders”.

And if ‘insiders’ want to be joined with these ‘outsiders’, they have to “go to him outside the camp bearing his reproach”.  Likewise, those “forsaking assembling” (à la Hebrews 10:25) and not the outsiders who refuse to come inside but the insiders who refuse to go outside to meet in twos and threes where Jesus now lives and moves and has his being by the Holy Spirit.

I concur with Orton – there is a “new visitation” coming; and, yes, it is “out of the boat”.  But it is also outside the gate; outside the camp.  There is no redeeming what is inside and making it a holy place; holiness, righteousness, salvation are in getting out of the boat – going outside the camp; leaving ‘Christian City’ – to meet with the redeemer, the saviour, our righteousness and be joined together as one body with the outsiders in the ‘the city of God’, the New Jerusalem, the ecclesia, God’s new Zion.

Whoever wrote Hebrews noted that, when you “go out” to Jesus...

“...you have not come to a mountain that can be touched and to a blazing fire, and to darkness and gloom and whirlwind, and to the blast of a trumpet and the sound of words which sound was such that those who heard begged that no further word be spoken to them.  For they could not bear the command, “IF EVEN A BEAST TOUCHES THE MOUNTAIN, IT WILL BE STONED.”  And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, “I AM FULL OF FEAR and trembling.”  But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which speaks better than the blood of Abel.”

By Jesus’ definition, true ‘Mount Zion’ is not inside the walls; indeed, he IS Mt Zion – all that Mount Zion was to old Israel and so much more Jesus is to God’s new covenant people.  Just as Jesus did not come to start a new religion or form a new sect within Judaism, his visitation is not to redeem or ‘heal’ the church but to help us see that ‘the church’ is nothing more nor less than a false ecclesia.  Too many of us have been looking at the old Mount Zion instead of being with Jesus outside the camp and thus being perpetually AT and IN the true Mount Zion.

Orton’s article then goes on:

“At first, those in the boat will claim this visitation has no substance – that it is a ‘phantom’ – a passing fad, of no consequence. By comparison, their boat with its human design and construction is far more substantial than this mere apparition. They can, feel it, see it, and even row it! They even believe they can control it – despite the overwhelming force of the elements!

“They will also respond with fear. Any fear of the storm will be completely overtaken by their fear of the unknown and particularly by their fear of the supernatural. It will drive them to reject this move of God.  Even, many of those who are currently networking new movements of mission, of pastoral unity, and even many so-called ‘apostolic’ networks will react in fear and cling to the boat – to the structures and patterns that offer a more tangible security.

“But some like Peter will be stirred in their hearts. And at the word of the Lord they will step out of the boat to come to Him (see Matt 14:28, 29). They will be irresistibly drawn from the securities of familiar patterns and structures to Him. And thus stepping out of them enter a new realm of freedom – of the miraculous. A realm of walking on water where they are no longer governed by sense-knowledge and natural reasoning!  They will distinguish themselves from the rest of the disciples by their fearless hunger to be with Him – to come to Him ‘outside the boat’, and thus step into the ‘new thing’. They are willing to “suffer with Him outside the city gates, bearing the reproach outside the camp” (Heb 13:12, 13). A study of revival history and of the coming of Christ Himself eloquently teaches us that the visitation of God comes most often through the least expected avenues and usually through those of no account in the religious system.”

Well – this very thing has been going on for at least the last twenty years.  Prophets spoke in the first half of the 1990s not only about this ‘visitation’ but also about what Orton explains in these three paragraphs.  I know because I was a part of it.  I have documented what was happening and the prophetic teaching of the time.

Those ‘in the boat’ have already done what Orton describes here – and done it for twenty years or more: claim that it is a phantom, a passing fad, of no consequence.  Their human ‘boats’ have continued uninterrupted their course of buildings and programs and they all tout that their ‘success’ is the blessing of God.  Sounds just like the Pharisees in Jerusalem compared with the dishevelled disciples out on the lake with Jesus.

They have, for twenty years or more, responded with fear and sought to fortify themselves and shore up their fiefdoms against the bulwark of Jesus’ woes.

And, for the past twenty years or more, there have been Peters, stirred in their hearts, stepping out onto the water to go meet with Jesus bereft of all attachments and securities – sometimes even to begin to sink.  But beginning to sink is not a measure of wrongness or failure.  Quite the opposite: it is that beautiful moment when we realise we have nothing left but Jesus – and we need nothing more than Jesus, with his hand reaching out to lift and stabilise us.

These ones are, as Orton puts it, “no longer governed by sense-knowledge and natural reasoning!  They will distinguish themselves from the rest of the disciples by their fearless hunger to be with Him – to come to Him ‘outside the boat’, and thus step into the ‘new thing’. They are willing to ‘suffer with Him outside the city gates, bearing the reproach outside the camp’ (Heb 13:12, 13).”

But I disagree with Orton when he says, “And so, through this visitation the church will be purged of human control.”  That’s a pipe-dream.  I believe the reality is that ‘the church’ is a human organisation that has only ever been under human control and without human control will simply die; whereas ‘ecclesia’ is a divine, living eternal organism that has never been under human control and never will be.  What is, in character and mood, “inside” cannot become, in character and mood, “outside” and vice versa.  Consistent with Paul’s teaching, the old does not become new; rather, the old is shed and replaced with the new.  You ‘put off’ the old and you ‘put on’ the new and you don’t put new wine in old wineskins.

In like manner, the church’s ‘gospel’ says that, in Jesus, old ways are transformed and become new ways (like pruning a tree or simply changing behaviour); whereas the good news of the Kingdom of God in Jesus Christ is that, in Christ, the old is put to death (crucified) and the new springs up out of the new life of the Spirit of God implanted within (the old tree is ring-barked and an entirely new tree is planted).  In this latter scenario, the old tree is withering away to death; the new tree is taking root towards abundant eternal life.

Why do I make such a distinction and such a point?  Well...  Who says who is “in” the church and who is “out”?  As far back as you trace its history, man has been determining that.  Furthermore, some groups and individuals that are “in” today were “out” at some time in the past.  All denominations started as rebellions that gave way to splits and later to accommodation and tolerance if not outright acceptance.  At one stage, the so-called ‘house-church movement’ was “out’; now it’s “in” for some and still “out” for others – all based on our own individual personal interpretations and preferences.

Does it matter, in the end, whom the church thinks is “in” and who is “out” – well, no; not really; not if Jesus really is the Head.  But, since the word ‘church’ does not appear in the original language of our bibles, how are we supposed to deal with this?  Personally, I think God cares about as much for it as Jesus did about whose inscription was on the money of the day.  Render to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar and to God that which belongs to God.  Church belongs to man and it will be rendered to man and it will die with man.  Ecclesia belongs to God and will be rendered to God and it will share eternity with God.  What we do with church is about as important to God as what we do with our sports clubs and community associations.  What we do with ecclesia we are accountable to Him for since we are all – let me stress all; not some – responsible for our part and place in it.

You join church by selection and human will; you are joined to ecclesia by an act of divine will and promise.  You can leave church by human will and resignation; only God can separate you from your divinely grafted place in His family tree.  Your church can change its constitution or rules and leave you “out” where once you were “in”; ecclesia’s only ‘rule’ is “IN CHRIST” and that is fixed for all time and eternity for all humans.

Church and ecclesia cannot possibly be the same thing.  And the language confirms it.  The church lied from the beginning when it claimed that ecclesia equals ‘church’: it does not.  William Tyndale was murdered by the church for this truth; we love to claim lineage to Tyndale yet we practise the very thing he died fighting against.  The church has forsaken assembling with millions of “outsiders” yet turns this around and blames them for its own sin.  As usual, Jesus stands outside the door and knocks while inside we play our games of charades and pretend that he’s inside with us by quoting Jesus’ own words from our overly-precious bibles.  Go figure!

I believe that Jesus never intended us to treasure a written relic of him over his own dynamic personal presence in the person of the Holy Spirit; yet that is what we have done, and then gone on to institutionalise and sacralise it all.  The scriptures were intended to draw and deliver us to Jesus, not to replace him, so we can then boast about how clever we are because we have tamed Jesus to our particular liking.

And I believe the “new visitation” begins right here: in is out; and out is in.

Amen.

BEING A CHRISTIAN

When I was young and single – youth group age, I guess – I often found myself engaged in a discussion around a dilemma felt by many then and, I suspect, many still today.  A youth camp, a conference, or perhaps a bible study series often led to the feeling that you didn’t want that special time to end.  It seemed that God was especially close; that real christian love for those around you flowed easily and abundantly; that growth toward spiritual maturity was in turbo mode; that you can do or withstand just about anything.

Inevitably, the time would come to an end and we all returned to ‘normal life’.  The cares of the world came crashing in; the demands of school, employment and family took over once again and made you somewhat testy; love was harder and in shorter supply; friends had their problems demanding your time and attention.  I’ll leave you to add your own sentences to the story.

Again inevitably, thought – and discussion – would turn to this dilemma.  Why does this happen?  What can we do about it?  What should we do about it?  What is ‘normal life’?  Still again inevitably, some would emerge on the side of the discussion that emphasised family and social responsibility as ordinary, and spiritual responsibility as extraordinary.  Others came down on the side of the discussion that suggested that our ‘spiritual worship’ responsibility (as in Romans 12:1-2) is what life is about and our other responsibilities have a lower priority.  We would remind ourselves of Jesus’ teaching to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness...”

Exhortations would start, reminding people of the ‘glory’ of those times and stirring people up not to ‘lose’ what we had.  Then reminders would come – sometimes quite harshly – that we had family, employment and social responsibilities that must not be neglected.
The dilemma and the tension it created would even bring on bouts of depression and sadness, disappointment and anger.  For me, these were not so much about losing what we had or missing the ‘glory’ of those times.  The depression and disappointment were more about the fact that being in the presence of God in fellowship with loved friends created a dilemma in the first place.  This was for me one of the great curiosities of life.  What was going on?  Did God have an interest in our dilemma?  You could use bible verses to back up whatever position you thought about.  The dilemma, the curiosity, and the search for answers have never left me.

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Another thing I remember from those earlier years of my life is a curious saying.  As a young person, I was never very sure or confident about it, but I heard it periodically and it was said with considerable conviction.  You’re too heavenly minded to be of much earthly use.  Over the years, my uncertainty about it has only increased.

 

At the time, it seemed to convey the idea that one should not get overly excited or involved in cultivating a christian life – in being a christian; or, if you’re going to, join the clergy – become a minister, a pastor, a priest or a missionary.  It seemed to me that what we were learning is that there are two levels of being a christian: one for ‘ordinary’ folks and one for extraordinary folks.

 

 girlfriend I once had added to my puzzlement – and, I have to say, to my determination – when she described me as a fanatic.  That term has a different meaning now.  The idea of the religious fundamentalism we know of today hadn’t taken root.  Today, these fundamentalists are often called fanatics, but that wasn’t the meaning then.  To my girlfriend, I was one whose goal in life was to serve and love God and the other matters of life could fall in behind that.  I wasn’t really interested in the more common pursuits of my generation, so she called me a fanatic.

 

Now thirty years older, looking back yet still curious, I have come to the conclusion that the great divide among christians is indeed the divide between ordinary and extraordinary; between laity and clergy; between pew-sitter and preacher.  And this has raised a huge dilemma: are they all christians?  If so, doesn’t that mean there are grades of being a christian?  And the irony for me is that I have actually lived this dilemma.  I tried the pastor, minister, missionary thing and couldn’t do it; but still, by the definition of many, I was and am a ‘fanatic’ – too heavenly minded to be of much earthly use.

 

You know what I think?  I think the ‘too heavenly minded’ thing is not only stupid, it is an insult: an insult to many human beings and an insult to God.  I think the real problem is best understood by turning the saying inside out: too earthly minded to be of any heavenly use.  That’s the problem I see all around me.

 

We can all make time for the affairs and the cares of the world but the world is a fading vapour.  We tend to fit God into a compartment in our life and convince ourselves that is being a christian.  We are steadily bombarded with messages of an alleged need to “join the real world” as if this momentary puff of life is the real world and the unseen ‘eternal’ world that we humans fall out of and fall back into is unreal.  We advertise a ‘University for the real world’ selling degrees in business, marketing, information technology, law, etc., knowing full well that the so-called real world of today will be overtaken by a new real world tomorrow.

 

Perhaps the great apostle Paul was onto something when he wrote in the first century AD. He wrote to the Corinthians: “we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”  And he affirms to the Colossians: “For by Him [Jesus] all things were created, in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible [or seen and unseen], whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.”

For most of my adult life, it has been part of my world-view that the unseen or invisible things in our universe and frame of reference vastly outnumber the seen or visible things.  To my mind, all the forms of knowledge that I acquire and live with – intellectual, experiential and intuitive – confirm this vast differential.  So, for me, God is the big picture – infinity actually – and what I am constantly being told is the ‘real world’, is just a small compartment within that.  To me, the most earthly-useful people are those with a ‘heavenly’ (eternal or infinite) perspective and paradigm.

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 Another thing I remember from my teen and young adult days is the testimonies.  Young people might not be out there ‘preaching the gospel’ but you sure can give your testimony.   A testimony is a story of your conversion to Christ – of becoming a christian.  We were told clearly that a testimony contained three parts: the first part was what your life was like ‘before’; the second part was how you were converted (preferably measured by a date in time); the third part was what your life is like ‘after’.  It seemed to me a bit like selling a roof restoration or a weight loss program, complete with before and after snaps.

My problem – and the reason I wasn’t asked to give my testimony very often – was that my before and after snaps seemed to be the wrong way round.  I was the nice, good, well-behaved kid, but my ‘after’ snaps put me at odds with many people because I was such a different person.  I wasn’t a bad boy who became a good boy – the testimony people wanted to hear.  Neither was I a good boy who became a bad boy – that testimony doesn’t count.  I simply didn’t fit the mould – still don’t!

It works for me if I describe it as God taking something bland and turning it into a surprise.  He took white rice and made a gourmet meal.  How did He do that?  He put Himself into me.  He changed, He subtracted, He added and He augmented – and He turned me into … well, ME.

In the language of the computer age, He performed a ‘warm’ system re-boot: Ctrl+Alt+Del.

His transformation of my life was by means of the Holy Spirit doing at least three things.  The grace of God brought my life under the control [Ctrl] of God: the will of the Father; the power of the Spirit; and the persistence and patience of the Son.  And in order to finish what He began, the Holy Spirit set about the work of bringing necessary alternative [Alt] ideas and responses into my life and deleting [Del] from my life what is unhelpful, destructive and repulsive.

And He did it all by love.  He did it to me when I was a boy, but as a man I can describe it much better.  I describe his love for me as showing me honour, respect and trust, though I didn’t understand it that way when I was eleven.  Love so amazing so divine / Demands my soul, my life, my all.  So wrote Isaac Watts.  So is my life.

My testimony is that I am not a fluke – a hiccup in human history.  In the words of prophet Isaiah, “before I was born the Lord called me; from my birth he made mention of me … He formed me in the womb to be His servant … and I am honoured in the eyes of the Lord.”  He took what, to some, was a weak and sick child and “…made me into a polished arrow and concealed me in His quiver.”

Therefore, to me, being a christian is not about being a good boy – about changed behaviour; it’s about being a servant, about being His polished arrow, about giving my soul, my life, my all to honour, respect and trust Him; it’s about changed character.  That’s how He loved me, and that love won my heart and changed my life – whether you like it or not!  I’m not always happy about my new life because there are some things that are contrary to the preferences of my old nature.  But love wins – and love covers a multitude of errors.

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These days, one of my favourite sayings is, “christian is a noun, not an adjective.”  I hear people talk about being christian, not ‘a christian’, as if it is a matter of religious preference.  Me?  I don’t use the term ‘christian’ much these days – unless I’m writing something like this, of course.  For one, the term has about as many definitions as there are people on the planet.  But, more importantly, the term has all but lost the meaning given to it by the first true christians.

You might even be asking why I don’t start the word with a capital ‘C’ when I write it.  When we can agree on its original and true meaning, I will be happy to use the capital C.  Christian can mean everything I have written here; it can also mean none of it.  It can mean purely and simply the system that stands alongside of Muslim, Hindu, Jew, etc. as a choice.  It can mean a set of ideas, dogmas and rules or the absence of these.  Or it can mean the revolutionary, kingdom truth of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of God.

The only way a person can be christian is to be ‘a christian’ – a changed person; and the only way to be a christian is for the Christ (from whom the word is derived) to be master and commander, lover and beloved of that changed person.  One of the original Christians, Apostle Paul, uses the expression ‘Christ in you’ and that is one of the best definitions we can use.  And if Christ is in you, He has won your heart and you are being changed into His character – uniquely, irrevocably.

Some say a christian is a person who has said a particular prayer or type of prayer.  Some say a christian is a person who attends ‘christian’ meetings in ‘christian’ buildings.  Some say a christian is a person who follows the rules and principles of the bible, particularly the old testament.  Some say a christian is a person who tries to emulate the teachings of Jesus.  Some say a christian is a person who lives in a country whose system of government and laws follows the traditions of a supposed ‘Judeo-christian’ ethic.

According to the bible, the first Christians were the ‘fanatics’ of Jesus’ day who were changed in their character by the love of Jesus the Christ.  No religion; no tradition; cultural revolutionaries; outside the system; setting people free.  By contrast, today’s christians are largely not fanatics; they are changed in behaviour (rather than character) by peer pressure; they have religion and tradition; they are cultural conservatives living in the system and trying to tie people into various parts of that system; all the while trying to ‘keep the rabble in line’ and not upset the boat.

By contrast, the model of the Christ was: “step out of the boat”! [See next blog post.]

Generalisation?  Of course.  But nonetheless true in large dollops.  And apart from anything else, it proves the point that christian can mean whatever we want it to mean for whatever purpose we propose.  Christian is repeatedly used as an adjective without any attempt to define or even describe what is intended: christian nation; christian values; christian school etc.

Jesus didn’t live and die and rise again to make naughty people civil and well behaved – even though that could be the logical conclusion from looking at what passes as christian.  He lived, died and rose again to set people free – absolutely free – from our hostilities, our guilt and all forms of bondage, including religion.  Whether that freedom is opposed or supported by the world system, it is what being a Christian is all about.

The love that sets us free (as it was for me years ago) is the source of the love that we give back to Him and is the same love that sets our families, friends and neighbours free.  “For freedom Christ has set us free.  Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” (Apostle Paul writing to Galatians in the first century)

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Like ‘christian’, ‘religion’ is another misunderstood and misused word.  It has come to mean many many things but, in the process, lost its root meaning.  Literally, the word means the process of ‘tying up again’ or ‘re-binding’ (from Latin).

The first christians were those who followed the Christ.  They were called this by the society of their day some of whom spoke with a certain contempt for them and what they stood for.  They stood for freedom – what else would one expect?  A contest between religions can be argued.  But theirs was no contest between religions; it was a contest between religion and freedom.  By (original) definition, religion is how you undo freedom and freedom is how you undo religion.

For far too long, ‘christians’ have peddled a story of polite bondage while saying they were preaching a gospel of freedom.  Neither they nor their converts are christians by Christ’s definition; they are acting more like Pharisees.

Governments and civil authorities of the day – as also in our day – survive by ‘keeping the rabble in line’.  The first christians were ‘rabble’ to all forms of authority and before a few centuries had passed (persecution only serving to embolden the Christians) another method had to be found to quell the rabble’s freedom.  In exchange for status, money, property rights and protection, ‘christian leaders’ agreed to quell the rabble’s freedom by a process of institutionalisation.  Religion is not a particular philosophy or type of philosophy; it is the process of quelling people’s freedom, binding them up again.  The philosophy behind it can be theological or political or both.

Today, the institutions created nearly 2,000 years ago hold sway.  It is now a common belief that to be a christian, one has to be connected to one institution or another, otherwise you are in rebellion against God.  It seems that few stop to think and ask whether the founder, Jesus the Christ, is still a rebel.  Which institution would Jesus choose?  Ummmmm?  And if He is a rebel and God is Three in One and One in Three, that makes God a rebel by our standard.  Argh!!!

What we end up with is worship of a god made in the image of man.  Somewhat ironic, don’t you think?  Man, made in the image of God, worshipping a god made in the image of man.  Man is the Emperor and God is his subject!  We get to define God (often scientifically) but He is not allowed to define us – that’s too unscientific!  Clearly we have no idea of the meaning of the word ‘God’.

What this suggests to me is that being a christian – by the standard of Jesus and the first christians – involves standing clear of that which binds up again: ‘religion’.  (See Galatians 2:4.)  One could legitimately translate Galatians 5:1 as ‘For freedom Christ has set us free, stay away from religion’ (religion being ‘burdened again by a yoke of slavery’).

And on a more positive note, being a christian is being set free, by the love of the Christ who lives within, from our hostilities, our guilt and all our bondages.  We are bound to none except to Jesus the Christ, the Lord, and by him to all others in the same condition.  We are not bound to any institution – neither should we be.  And if we are going to take Jesus seriously, we have a two-pronged obligation of love: love God with all our being; love those around us as we intend to love ourselves.

Peter, James, Jude and Paul – four first-century apostles of Jesus – all counted themselves willingly as “bond-servants” of God and of His Christ, Jesus of Nazareth.  For them, being a Christian meant a lifetime of glad and willing service (“ministry”) to the one who had given them new life and set them free from the bondage of ‘sin leading to death’.  This attitude of service clearly reflects the ancient Jewish practice described in Deuteronomy 15: “It shall come about if [a kinsman] says to you, ‘I will not go out from you,’ because he loves you and your household, since he fares well with you, then you shall take an awl and pierce it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your servant forever.  Also you shall do likewise to your maidservant.”

And what of voluntary association?  Voluntary association with our myriad religious organisations is about the same as putting a ring in your nose so you can be led about by the institution wherever they please – not forgetting the pain when you resist their tugs.

On the other hand, if God sends for us and calls us, we go, but with no rings in our noses – not for anybody; not at any price.  And why would we when we can gladly and willingly serve the One whom we love and who loves us and with whom we fare well – the “friend who sticks closer than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24)?

How many stories of loving God with all our heart and loving our fellow-humans as we love ourselves does it take for us to realise what being a Christian is – and that Christian is a noun, not an adjective?
One final question: how can we possibly imagine that the bile and hate spat from our ‘churches’ towards loving disciples of Jesus (and towards ‘outsiders’ wanting to know about Jesus) constitutes loving God with all our heart and loving our neighbour as ourselves?

[I did a Google Images search on “being a christian” and quickly found this one below.]

David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons have researched and described it well: UN-christian church.  [un-christian: what a new generation really thinks about christianity...and why it matters - Baker Books, Grand Rapids, Michigan: 2007]

Because of our totally insufficient, inadequate and preposterous definitions, it is today possible to be an un-christian christian.  God forbid!

Gifts; Ministries; Effects

Over the years, I have spent many hours studying, writing and teaching on the subject of “spiritual gifts”.  Through all of that, one thing has become very clear and has presented itself to me on many occasions: the real point of spiritual gifts is not that we are ministered to (that we receive the ministry of those gifts) but that we serve the Body of Christ by means of ministering to others our gifts in the power of the Holy Spirit (that we give the ministry of those gifts).  I believe that, as individuals, our focus is to be on serving, not being served.

And, according to Paul, it is by this means that the Body of Christ grows into its Divinely-planned maturity which matches and complements the maturity of Christ, as each one of us does his/her part.  For over twenty years now, one of the central passions of my life is to see every ecclesia within my purview functioning along the lines that Paul articulated to the Corinthians:

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.  --  1 Corinthians 12:4-7

And what that looks like on the ground, so to speak, was also written by Paul to the Corinthians:

What is the outcome then, brethren? When you assemble, each one has a psalm, has a teaching, has a revelation, has a tongue, has an interpretation. All things must be done for edification. --  1 Corinthians 14:26

However, most don’t want what I have to offer; neither do they want what many other Spirit-gifted men and women have to offer; though they do insist that we have what they offer.  What most appear to want is for us to manipulate and regulate our gifts to suit the preferences and the structures and the job descriptions of the particular church we are part of.  Many simply want supporters of and contributors to “my vision for this church”.  Even though there is no new covenant biblical precedent nor any new testament teaching to support such notions, we often don’t even get to attempt to manipulate or regulate; this is done for us by a chosen circle of people holding church authority – by means of “papal bulls” by other names.  [A Papal Bull is a formal proclamation issued by the Pope.]

But here we are: a small group of men and women drawn together by the love of Christ and the belief that there is such a thing as the Body of Christ, and by an undying compassion for fellow-man.  And the critical thing is, I believe, that it is not about putting these gifts to work in a man-made “church”, but in whatever ecclesia we find ourselves in – where two or three are gathered; or twenty or thirty; or perhaps more.

The grace of God in us (for that is the true meaning of ‘charismata’) is just that: the grace of God.  We do not own these things; neither does any organisation or institution.  Many churches have adopted some variation of the basic business model, even including the position of CEO at times.  And in the business model, the business owns the gifts and talents of its members and, increasingly, the product of the use of those gifts and talents in church.

But we are stewards of the graces given to us; and when we live like that, God the Great Conductor will bless whom He wills with the product of our combined faithfulness.  And when we prostitute ourselves to another (the ‘church’ for instance), we deny each other and God’s audience the blessing of the complete symphony He is producing in us – precisely because of the manipulation, the regulation, the compromise, the neglect, the hubris and many other things that are endemic in modern church.

As far as I can tell, this is how it is supposed to work – in brief:

·         As far as God is concerned, to be part of His household, we must be born again;

·         We are born again as an act of God’s grace and mercy,

·         in response to repentance, faith and baptism;

·         We are born again as God’s Holy Spirit kills the old life and begins a new one;

·         The substance of the new life is being filled with the Spirit of God,

·         joining each one to Christ and to one another to form one new living Body;

·         The Spirit of God is the life-giving spirit of that one new living Body;

·         And the Spirit of God cannot be present without ‘manifestation’;

·         So each one receives a unique “manifestation of the Spirit”;

·         The manifestation consists of Spirit-empowered character and abilities;

·         And that manifestation becomes visible via the fruit of the Spirit in one’s own life,

·         and in the lives of the others in the Body, moving towards maturity;

·         This Body is “The Bride of Christ” under construction;

·         The construction comes about via gifts being employed in ministries producing “effects” or out-workings, as God “works all things in all persons”,

·         so that, at the marriage supper in John’s Revelation, the whole Body is present and accounted for and God’s household is completely complete.

This is the nature and the structure of the new covenant of the kingdom (household) of God in Christ Jesus.  A little research will produce new covenant scripture references for all of these points.  I always encourage my readers to apply the Berean model and “search the scriptures to see if these things are so” (Acts 17:11).

A couple of times in the scripture record, a ‘voice from heaven’ is heard saying, ‘Come out of her my people; save yourselves from the fierce anger of the Lord’ (allowing for variations in English translation).  Both (Jeremiah 51 and Revelation 18) refer to Babylon.  The first was the actual historical, geographical Babylon; the second was the metaphorical Babylon.  But both mean the same thing: organised religion, oozing hubris, trying to reach God by means other than God’s covenant relationship.  And whenever church is organised, religious, oozing hubris or adding requirements to the pure simplicity of “Christ in you the hope of glory”, it is Babylon; it is “another gospel”.

And the call of God resonates permanently and continuously throughout history:  ‘Come out of Babylon my people’.  And the one call we ought to be well aware of is that of apostle John writing before the end of the first century: “...so that you will not participate in her sins and receive her plagues.”

Remember Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.”  Read Ezekiel 34 and John 10.

From the days of apostle John til now, there has been an untold number of God’s sheep wandering about on the hills and mountains, prey to all manner of hurt and harm; but they are there because, without realising it, they responded to that call.  It is how God protected them and kept them alive.  And He has become their one true living Shepherd.  Against all the odds; and against the wishes, demands and even threats of modern Pharisees, they have followed their intuition (the leading of the Holy Spirit in discernment-based knowledge) and distanced themselves from that which threatens their life and their sanity.

But the time is now for these ‘scattered sheep’ to understand that they are all gifted by the Holy Spirit for the unity and maturity of the Body, and to employ those ‘varieties of gifts’ in ‘varieties of ministries’ to achieve ‘varieties of effects’ for the kingdom of God, under the baton of Christ the Head, and not for the consumption of Babylon and her false shepherds and false prophets.

God intends to punish those shepherds who manipulated, regulated, controlled, compromised, consumed, etc, the “manifestation of the Spirit” given to each one of His dear children for the accomplishment of His purposes in the Bride of Christ.  His warning is clear – don’t be there when the judgement happens or you will share in her sins and her plagues.

Furthermore, if you are out with the other abused sheep, you will be rightly positioned to welcome the ensuing outpouring of broken, wounded, half-dead sheep and, by means of varieties of gifts, ministries and effects, bind up their wounds and bind them to their one true shepherd and yours, Jesus Christ the Lord.

Our job is not to act like demigods or high-priests and seek to save the sheep and ‘set them free’ by binding them to us or to our vision or to our ministry or to our ‘church’ or to our religious culture – that’s what the Pharisees did.  Our job is to point them – even deliver them on a stretcher if they cannot get themselves there – to the true Shepherd of their souls.  Peter described him this way: “Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified.”  Paul says that Jesus “...was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord.”

When those gifted as apostles, prophets and teachers are permitted and encouraged to work at their gifts, ministries will emerge that then allow other ministries to be born and to flourish, all under the baton of the Master Conductor (the Head of Ecclesia); all without us trying to manipulate things, gloriously evidencing the passion and mission of God for the completeness and maturity of the Bride for the Son.  In other words, all moving inexorably towards the out-workings the Spirit of God longs to see, works towards, and intercedes for.

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.  And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord.  There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons  But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.   (1 Corinthians 12:4-7)

What is “the common good” Paul was talking about?  Today we describe the common good for political purposes and ends; Paul was talking about something quite different.  I believe he expresses it in his letter to the Corinthians:

...all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.  For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit...  so that there may be no division in the body, but the members may have the same care for one another.  (selected from 1 Corinthians 12:12-25)

This is consistent with Jesus’ deep prayer for those he left behind (John 17 – “that they all may be one...”); it is also consistent with the record Luke gives us concerning how those same disciples lived immediately following Jesus’ ascension (Acts 1:14) and following the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:42-47).

To the Ephesians, Paul wrote of the common good this way (chapter 4):

...for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.  As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

There are certain “effects” or outcomes that God, by the Holy Spirit, is faithfully and unremittingly working out within and among and for His Body.  He is achieving that by establishing and cultivating a vast array of “ministries” within and among and for the Body.  These “effects” and “ministries” are the reasons He grants a glorious spectrum of manifestations of Himself (His individual grace-gifts) to every member of His Body as He sees fit, according to His aims and goals.

Neither the effects (outcomes) nor the ministries nor the gifts are random; rather they match who and what each one is and how each was created – according to how He knows us and how we know Him in Christ.  And all of this manifests the deeply symbiotic relationship that the New Testament calls “in Christ” – the relationship that comes into being divinely and sovereignly by what Jesus told Nicodemus about (John 3): being born again – born of the Spirit; the second and spiritual birth.  And the relationship moves forward towards its end-game as Paul described in Romans 8: “living according to the Spirit."