DownshoreDrift

Paul said, in the Second Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 11, verses 2-4,

2I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. 3But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 4For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough.

This passage makes me think of many of the problems that have erupted in the SBC recently. It also makes me think about how we do church and live out our lives. Is Christ our focus? Are we passionate about Jesus, or about ministry? Do we love Christ, or love our churches, positions, and ministries? When I frequent Christian web sites and blogs, I rarely see Jesus mentioned. There was a paper put out recently by Dr. Malcolm Yarnell of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary that many of you have already seen and commented on, where he gets all excited about the Baptist Renaissance at Southwestern. He mentions "baptists" 68 times in the article, and Jesus or Christian only 7 times. I know that the point of the article is how great it is that SWBTS is getting back to it's strictly Baptist roots, but if we are taking time to exalt our denomination, church, or ministry in a way that leaves out Jesus or uses Him to accomplish our own purpose, we are in error. If only we could have a renaissance of simple and pure devotion to Christ in the SBC or in our churches. Or, in our hearts.

What else has grabbed your attention? What are you using Jesus for? To have a better life? To grow your church and/or ministry? To give you what you want? To help you with evangelism or missions (those things, as good as they are can miss the point if we see Jesus as a means to an end)? Is He looked to so that you can prove your theological points? That would at least be something, because we rarely even refer to Christ in all of our religious talk, unless to say we are Christians or we are doing this to honor Jesus Christ. I wonder how honored He really is, when we use Him to further our own ends.

Jesus cannot be owned by us. We cannot use Him to make ourselves feel better, to have a better family or personal life, or to have a more successful ministry. He is not to be used to win theological arguments. He is to be worshipped because He is worthy of our praise and we are to be devoted to Christ alone. Jesus is not a method for church growth so that we can feel better about ourselves and be "successful" or "effective" in ministry, nor will He give our blessing to our triumphal pronouncements of how right we are on everything. Devotion to Christ demands humility because we begin to understand how amazing He is and how dependent upon Him we are - for everything.

Our church is growing right now at a fairly rapid pace. And, I don't know why. Of course, we have wonderful people who love the Lord, but what I mean is, there is no method that we are using. I can't look at 3 steps to church growth like I was taught in seminary and in the books I've read and explain why people are getting saved, growing in their walk, inviting others to church, and gathering in small groups to disciple one another. I've tried to figure it out and I can't. Well, there goes the book I was going to write and the church growth conference! All that I can say is that we continue to lift up the name of Jesus and trust the work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of our people. He is doing it. God is at work all around us and people are responding. They are taking submitting their own lives to the Lord and something supernatural is happening in their lives, that is actually natural for the Christian. We are just simply looking to Jesus and letting Him do what He wants. It is quite liberating, actually.

I guess I am learning that we cannot own Jesus. We can't get Him to work for us, no matter how many prayers we pray or how much we obey so He will bless us. The New Covenant requires that we live our lives in RESPONSE to His gracious initiative.  It means that we are free from striving and trying to earn God's blessing because He has truly paid the price for our sins and He gives us new life in Him. He was free, yet took our burden, so that we could be free. Do we believe it? Or, do we continue to construct our own burdens that we try and lift so that somehow, someway, God might bless us. Well, He already has - in Christ. But, we are too busy running after other things to notice.

I leave you with some poignant lines from a Rich Mullins song, "You Did Not Have a Home,"

Well you had no stones to throw
You came without an ax to grind
You did not tow the party line, No wonder sight came to the blind
You had no stones to throw
You had no stones to throw
And You rode and ass' foal
They spread their coats and cut down palms
For You and Your donkey to walk upon
But the world won't find what it thinks it wants
On the back of an ass' foal
So I guess You had to get sold
'Cause the world can't stand what it can't own
And it can't own You 'Cause You did not have a home
Birds have nests, foxes have dens
But the hope of the whole world rests
On the shoulders of a homeless man
You had the shoulders of a homeless man

May we all be reminded of the simplicity of devotion to Christ in all things. May He receive the glory.