To preach or not to preach?

When is it an appropriate time to preach the gospel, and when is it not? Is it possible to be too forceful in our presentation of the gospel to people? Is there a time to not preach the gospel?

Even as I ask these questions I hear a myriad of responses from people who will likely not agree with me. I will try to answer some of these, but know that people will want to throw more at me.

The first and most important thing to remember is some of the ways that we are actually exhorted to preach the gospel. A couple of examples come to mind. Peter says that we should always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us. (1 Peter 3:15) That is be ready, but this does not mean, always preach. Another is when Paul tells Timothy to "be prepared in season and out of season". Again, this is about preparation and readiness, but does not mean to always preach regardless of the season. (2 Timothy 4:2).

Paul also teaches that people can not believe unless they have heard. (Romans 10:14) There is a strong implication here that the gospel must be taken to everyone. But are we actually required to take the gospel to every individual, or is our individualistic world view an obstruction to the gospel? Jesus teaches that the gospel must be preached to all nations. In fact there really is an approach to the gospel in scripture that is more centred on nations than on individuals. This could be unpacked quite extensively.

When Peter tells people to be ready to share the gospel, he tells them to do it with gentleness and respect. I would argue that this is something that often gets left out. In fact many Evangelicals often take the approach that their only job is to preach, often without any love at all, and that once they have "preached" their responsibility is done. Often such people are very quick to damn someone to hell if they do not listen to a forceful presentation.

Therefore, I want to challenge the evangelical presupposition that we should preach the gospel to every individual and propose that we should only do so when someone is ready to listen. (I am sure this sounds heretical to some, and at least highly controversial to others.) Let me present from scripture why I believe this to be so.

A key concept in understanding the preaching of the gospel is how Jesus did it. Jesus did not in fact preach to everyone. John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus. A key part of this was the baptism for the repentance of sins. A maxim is used to refer to how many received this baptism- all of Judea, minus the rebellious pharisees. So for starters, Jesus was not actually too interested in preaching to rebellious pharisees. Most of his conversations with the pharisees saw Jesus answering the pharisees attacks, but doing so in ways to cryptically throw them off their attacks. Other times when the masses followed Jesus, Jesus preached in such a way as to again be cryptic, telling parables so that people would be "ever hearing, but not understanding", so that only those who were really hungry would seek the truth. (Mark 4:12, Matthew 13:14, Acts 28:26, Isaiah 6:9). This is consistent with other things Jesus taught- "blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness" (Matthew 5:6)  and "whoever seeks the truth will find it" (Matthew 7:8).

A lot of that description of Jesus' method sounds a little reactive. That is, so many were flocking to him because of his miracles that he was forced to react in how he preached the truth. He wanted to make sure that he was actually preaching to those who wanted to listen and were not just seeking the fireworks show. A common argument might be, "well, we can't actually compare ourselves to Jesus, we need to do things differently."  But, Jesus was deliberate in actually telling us how to go about preaching the gospel. He was not only reactive, he was proactive.

Jesus did have a plan for spreading the gospel (i.e his message, the truth) to people. He actually outlines this plan very clearly twice in the gospels, in Matthew 10 and Luke 10. Jesus sent out his disciples two by two. Let's have a look at what he told them to do.
1) Jesus told the pairs (among the 72, not just 12, which included women who were among his closest followers) firstly to go into the harvest. (Luke 10:2) That is, the harvest was ready to be collected.* (More on this a bit later).
2) Jesus told them to take nothing with them. In a first century middle east context they could easily go from village to village. The commonality in a 21st century Siberian context is that we should approach a village or other context in need, depending on hospitality.
3) Jesus told his disciples to greet someone's home with "May the peace of God be on your home." If this was received, then it was a key indicator that this person was ready to listen.  If the host did not receive the peace of God, Jesus intended for his disciples to move on, that is not to persist with a person who was not ready or willing to listen.
4) When received, Jesus then wanted his disciples to (a) receive the hospitality offered to them (b) heal the sick and (c) preach the Kingdom of God.
5) When not received in an entire town or location, Jesus basically tells the disciples to move on and not waste their energy on stubborn people.

There is some context worth looking at in the above example. First century Jewish villages had all of God's word and law. They were in no ways naive about what they were rejecting if they chose to reject God's peace and kingdom. When going to an unreached context this needs to be approached a little differently, taking the time to patiently and contextually explain the truth. Unreached people however are not as big a stranger to God's law as we might think, and there is still a time for not preaching even in such an unreached context. Where Jesus told his disciples to shake the dust off their feet in a Jewish context, this could mean going away and praying and waiting to come back in the future in a different context.

Jesus' method is deliberate and proactive. He wants us as his disciples to seek out those who are ready to listen. A good way to refer to such a person is a "person of peace". This method is employed by Jesus many times in his ministry. Jesus seeking out the woman at the well in Samaria is a classic example. He found a specific person who was ready to listen, and through her the doors opened to an entire community where he stayed for a couple days teaching about the Kingdom of God. He actually does the same thing with the man named legion, who he heals from demon possession. That man opened the doors to an entire community when Jesus later returned there. If we are to be deliberate about following Jesus' proactive example, this is the best way to preach the gospel- find a person of peace who is ready to listen and reach an entire community through them. It could even be argued that it is counter productive to do otherwise. We end up spending so much time and energy convincing ones and twos and removing them from their community, where as God has a plan to transform entire communities and see rapid multiplication of the gospel.

The argument needs to come back to the idea of whether we are obligated to share the gospel with every person we meet. Firstly I would say that Jesus' name and truth should always be on our lips. We should not hide our light under a table, we should put it high on a stand for all to see. But, and this is a big BUT, we need to be ready in gentleness and respect to stop when people do not want to listen. This can be very hard for us to do at times. We tend to take it upon ourselves that if we do not give someone a full gospel presentation that they may never have another chance to hear and seem to think we could be personally cosigning them to hell. Surely if we had done more we could have prevented this! Or could we have? Or should we?

I will go on record as saying I am not a calvinist. I really do believe in free choice, given by God. I know my ideas seem inconsistent with this. Perhaps the biggest question we should ask is, who is better at preaching the truth, us or God? Let's have a look at where God does preach to people.

In Psalm 19 we learn:
The heavens proclaim the glory of God
The skies display his craftsmanship
Day after day they continue to speak
Night after night they make him known
There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard
Their message has gone throughout the earth
And their words to all the world

Those are some amazing facts! There is not a language where the voice of God's glory has not been heard. This message has gone to all the world! That is a little staggering to realise, if we think the responsibility is all ours. This means that all ethnicities, all people groups have already been hearing something from God. Our part as disciples is to be obedient, not to question God's methods. He tells us to preach the Kingdom of God, but there is a proactive way we should do this, and a way we should avoid.

Often in theology we reduce God's preaching to a patronising "general revelation". As if to say, "well God can only give some vague message to people himself, and it is up to us to fill in the gaps". Have a look further at the context of Psalm 19. The rest of the Psalm goes on to say what the heavens, the skies are preaching about. Verse 7 and 8 tell us that they are giving us the instructions and commands of the Lord. What? That doesn't make sense surely? Surely God went to great efforts to give us his law, and then to even greater efforts to come as Jesus, the Word made flesh. But Psalm 19 is telling us that God is even teaching us his instructions and commands through his glory being revealed in the skies. Again, our part is to play obedience and bring people to Jesus so they can be disciples and follow Jesus' commands closely. But still, we are not allowed to say that God doesn't do more than simply make people aware of his existence, he preaches so much more to them.

Of course the Romans scripture can not be ignored.
Ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities- his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God. 
This verse (Romans 1:20) actually sounds remarkably similar to Psalm 19, that people can know God from what he has taught us in the sky. This also lines up with Genesis 1, day 4, that God created the stars to bring light on the earth. So we can see from scripture that people in all parts of the world should know something of who God is, something of his glory and even something of his instructions and commands. In fact Paul goes even further in chapter 2 (verses 14-15).
Even Gentiles, who do not have God's written law, show that they know his law when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. They demonstrate that God's law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts accuse them or tell them they are doing right.
Really, this is quite a lot of scriptural evidence to let us know that God most definitely speaks to all peoples before we ever turn up on the scene.

What this all means is, if someone rejects the peace of God when we bring it, they are cognisant of their actions. This doesn't give us permission to communicate the gospel in a culturally insensitive manner (gentleness and respect = cultural sensitivity), but it does give us permission, in fact even requires us to pull back when people reject God.

We have to consider our actions. So often we can come in with a lot of pride and force and insist that people listen to our entire presentation. This approach is not loving. In fact it's not even wise, not what Jesus asks us to do. Jesus asks us to seek out people who are ready to listen, people who have noticed his glory in creation, people who have God's law in their hearts. When we are obedient to Jesus this way, doors will be opened wide into entire communities or people groups.

This should give us a lot of relief. God is in control. We should not be preaching to everyone the entire gospel presentation. We should be opening our mouths and speaking out God's glory, and when people show their curiosity we have a perfect opportunity to go further.
I can think of times in my own life when I believed that I had to push through and convince someone to listen to me. I can think of times here in Russia where other workers here have sat in taxis or trucks with me and pushed through, handed out tracts when the driver has indicated that they do not want to hear. I can even think of a time, when having told my believing brother that this was insensitive, it lead to a big argument and falling out, because he believed he had to preach the full gospel to everyone he met.

Be ready, be prepared, in season and out of season. Always speak the name of Jesus, do so in love with gentleness and respect. Seek out people of peace who are ready to listen. Remember that God has already been preaching to people. Remember that in obedience our job is to go into the harvest and collect the harvest* that God has already prepared. When people do not want to listen, don't push them. You are not letting them down if you don't give them a "full presentation". God is far better at preaching and revealing his glory to people than we are. Often we can get in the way of God getting through to a person. By our backing off, we give God the chance to keep speaking in his own way. Then when someone is ready our job is to be ready to give the reason for the hope that is within us and hopefully even collect a harvest!

Thinking about covenants (and oral bible stories)

We have been telling stories in Genesis for quite a while now. It could be argued that we have been bogged down in Genesis, but then again we have learnt so much. In fact I would go so far as to say that we have relearnt a lot.

As we embarked on telling stories orally to students here in Siberia we did not know just what stories from the old testament we should include, and when we would then move on to Jesus. I have often argued in the past that it is not wise to rush to the new testament too quickly. One of the things we realised as we studied bible translation, was that many of the key terms needed in the new testament can actually be discovered by going through the old testament first. In the same way, it has been the stories of the old testament that have revealed to us, just how many we also need to share.

Quite a while back I wrote a blog on The First Covenant. I had a bit of a personal revelation after telling the story of Noah to some of our indigenous Siberian friends. I realised that a covenant was all about God taking territory back on earth. When he made a covenant with Noah, this was ground that the devil could not take back from God, even though he claimed the rest of the planet. It was God's first step in his plan for victory to reclaim everything.

With this enlarged view of covenants other revelations have laid in wait for us as we have continued to share oral bible stories. There is clearly a big thing going on between God and Abraham. God makes a promise to bless all nations through Abraham. This is a covenant of massive prophetic levels. God is now laying out his plan to claim everything back. If we look at the Abrahamic covenant we will see that all nations on earth are included in it. It is therefore very relevant for all peoples who have never heard the story before. In fact, I would even say that they are provided for or covered by the Abrahamic covenant, even though they still need to place faith in it.

Our understanding of scripture is that Isaac is the son of the promise, who God promised to Abraham. It was through Isaac's line that God would bring his message of salvation to the world. This is of course true, but there is more to the Abraham story than meets the eye. On more than one occasion, something interesting has happened when we have come to the story of Ishmael, when sharing it with Siberian indigenous peoples.  (Bear in mind that we were even tempted to skip over this "irrelevant" story.) Each time we shared the story, the listeners were convinced that Ishmael was the son of the promise. We told them, wait on, the story will reveal someone else.

On deeper reflection, there is something going on with the Ishmael story. He is not God's original plan, Isaac is. But at the same time, God does not reject Ishmael. In fact God even decides to bless Ishmael and bring about a great nation through Ishmael too. When God made his covenant with Noah, he enlarged his tent in this world. When he made his covenant with Abraham he enlarged his tent again. When Ishmael came along (a mistake by Abraham), God decides to incorporate Ishmael into his plan.

Ishmael was not part of God's original plan, but God decides to enlarge his tent through Ishmael anyway. If you like, Ishmael is an annex to the Abraham tent, even though the front chamber is still in Isaac's name. This means that the Arab's exist in provision under the line of Ishmael as a blessed nation.

Every single covenant made in scripture needs to be fulfilled by Jesus the King. We as believers now live under the new covenant of Jesus. The covenants of Noah and Abraham apply to us as gentiles, and then it is Jesus who fulfils these covenants and then brings completion through his sacrifice. As gentiles we were never and should never be under the Mosaic covenant. Paul argued rightly in the new testament that the Jerusalem church should not bring gentiles in under the Mosaic covenant. The Jerusalem church were under the Mosaic covenant, but this was still incomplete without the new covenant of Jesus to fulfil it.

If Jesus fulfils all covenants, then he also fulfils the Ishmaelic sub-clause of the Abrahamic covenant that applies to Arabs. When Muslims claim Ishmael we should not be so quick to tell them they are wrong. But we should point them to Isa (Jesus) who is the only true fulfilment of the Ishmaelic sub clause. This of course means that there is no such thing as a Mohumadic covenant.

When we are bringing the gospel to people, we need to consider what covenants they are under before bringing them to the new covenant. For Jews, this means they need to come in through the Mosaic covenant first and then on to Jesus. But this does not apply to any other peoples. For Muslims, or Arabs at least (I haven't figured out whether they are to be considered the same or not), they need to come in through the Abrahamic covenant with the Ishmaelic sub clause. For most peoples of the world however it is enough for them to come first through the Noahic and then Abrahamic covenants, before they finally come to Jesus and his perfect new covenant, in which we are all provided for.

This deeper understanding of covenants has brought us to the place where we realise that we do need to share all of the oral bible stories from Genesis 1 to the end of Abraham. But for the majority of peoples in the world, it is then appropriate to move on to Jesus next.

Jesus original intention for his followers.

What did Jesus mean when he said, "Upon this rock I will build my Ekklesia?" This came up in Matthew 16 verse 18 when Jesus was speaking to Peter, after Peter is the first of the disciples to openly declare Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.

Do we automatically know what Jesus meant, or is it worth revisiting this again? The first mistake would be to simply assume we know what he meant based upon modern translations of the Bible. Modern translations all seem to translate the work Ekklesia as Church. Older translations into English such as Tyndale and others of the 16th century did not do so.

But what does the word Ekklesia actually mean? When Jesus uttered the word in this context it was radical. In fact, so many of the things that Jesus said were completely radical the first time he said them. That is why he had so many enemies and was crucified. Remember, he completely upset the religious sensibilities of established institutional Judaism.

Here are a few places that I have looked at to seek a definition:

1) A straight definition of the Greek word the way it had been used up until Jesus' time can be found in Wikipedia. Ecclesia (from ancient Athens).
In Ancient Athens, the Ekklesia was a political assembly in any one city that made decisions for that particular city. All citizens were welcome to be a part of the Ekklesia. When Jesus uttered the word Ekklesia, this is the definition that his disciples would have heard. Another definition did not exist at the time.
Could Jesus have had a political definition in mind when he uttered this word? Well good exegesis demands we consider Jesus' views on politics from elsewhere in the gospels. Jesus says in John 18:36 that "His kingdom is not of this world" and that his followers would fight to defend it, if it were. Pilate rightly goes on to say "so you are a king then?" to which Jesus agrees.
I would argue that Jesus did have a political definition in mind when he said the word Ekklesia. The distinction that needs to be made though is that he was not saying his Kingdom was of this world, so neither should his Ekklesia be.

How could the word Ekklesia be translated as it had been understood by Greeks and Romans before the first century AD? If it is to have some political meaning, then this needs to be considered. It carries the idea of a council, a body of representatives, a legislature, a parliament, senate or congress. This "council" is to be the representative of God's Kingdom here in this earth. This does not mean making earthly political decisions as such. It does mean however, making decisions to transform this world through acts of love into God's Kingdom.

Consider the place that early believers had in the Roman Empire. They were expected to worship the Emperor as all people were. The Emperor set himself up as a god and demanded worship. Early Christian believers refused to worship the Emperor, and said "we have a different King". What is more they also had a different Ekklesia, the assembly of believers that endeavoured to see Jesus' Kingdom established on earth. It is no wonder that Rome was threatened by this concept and executed early Christians. I count myself among these believers. I know that in today's world if the Ekklesia of Jesus was truly impacting society in a big way, that it would be a threat to the established political system of the day, a threat that would undoubtedly result in persecution and execution of Christians once again.

In my mind, this is something of what Jesus meant when he said would establish his Council Assembly, starting with his first follower Peter.

2) It is worth taking a look directly at the Greek scriptures. This is not hard to do these days. The NET bible on Bible.org makes the Greek text available.  (A note here for dissenters- the Greek text has been deduced from the over 25,000 original manuscripts available. The fact that there is some variation in these texts is not alarming, as a process of Triangulation can be used to come up with the original words.)
Read the Greek text. To actually read the Greek you will have to click on the Grk/Heb tab at the top of the right hand column. You can click on the word ἐκκλησίαν and come up with a definition.
The definition speaks of "a gathering of citizens" or "an assembly of people gathered". The definition then goes on to speak of what the word means "in a Christian sense". That is, the word Ekklesia did add meaning from it's original Athenian political sense. But this is added meaning that came over the next couple of centuries.

So, I will readily admit that Ekklesia also means "a gathering or assembly of Christians".  But that is the definition of the word as it appears in Acts or in Paul's letters, but not as it appears when Jesus first says it in Matthew 16:18.

3)  A well researched article entitled "The translation of the Greek word 'Ekklesia' as 'church' in the English Bible and its ramifications", further discusses the definition of the word.
The article makes the point that there is no sense in scripture of a universal hierarchical church. Indeed the word Ekklesia is always used in a local context. Even in Revelation, Jesus addresses seven separate Ekklesia groups, but not one mass Ekklesia. This article argues that it is a mistake to translate the word Ekklesia as church, and that assembly or congregation are better suited.

Conclusion: Jesus was interested in establishing his Kingdom on earth, a new order. To do this he wanted to see Local Council Assemblies of believers be his representatives through out the earth. He always intended to remain the King in charge of all of these assemblies, never to have an intermediate person in charge. These Local Assemblies are of course places of worship, but if they never consider how to transform the world around them, then they are not fulfilling their purpose. Therefore the Council part of the definition needs to be worked out in practical Christian love.

I have argued strongly against the word church before. Again, I am not even suggesting a replacement. It is equally possible for us to behave as the representatives of King Jesus in local gatherings without having to put a label on anything. Often when we start to use labels, we begin to shape them into our own human religion and depart from Jesus' original intention. Let's be about doing Jesus' Kingdom.

I am a baby Christian learning to take my first steps

I made the decision to stop going to church in July 2011. It was a decision that was a long time coming. I have long known about the priesthood of all believers and long known this is God's plan for the body of Christ.

So leaving church was not a sudden decision nor was it not deeply considered. Back in 2007-08 my family was blessed to be part of a home church when we decided to step out in faith following reading "Organic Church" by Neil Cole. This wasn't even the first time I had been involved in something close to the priesthood of all believers. Back in the early to mid 90s I was part of a church that made its way from a traditional "sitting in rows and pastor led church" towards an "open church" where all were encouraged to share, prophesy and lead in worship and teaching.

The decision in 2011 followed after reading "Pagan Christianity" by George Barna and Frank Viola. (Yes, I did read Reimagining Church and found it to say nothing new than I already knew from previous experience and reading.) There were many good points made in this book about the development of the church from Constantinian times. I had also long been aware of the massive changes that happened during the fourth century, but never to the extent that the book pointed out. I no longer needed any convincing. 

If I was to be a part of the solution instead of the problem I needed to be a part of something new. This meant I would have to go through a period of "detoxification" from many of the things in the church that had polluted my faith. At times this past year has been very good, and at times very hard. On the positive side, I noticed that I made friends with a lot more people who were not Christians. At the same time I did not judge them, I did not plot how I would invite them to church. I spoke to them of Jesus out of an overflow of my faith. I know this has had many positive effects on people, leading them towards Jesus. But on the downside, there would be times of feeling guilty for not going to church.

This guilt passed with time. It is quite ridiculous that I had subconsciously picked up the belief in my life that to be a good Christian you have to go to church. This is fraught with so many problems and is at the root of human religion. As I realised that there must be something else to being a Christian I began to go back to the gospels, and began to see Jesus in a very different light. I began to notice that Jesus is very forgiving. In fact, he forgives without provocation. 

The biggest story that wedged a splinter in my mind is the story of the woman caught in adultery. This woman had just been caught, she hadn't even the time to repent. Yet as Jesus exposed the hypocrisy and sin of the pharisees as none could throw the first stone, he tells the woman "no one condemns you, nor do I, now go away and sin no more."  Jesus does not ask the woman if she repents before he is willing to forgive her sin. (He hasn't even died on the cross yet.) He forgives her first! He then asks her to repent as an act of response to her forgiveness. This is not in keeping with evangelical doctrine, and so I have realised neither am I.

Forgiveness is a massive part of Jesus' purpose. When he heals the paralytic he is more concerned that he be forgiven than physically healed, "so that you may know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins, I say to you take up your mat and walk." Jesus teaches in some hard hitting parables that if we do not forgive, we are fried. I'm not much of a fan of hell, but I can not avoid that Jesus teaches about it. But it is not in reference to punishment for sins that he so much speaks of hell, but rather that people who do not forgive will lose the Father's forgiveness. This seems so backwards, but I believe it is a massive part of the gospel that we have misunderstood. There is NO option to not forgive. We endanger our very salvation by not forgiving. Yet at the same time Jesus is handing out salvation as quickly and as generously as he can to who ever will receive it. This challenges me in ways that have often been glossed over in my past church going life, where there is much unforgiveness.

Let's go straight for the most obvious of all stories Jesus taught when it comes to heaven and hell. Many church going evangelicals will love to put this one in the too hard basket. It's the parable of the sheep and the goats. Jesus does not let us off the hook. If we ignore those in need around us, we are ignoring Jesus, we are unloving (perhaps unforgiving of someone for offending our prejudices), and yes we set ourselves up for hell fire. Surely my idea of Jesus forgiving everyone is a universalist sounding idea? No, I am not a universalist. I do believe Jesus hands out forgiveness much more easily than any Christian or any church on the planet. But we humans have an awful knack of throwing it back in Jesus's face and saying "no thanks, I think I will hold on to my comforts, my prejudices, my unforgiveness and I will go it my own way." People reject salvation, far more than missing out on seeing it.

I have been praying for the last couple years that Jesus would help me to love the weak and the poor. I am such a novice at this. I have began to really take a notice of the poor people in our city, of the street people and the beggars. Jesus tells us to give to everyone who asks of us without expecting anything in return, and as a rule I really try to do this. Only recently my wife and I found ourselves holding the hand of an old lady we know from the street as she died of gangrene behind some rubbish bins on the wet concrete. The Lord's graciousness in this situation speaks such volumes. He provided a person to tell us that she was dying, he provided an old arm chair that someone had thrown out so we could lift her on to it, he provided a caring doctor in the ambulance who did not reject a street bum. It is staggering for us to realise that our friend Marina was most likely destined to die alone in the cold, rain and garbage, but that the Lord loved her enough to make sure that this would not happen. I read to her from Psalm 23 and Revelation 21. As I was walking on the way to those garbage bins with another street lady, the Lord spoke to me and reminded me "what ever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." I knew that I would offer her forgiveness of sins. Melody and I were at her side, Marina was quite unresponsive as she died from toxins in her system. But the Lord blessed us as we saw Marina nod a couple of times in response to Melody. I prayed for Marina, "Marina, Jesus forgives you of your sins, Jesus is waiting for you." No matter your belief on sin and forgiveness it is hard to argue that Jesus did anything else in the gospels. Of course I do not know Marina's heart. But I also know it would have been her choice to reject this forgiveness that was freely given to her. We saw this woman open up to us slowly over the last couple years, shedding tears as my wife and I hugged her many months ago and declared our love for her.

It is only in taking these baby steps that I am beginning to learn what actually being a Christian means. This feels like the beginning of the journey of my faith, that my entire life up to this point has been embryonic. I am still very weak and hopeless in being able to truly love the way Jesus does.

So back to this dreaded church thing. Why do I feel so guilty about not going to church? Recently we went to Canada for two months, to see family and supporters of our work. We went to church every Sunday for two months. I didn't have the heart to tell people I wanted to skip services. I didn't want to offend them. I figured, how could going to church for a couple months hurt? But I fell into my stupid little subconscious lie that I was pleasing God by going to church services, that I was performing some kind of holy religious ritual. And surely all the people in these church services are good people who love God, so it can't be that bad? But after doing this for two months, and getting my religious reward in God's eyes for attending his holy temple, I suddenly feel like a heathen again for not going to church. It feels like a year of progress in my detox has gone down the drain.

Part 4: What will happen to the nations?

Individualism is a pervasive world view that now exists in the west. It affects how everything is played out, especially attitudes towards the gospel. I won't go into depths on individualism now- I will leave that to experts like Mark Sayers.

Unfortunately this means that people often only read the bible looking for ways that the individual can be saved. This approach neglects the fact that people best come to God in the context of their community, culture and nation. This approach also means that many western readers neglect to realise that the bible is so full of the theme of nations.

One of my bug bears is the western pre-occupation with an eschatology that has Jesus returning really soon to rescue them from an uncomfortable society that is not as cosy and puritan as it once was. This is a very selfish approach that does not acknowledge the thousands of nations around the world yet to understand the powerful gospel of Jesus Christ.

Jesus was not plagued by individualism. He saw it as his role to bring the truth and gospel to all of Israel, to the "lost sheep of Israel." It is true that his method was to focus on the small, not on the big. Jesus preferred to spend his time discipling a smaller group of people than preaching to the masses- as much as he had compassion on the masses. But even as Jesus was discipling his core group of men and women, he was doing this in the midst of community, one of the building blocks of an ethnic nation. Jesus avoided individualism.

Jesus spoke to his disciples of the end of time. But Jesus chose to deflect this error and focus his attention on the importance of the nations. He explained that the gospel he had been teaching them needed to go to all the nations of the world.

This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:14).

This was not just a nice idea, but a necessity for the end to come. This is so often ignored by western individualism, a world view that is so self focused it ignores the wider world.

Some even try to argue that it is therefore only necessary to preach the gospel to all nations, and that when all have simply heard, this is then good enough and Jesus can return. Wrong. Aside from this being unloving, there are other scriptures that underline God's purposes are far deeper. 

Jesus tells his disciples to "go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit." It is clear that preaching is not enough, making disciples of all nations is the goal. Doing this takes patience and a lot of time.  (Matthew 28:19)

That is not the end though, nor the only evidence that Jesus cares about the nations. We can take a flash forward to the end of the age in Revelation. Multitudes are worshiping before the throne of the Most High God. There are so many there that no one could even count them. 

They are singing: Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the lamb. (Revelation 7:10).  But don't forget to notice who is there as they are worshiping God. A multitude of people from every nation, tribe, people and language. That's people from everywhere, all nations. This underlines that it is God's desire that his plan of salvation is for nations, not just individuals. and that all nations need to be in heaven, not just in small numbers, but in a multitude.

Following the posts:

Part 1: Nations in the Bible

Part 2: Nations in the Bible

Part 3: What is the definition of a nation?

It should now be clear what a nation is, and how significant they are to God in his eternal plan of salvation. In following posts I would like to take a look at what empires are, how they differ from nations and are not part of God's plan, how there is only one good empire and how the Kingdom of God fits into the concept of nations and empires.

Part 2: Nations in the Bible

This idea that "the nations" are important to God is not some fleeting idea in the Bible. It laces every story, every context, and is intertwined throughout the entire epic. It is simply because as westerners we are individualistic that we miss this emphasis. We make the perilous mistake of thinking that God's story is only about salvation, and then we reduce that to individual salvation.
One of my favourite verses in the Bible, I think sums up very well the purposes that are in the heart of God. Habakkuk is complaining to God about the violence and injustice surrounding Israel. The Lord responds that he can use any nation for his glory, even the Babylonians.
The Lord goes on to explain to Habakkuk that in a future time all will be clear:

This vision is for a future time, 
it describes the end and it will be fulfilled, 
if it seems slow in coming, wait patiently, for it will surely take place. 
It will not be delayed. 
What sorrow awaits you who build cities with money gained through murder and corruption! 
Has not the LORD of Heaven's armies promised that the wealth of nations will turn to ashes? 
They work so hard but all in vain! 
For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.
(Habakkuk 2)


God is very interested in the behaviour of nations. The Lord wants to see his world transformed in every way to bring glory to him. He desires people every where to worship him and to display their love for God and for people through righteous and just living. It is glorifying to God when the nations live in the way that he desires.

It is not enough for individuals to simply live righteously. People exist in families, clans, tribes, communities and nations. These social structures must be transformed by the gospel. It is when this happens that God is glorified.

God's heart for nations is the very reason that God decided to use a nation as part of his plan. He spoke to Abraham and told him that he would be come a great nation that would bless all nations. Sadly, this plan is not fully revealed in the old testament. We see a hint of this during the time of Solomon. During Solomon's reign, his wisdom and fame spread to other nations of the world. Kings and Queens from around the world came to him. It is clear to see that God wanted this to work better than it did. Nevertheless, there is still an example here. The Queen of Sheba came up to Israel during Solomon's reign. She took Judaism back to Ethiopia. The Ethiopian people became believers of the old covenant. These facts can be verified by studying Ethiopian history and archaeology.

The story did not stop with the Queen of Sheba for the Ethiopians. Later on, in the story of Acts, Philip shares the completion of the gospel with an Ethiopian Eunuch. The Eunuch already understood the old covenant. Philip explained to the Eunuch who Jesus was from Isaiah. The Eunuch became a believer in the New Covenant and went back to Ethiopia to explain the rest of the story to them. This is probably the best example in history of a "Jewish" people becoming Christian en masse.

There are so many examples in the old testament that speak about the nations. I will not try to quote them all. Many of them can be found in the prophets, because it was something that God was trying to teach his people.

If we are to obedient to our Lord, then we should of course pay attention to Jesus' words to his disciples before he ascended into heaven:
All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.
Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.
Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.
(Matthew 28).


If we are to understand these words of Jesus, we need to pay attention to what he said. He asks us to make disciples. Disciples are followers of Jesus. But pay attention, he doesn't speak just of individuals, but of nations too. They are very important to Jesus. I consider it to be an interesting and vital note at this point that Jesus did not ask his followers to start churches or to build temples, he asked them to make more followers and to teach them to obey Jesus' commands. Again, in Jesus' commands there is nothing about planting churches, building churches or establishing a priestly temple system.  (But, that is probably for another post.)

There is a parallel in Jesus' words, from the very first command that God gave in Genesis. God told people to "go out into all the world and multiply". This is exactly the same principle that Jesus applied to his disciples- "go out into all the world and multiply followers of me and of all nations." There is an eternal godly principle here of multiplication to the point of filling the earth with God's glory. And I believe that God deserves nothing less than the earth being full of his glory.

If you take anything away from this post, I hope it is that the nations have always been a massive part of God revealing his glory in the earth, and that he will get his desire, but is very patient in doing so.

More in part 3 about how to define a nation, and whether every nation has a part to play in God's eternal glory.

Series: Empire, the Kingdom of God and Nations- a biblical and political perspective. Part 1: Nations in the Bible

This is the first post in a series on the topics of Empire, Kingdom of God and Nations. I would like to have a look at each of these topics from both a biblical and political perspective. The goal is to better understand what God thinks about these topics and how we should live out following Jesus in this context.

A good place to start this series is probably at the beginning of the chronological biblical story. The first of these concepts that arises in scripture is that of a nation. It is easy to read a word without considering the full meaning, the mistake being to interpret nation as a political nation state. This is surely one of the definitions of nation, but not the first one we come across in scripture.

The tower of Babel becomes the starting point for the discussion. I won't go into this stories dating in history- that is perilously hard to do. One thing is certain from this story though- this is where the nations rebelled against God. The people rose up with pride in their hearts, "Hey, we should build a really great city, it will have a huge tower as its centrepiece, that will reach even up into the heavens, we will become famous and powerful. God will not be able to send us out across the world like he wants us to do, because in our great power we will do what we want." God sees their rebellion and says, "anything that they want to do will be accomplished, their pride must be ended." God decides to confuse their common lingua franca, and the people are stuck with their tribal dialects. They give up on their plans of world domination, and set out to live separately from one another, just as God intended when he said "go into all the world and multiply."

This is the story in the Bible where the nations are scattered. It is not exactly the story where the nations are born. There is a clear outline of the birth of the nations in Genesis 10. What ever date you place the tower of Babel, the nations were already coming into view before the tower. Each section of descent in Genesis 10 concludes with, "these were the descendants, identified by clan, language, territory and national identity."  "All the nations of the earth descended from these clans after the great flood."

A linguistic world view that allows for multilingualism allows for each of these clans to have their own language at the same time as a common language existed. Many a time people have viewed this story and concluded that it was a curse from God to create multiple languages. This is simply not true, the various languages had already developed. God confused the common language, not as a curse, but as a means of grace, so that they would fulfil his plans and multiply to fill the earth. 


This alternative view, that God acted in grace at Babel, allows us to see that the nations are a good thing in God's sight. This altered world view is further confirmed in the story of Abraham in Genesis 12. (Some time into the distant future after Babel.) God promises Abraham that he will become a great nation and that "all nations on earth will be blessed through you." God had a positive plan for all of the nations. He chose to make a nation out of Abraham.

The nations become a recurring theme of scripture from the tower of Babel, through the old testament, the new testament and up to revelation. They are dear to God's heart and a big part of his plan of salvation.

More to follow in future posts about How to Define a Nation, How to Define an Empire, What does the Bible have to say about Empires?, Are there still Empires in the world today?, What is the Kingdom of God and how does it relate to Empires and Nations?, Discipleship movements that change nations.

Why did Jesus get baptised?

Why did Jesus need to be baptised?

Jesus never sinned. I have always been confused about why he decided to receive baptism. I thought that perhaps it was to simply give us an example so that we would follow. The point in the story where Jesus is baptised though is basically at the end of John's ministry. John the Baptist has baptised all the people in Judea and Jerusalem, and then Jesus is basically last. So it wasn't really as an example for the people in his day.

John's baptism is for the forgiveness of sins, so this is still confusing. For the rest of us, we need to be forgiven of our sin. So what does baptism mean for us? For the rest of us it means a physical act of repentance. What is repentance? A decision to not sin in life. For those of us who have sinned in life (everyone except Jesus) this decision means leaving behind a sinful life, but also walking into a sinless life (of course we still struggle to be sinless). Think about it for a moment though- baptism is a covenant with God to live a sin free life. Jesus was able to make such a covenant. By getting baptised he was saying to the world "I am going on record to declare that I am living and will continue to live a sin free life before God, I covenant myself to be sin free." God's response to Jesus covenanting himself is immediate, "You are my son, who I love very much and I am very pleased with you."

Jesus covenanted himself to a sin free life. This is definitely an example, but it was a pre-requisite for his starting up the kingdom, his coronation if you like.

That's what baptism is for us, a covenant to be sin free before God and as such it is actually repentance in action. As such I can not see how a believer would not choose to take this physical step of making a covenant with God. It is an essential step in obedience to following Jesus.

The kingdom of God is found in the doing

The kingdom of God is all about action. The gospel of Mark outlines this well.

* John the Baptist preaches repentance, that people should come to the river to be baptised. Action is required in response.

* Jesus comes to the river to be baptised, even when he does not need to be forgiven of sins. (But the state of sin free living is still required.) Jesus models action, he shows more than tells.

* Jesus calls people to get the kingdom started with him, to confess their sins and believe. But how were they to believe? Was it just a thought in the heart? Action was required. Belief came about by following Jesus. Simon, Andrew, James and John all decided to act in response and went with Jesus.

* Jesus cast out a demon from a man in the synagogue. The way had been prepared by repentance of sins and baptism in the Jordan, but Jesus then began to clean house. Jesus went through out the towns and villages of Galilee to all the synagogues casting out demons. This action of Jesus was the beginning of implementation of his Kingdom. Jesus also healed Simon's mother in law and the many people that came to Simon's house and later to Jesus' house in Capernaum. This action was also a demonstration of his kingdom.

I think there are some very telling stories about repentance in the gospels. One of my favourites is the story of the woman caught in adultery. As there is no one to stone her Jesus tells her to "go and sin no more". This is the action that is required from her to repent. Repentance is not actually the presence of a contrite heart. It is in the act of going away and not sinning that repentance is actually lived out. Baptism is also part of the physical action required to couple with repentance. Words are not enough. This is one of the reasons that formulaic prayers for becoming a Christian can be so hollow and mean so little. It is not the prayer that makes someone a Christian, it is the going away and not sinning and then the following of Jesus by affirmative action.

It is my opinion that little of the Kingdom of God exists in the landscape of the western institutional church. There is a formulaic teaching going around that people need to repent of their sins once, (because Jesus died for sins once and for all, there is a misconception that repentance is once and for all also) and that after this no real action is required. Christianity becomes a religion of words and good feelings, but no copying of Jesus' behaviour, the modelling that he gave to us.

It is impossible to build his temple (the one temple of all believers) in a place where the kingdom does not already exist. I know of very few places in my own experience where- continual confession of sins occurs, demons are cast out, the sick are healed, the poor fed, the lonely invited in. Most of the expression I have seen of Christianity is a hollow expression of ceremonies with little action followed up (these are not meant to be sweeping generalisations against the people I know who do these things, but they are usually no more than 5-10% of any congregation, sometimes less).

Building the church before building the kingdom is putting the cart before the horse. I do feel a little stuck as to doing this in my own life. But I also know that it is only when the kingdom is built that Jesus' true ekklesia will come to life.

What is the kingdom of God? (My church detox continues.)

My season of detox continues and I don't feel as sick as I did before. I still have the odd pang of guilt when Sunday rolls around, but even they are starting to subside.

One of my problems is that when ever I hear the word "church" or "pastor" I cringe a little. The word "church" just brings up images of being chained to the pew (metaphorically for me, but there were some convicts in early Australia who were literally chained!), and not being able to participate. The word pastor (I have sympathy for them) still brings up images of a person overworked by the system, unable to release people into what God has for them.

I really appreciate Frank Viola and all that he is doing for the organic (church) movement, but I do respectfully disagree with him that we need to use the word church. Frank Viola has been in the organic movement for more than 20 years now, so the word no longer carries connotations for him, he is able to use it as it should be. But unfortunately when nearly everyone else hears the word we all get it wrong. I personally want to let the word rest for a generation or so.

Wolfgang Simson was heard to joke (while publicly speaking in Australia) "It was brave of you to invite a non-Christian today to speak. Today I am an ex-Christian, I'm just a follower of Jesus now." Wolfgang Simson is a dedicated follower of Jesus, but he is brave enough to let go of the label Christian (that carries so many incorrect definitions in people's heads). So surely I can be brave enough to let go of the label "church".

Some interesting twitter feeds have been coming through this week. A story of a new house church* movement springing up in Ecuador caught my attention. Have a look at The M Blog here to begin reading the story. It's good to know God is doing good things in so many places around the world. I draw encouragement from such stories to keep moving forward in obedience and faith that we are on the right path and that the Lord will raise up an organic movement of disciples in our midst.

I have been asking the Lord to show me what his kingdom is, and that is a slow unfolding process. I would like to record my thoughts on what I am learning so far. I have begun to tell oral stories from the gospel of Mark. I love the gospel of Mark because it is so fast paced and suspenseful. Most times when people make a movie about Jesus they usually choose Matthew or Luke because they want to tell his whole life story. Mark doesn't do this, he just gets straight to the point. A movie of Mark would be an action film or a "supernatural thriller from the other side" (the other side than from which most supernatural thrillers come!).

I have it in my mind and heart to tell the whole story of Mark in one go. So far I have told four of the early stories and begun to fill in the gaps.

River Jordan

The first story starts out with the wild camel hair covered, locust eating prophet preaching in the desert. The prophet John the Baptist preaches "say sorry for your sins, get baptised in the river for the forgiveness of your sins." There's something in this story that I had never really paid attention to before. ALL of the people of Judea, all the country towns and villages and ALL of the people of Jerusalem came out to the Jordan River to be baptised for the forgiveness of their sins. That's something to imagine, that ALL of the people came out. There must have been some that didn't, surely. Well later we find out that many of the pharisees did not receive this baptism. And because they had not received John's baptism they were unable to receive God's kingdom. (Luke 7:30.)

John is preparing the way for the Lord. How? He is baptising people for the forgiveness of their sins. This prepares the way for Jesus, so Jesus can get on with bringing his kingdom. This means that Jesus could not bring his kingdom to those who had not repented and been baptised. All of Jesus' ministry is actually to people who had already been baptised for their sins. I'm sure it's true that some of these people later on decided not to participate in God's kingdom. But for now, they were all in.

After the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus he was led out into the desert for his forty days of spiritual battle with the devil. He won by the way. (An interesting footnote here, is that an Altai man in Siberia when telling his epic story of the gospel spent a lot of time on this part of the story, in fact more than the cross itself. For this man and his culture the battle in the desert was where things were won and decided, the cross was the payment of the bill so to speak.) But straight after that, Jesus is back again.

Lake Galilee

This time Jesus is at the Lake in Galilee. He is walking along. As he walks along he says to all those around him "Now is the time to get the kingdom started, say sorry for your sins and believe in the good news." Jesus did not need to tell people to get baptised, they had already done that. But confession of sins was still important. It seems confession of sins is an important part of receiving the kingdom and it's not just a one off event either. (Sometimes in evangelical Christianity it does become a one off event at the "point of salvation".) Jesus says this to everyone he sees. As he comes to Andrew and Simon they seem to respond to him, so he takes things further, "Come with me and I will show you how to catch people, not just fish." The same thing happens with James and John.

This is just the beginning of God's Kingdom though. The whole story of the gospels is wrapped up in Jesus showing and then teaching what the kingdom actually is. He doesn't spend a bunch of time showing what the church* is. (Not to say that the church* is unimportant, but that is more of a lesson for later. And really the church* is a collection of all God's people, who are already a part of the Kingdom. You simply can't have the true church* without the kingdom. Many have tried, and the result is a stale institutional church.)

Mark moves pretty quickly (a lot quicker than my blog!), and before you know it Jesus is casting out demons and healing the sick and telling people their sins are forgiven in front of legalistic know-it-alls. Jesus is demonstrating first of all what the kingdom looks like, he only bothers to unpack the teaching later on.

That's as far as I have got in my rediscovery of God's Kingdom. Hmmm, before I try to understand too much of the teaching perhaps I better get back out there and do some more of the doing, since that's how Jesus started things.

Now is the time to get the Kingdom started!

-----------------------------------
Church*- What is a good alternative for this word? There are probably many, mostly phrases, but that is the challenge of post-modernism, to bring clarity back to truth and definitions.

Ekklesia may be a good option, because it needs further unpacking.

A phrase that explains the concept would be something like "the people who belong to Christ in that town or city."