Jesus was an activist. But what did he target?
Openly denouncing Pharisees. Eating meals with prostitutes. Overturning the temple. Jesus was disturbingly confronting to the social structures of his day. Gentle Jesus, meek and mild? Not so much. Jesus cannot be tamed. Continue reading “Jesus the activist”
Should Christians be activists?
Good news! Jesus is the Christ. That means he’s chosen by heaven and anointed with power to rule the earth. He is restoring heaven’s government to a world that has been terrorized by competing claims and civil war ever since humans tried to take God’s power into their own hands.
This is good news for the world because it’s how the violent hostilities are replaced by divine peace. Peace can never be achieved through force. The cross is the ultimate paradox for solving violence. The all-powerful God placed himself at the centre of the battle for power, giving himself for his people, reconciling us to himself and to one another.
This is how hostilities end. The cross is God confronting human power claims. It’s how God restores peace, by uniting us under his governance (Ephesians 2:14-17).
With the pain and fragmentation the church is experiencing, this repost calls us to pull together around the heart of our faith: Jesus.
A liberal, an evangelical, and a charismatic walked into a bar. Secretly, the evangelical hoped his elders didn’t see him talking to the other two. Especially in a bar. They were already locked in a debate about healing when Mary arrived. “Sorry I’m late.” Continue reading “Can the kingdom gospel bring us together?”
Jesus never called us to condemn the sin of the world, but he did call us to confront sin in the church.
Today the High Court of Australia overturned Cardinal Pell’s conviction.
Previously I said, “Let’s be cautious about assuming that you or I know better than the jury … Let’s await the outcome of the appeal.”
Now, let’s be cautious about assuming you or I know better than the high court judges who unanimously decided that the evidence should not have led to a conviction.
I’m devastated. When a church leader is exposed as a child-abuser, our nation has another reason to hate the church and despise our message.
Silence the excuses! It makes no difference whether you’re Catholic or Protestant. It won’t do to wonder if the courts got it wrong. A manager in the household of God has been found guilty of abusing the trust placed in them to care for the children in the family.
The nearest Jesus ever came to recommending capital punishment was this: Continue reading “The scandal of George Pell”
If I made the kingdom of God the centre of my thought and activity as Jesus did, where does it lead me? As I began this journey seven years ago, I wondered out loud, “Would seeking the kingdom make me an activist?”
For some, the gospel is personal salvation (John 3:16). For others, the gospel calls for action: caring for the poor, seeking justice the powerless, protecting the environment. What does Jesus’ gospel — the gospel of the kingdom — call us to say or do?
This post is just to say a huge thank you to all of you who have helped me on the journey to discover why Jesus thought the kingdom of God was the centre of everything, and what would change if we accepted his perspective. Continue reading “Thanks for the feedback”
Here it is: the good news in a nutshell.
Since the kingdom of God was Jesus’ core message, we’ve asked how John 3:16 would sound from his perspective. In this post we put it all together: the king rescuing his people: Continue reading “The evangelical message (John 3:16)”
Can’t throw those bananas out?
“Not perish but have eternal life.” What I thought this meant as a child was that I had to believe in Jesus if I wanted to go to heaven, not hell. But that’s not what it says. Continue reading “Perishing vs eternal life (John 3:16)”
If you find it hard to believe, you’re not alone.
Forty-three years ago, a bulk ore carrier struck the pylons of a bridge in Hobart, and the central sections of the bridge fell into the Derwent. Some Tasmanians still refuse to drive over that bridge. You can show them the bridge is safe and they’ll believe you, but they can’t trust it with their lives. They want to believe, but after the trauma it’s not so easy. Continue reading “Finding it hard to believe? (John 3:16)”
The gift that’s exactly what we need.
We’re reading John 3:16 as the story of the kingdom of God, the lens Jesus used. God is sovereign. The world resists him. The sovereign persists in loving his resistant realm. He does so by sending the most amazing gift.
Queue the questions:
What do we mean by “God loves the world”?
If Jesus made the kingdom of God the centre of everything, surely we can learn to hear Scripture as he did. This lens reframes everything, even familiar texts:
John 3:16 (NIV)
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Let’s ask some fresh questions: Continue reading “God and his world (John 3:16)”
I woke up this morning meditating on how John introduces the person who is good news.
1 In the beginning was the Word —
the decree of the heavenly sovereign bringing shape and significance to a formless void,
the decree bringing light into darkness,
the decree bringing life into barrenness,
the decree that makes life productive,
the decree that makes humans his regal agents.
This Word is not other than God; he has his being in relation to God.
The Word was God: God revealed, God expressed.
2 We’ve heard him only recently, but the Word has always had his being in relation to God, from the beginning.
3 Everything exists because of this divine Word;
not a single thing exists apart from him, the ground of our being.
4 Life sprang forth from him.
His life lights up humanity.
5 Resisting the Word leaves humanity with a dark side, but his light shines in the darkness.
The darkness has not grasped God’s decree that there be light.
The darkness has not held God’s Word in the grave.
What is the gospel? Ask many people in our churches and they’ll tell you it’s about how you get saved, by asking God to forgive your sins. Would it surprise you to know that that’s not what the gospel means in the Bible?
The word gospel (or good news) is used a lot in the New Testament — 125 times in the NIV translation. They’re all listed below so you can scan it and see. As you scan, ask:
Continue reading “What’s the good news in the New Testament?”
What’s wrong with the world? What must God resolve to establish his kingdom with Jesus as ruler?
Remember the jubilation when World War II ended? Turns out Hitler’s defeat didn’t resolve our problems. SBS is running a documentary titled After Hitler, and episode 2 says:
In the five years that separated the end of the Second World War from the start of the Cold War, the world had hoped for a lasting peace, but instead found itself on the brink of apocalypse. Five years of chaos and hope for the people of a shattered Europe, who became pawns in the games of the major powers.
History keeps repeating. When people rise up against an oppressive ruler, the person who comes to power can turn out to be even more monstrous. How can we ever be delivered? Continue reading “How Jesus overcomes the world’s power problem”
Yesterday Steve McAlpine posted on the scandals that keep recurring in our mega-churches. He wants to help us break the cycle by recognizing the shape abusive leadership takes:
The recurring central theme to these scandals is the manner in which a concerned, godly eldership is first enervated by an increasingly toxic church leader, then replaced by that church leader, before finally being excoriated publicly by that church leader, with the new leadership on stage leading the tomato throwing exercise. …
That’s the pattern. It’s that simple. You could throw it in with the seven or so Hollywood standard movie scripts that exist and it wouldn’t look out of place, so step-by-step, formulaic it is.
Why does this keep happening? Steve offers two suggestions, and I’d like to take this further. Continue reading “Those mega-church scandals”
So, if we don’t use guilt to hook people, what do we do? We do what Jesus did, of course. Continue reading “So what do we do if we don’t preach guilt?”
If the gospel isn’t a message about personal guilt, why did Jesus commission his followers to announce “repentance for the forgiveness of sins in his name?”
My friend Tim Healy has responded with a great question. We’ve been emphasizing that the gospel of the kingdom is good news of the restoration of God’s kingship, liberation of the earth through his anointed ruler (Christ, our Lord). Over the last 2000 years, the Western church has veered towards a message about individual guilt. We need to recover the blazingly good news Jesus announced and enacted.
Here’s Tim’s question:
“Goin’ to church twice in one weekend? Gees, you must be feelin’ guilty!” I have no idea what he thought church was — the kind where you go and confess to a priest, or the kind where you pray the Sinner’s Prayer.
What bothered me was his perception of church as people who struggle with guilt. Is that the message people hear from us? Not a message of hope for the world? Not a Saviour who resolves the injustice and sets all things right? What happened to the good news of a selfless ruler who gave his life for his people and now calls us to care for each other the way he cares for us? Continue reading “We need good news”
What response should people make to the gospel? The way you answer that question reveals what you think the gospel is. Continue reading “Responding to the gospel of the kingdom”
“What should we print on our baptismal T-shirts?” they asked.
Seeking the kingdom 