Month: July 2016

I am more or less a product of an era known as the Jesus Movement. This movement took place in the 60’s and 70’s and was made up of mostly teens and twenty-somethings who had come out of the drug and hippie culture. Then there were a few like me who were just good church kids that got tired of traditional stuck-in-the-mud religion.
Then at the same time, the hippie culture was in full swing. Think Woodstock. This culture was mostly characterized by rock-n-roll, drugs, free sex, and discontentment with “the establishment.” There were sit-ins and war protests galore. They wanted change. Much of this cry for change was legitimate.
It was at this intersection of movements that the church missed a huge opportunity to change America and the world.

In 1970 author Hal Lindsey wrote a book titled “The Late Great Planet Earth.” The book was about an event he called “the rapture” when Jesus would come in the clouds and instantly snatch his church from the ever worsening planet, taking us to heaven, and leaving the earth to suffer the wrath of God in a seven-year tribulation. And He used scripture to back it up in a very convincing way. Convincing, that is, if you have very little knowledge of the bible or church history.

I, like a lot of my peers, bought into it wholeheartedly. Our goal now was to get as many saved as we could and the sooner the better, because He could come any minute. Ok, so what has this got to do with hippies and Jesus people?
On the one hand you had the hippies who wanted to revolutionize society and on the other hand you had those who had hearts changed by Jesus. So, what happened was the new followers of Jesus went out and revolutionized society, right? Wrong. We bought into the “left behind/I wish we’d all been ready” message. Why change society? Why change government? Why go to college (unless it was bible college)? Our only mission was to get as many souls saved as possible before the rapture. Why polish brass on the Titanic?

That way of thinking caused us to compartmentalize our spirituality and spiritualize our Christianity. We were waiting for a “someday” kingdom, when all the while Jesus had told us the kingdom was at hand (Mark 1:15). Meanwhile, many of the hippies who didn’t come to Jesus went to college and became lawyers, politicians, judges, professors, etc. and became shapers and molders of society.

One of the most overlooked passages in the bible is in Isaiah 9:7 –

Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end,
Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom,
To order it and establish it with judgment and justice
From that time forward, even forever.
The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this.

And one of the most misappropriated scriptures is none other than John 3:16 –

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,
That whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

The word “world” in this passage is the Greek word kosmos, which means the whole created order! When I began to understand that Jesus came not only to change me, but everything, my whole outlook on life started to change.
Where I once saw myself as someone waiting to be rescued from a sinking ship, I now see myself as partnering with Christ Himself in saving the world. The world is going to be saved!

I used to frequently say that it doesn’t matter what your eschatology is (I would throw that out there when I didn’t want to argue about end times). It was a cop out. It is important. With that I’ll leave you with a quote by N.T. Wright from his book Surprised by Scripture –

“When Christ shall come,” we sing in a favorite hymn, “with shout of acclamation, and take me home, what joy shall fill my heart.” What we ought to sing is, “When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation, and heal his world, what joy shall fill my heart.” In the New Testament the Second Coming is not the point at which Jesus snatches people up, away from the earth, to live forever with him somewhere else, but the point at which he returns to reign not only in heaven but upon the earth. After all, the risen Jesus in Matthew 28 declares that “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me,” and makes that the basis for his commission to his disciples.

All authority.

Hmmmm….

Kevin

The fiery evangelist made his point clear that fourth night of the annual spring “revival.” Hell was a real place that awaited those who didn’t accept Christ. In our denomination it was called “making your profession of faith.”
I sat there in the pew next to my mother with my palms sweating profusely, thoroughly convinced that if I procrastinated and didn’t walk that aisle, I could walk out of there, run the risk of getting killed in a car accident on my way home and split hell wide open. I had heard the stories of others who didn’t answer the invitation and soon thereafter met their fate. I had already been scared spitless the night before when the preacher told us about the Second Coming and the risk of being “left behind.” It frightened me so bad that I had a dream that night that I had died and gone to hell. This was a lot for a nine- year- old boy to take in, but I finally made the decision to walk the aisle, shake the preacher’s hand, and repeat the “sinner’s prayer.” Now I had my ticket to heaven and all was well.

Now what?

That would seem the natural question to ask for one who had just decided to follow Jesus. But I didn’t ask that question. We weren’t trained to ask that question. Now what? I was on my way to heaven. That was the what. It was all about escaping the punishment of hell and going to heaven.
To be completely honest, I don’t think I was really deciding to follow Jesus. I was just scared of the thought of spending eternity in hell. Was I saved? Yes. All He asks is that we believe.
It was as if I had been taught to read John 3:16 like this –

For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Do you see the emphasis? One of the most popular and powerful statements ever made by Jesus had been reduced to avoiding hellfire. Here’s the point – Jesus indeed came to give us eternal life, but that life begins the instant you believe. The word life in this verse comes from the Greek word zoe, which means life real and genuine, a life active and vigorous, devoted to God, blessed, in the portion even in this world of those who put their trust in Christ, but after the resurrection to be consummated by new accessions (among them a more perfect body) and to last forever (Thayers).

Jesus came not only to die for our sins, but also to show us how to live. When Jesus called his twelve disciples, He simply said “follow me.” I haven’t found anywhere in the gospels where He said,”repeat this prayer after me” or “sign this card.”
It is absolutely true that Jesus came to save us from our sin and our own destructive behavior, but even more important – He has saved us for something. And what is that? It is that we would be so aware of His life in us that we in turn would be life givers.

“If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” (John 7:37-38)

The more intent I become in following Jesus, the more I am seeing that He looks way different than the one I had heard about that night while sitting in the church pew, although I am thankful that someone did at least point me in His direction.
I’ll leave you with this – Jesus didn’t save us to take us to heaven.

He saved us to save the world.

To be continued…

Kevin