The Invitation: Chapter 1, Part 2

People think they have heard the invitation. They think they have accepted it – or rejected it. But they have not. The difficulty today is to hear it at all.

Especially living in the Bible belt, you really see this a lot. There are those that self-identify as Christians, but with no real influence on the way they live. Religion has really done a disservice to Jesus. He will change your life – if you let him. Sometimes the hardest people to reach are the ones sitting in the pews.

God’s desire for us is that we should live in him.

This might be the best summary of the Divine Conspiracy in a single sentence. God wants us to live in Him. He wants us to enter the eternal kind of life now. Store this thought away, we will discuss it at length in chapters to come.

The “gospels” that predominate where he is most frequently invoked speak only of preparing to die or else correcting social practices and conditions.

Willard will devote a whole chapter to this, so I’ll just briefly comment here. The theological “right” tends to make getting into heaven the primary focus, while the theological “left” tends to make fighting social injustices the main thing.

Our usual “gospels” are, in their effects – dare we say it – nothing less than a standing invitation to omit God from the course of our daily existence.

The problem with these being the focus is that we omit God from our everyday existence. We are not living for Him, let alone in Him.

But just think how unlikely it would be that this great world-historical force, Jesus called “Christ,” could have left the depths of moment-to-moment human existence untouched while accomplishing what he has! More likely, we currently do not understand who he is and what he brings.

Willard notes the shear magnitude of the “footprint” that Christ has left on history. It doesn’t seem logical that someone of that kind of influence, who paid the price He paid, wouldn’t care about impacting our everyday lives. The conclusion is that we don’t understand Jesus like we should, nor do we comprehend the significance of the invitation He gives.

In other words, if he were to come today he could very well do what you do. He could very well live in your apartment or house, hold down your job, have your education and life prospects, and live within your family, surroundings, and time. None of this would be the least hindrance to the eternal kind of life that was his by nature and becomes available to us through him. Our human life, it turns out, is not destroyed by God’s life but is fulfilled in it and in it alone.

Willard makes an interesting note about Jesus. We often make excuses for our circumstances when we think of making a real impact on the world. The reality is that Jesus just have easily could have lived in my exact environment without thwarting His ability to change the world. The kind of life God wants to give enables us to live a fulfilled life, not hinders our happiness.

But they [the crowds who responded to Jesus] were only responding to the striking availability of God to meet present human need through the actions of Jesus. He simply was the good news about the kingdom. He still is.

Jesus is the gospel. His invitation to enter into his kingdom remains.

Now God’s own “kingdom,” or “rule,” is the range of his effective will, where what he wants done is done. The person of God himself and the action of his will are the organizing principles of his kingdom, but everything that obeys those principles, whether by nature or by choice, is within his kingdom.

This is a great explanation of the kingdom of God – a term that has been widely misunderstood. We enter the kingdom when God becomes the King of our lives.

If we attend to what he actually said, it becomes clear that his gospel concerned only the new accessibility of the kingdom to humanity through itself.

With our new understanding of what kingdom is, much confusion is cleared up as to when it will come. It’s always been, but with Jesus there is a new availability to enter it that was not present before.

The power [electricity to the rural community] that could make their lives far better was right near them where, by making relatively simple arrangements, they could utilize it. Strangely, a few did not accept it. They did not “enter the kingdom of electricity.” Some just didn’t want to change. Others could not afford it, or so they thought.

Dallas grew up in a rural community where electricity did not become available until he was a teenager. He draws an excellent illustration from his experience to explain the availability of the Kingdom of God.

We need not fly upside down. There is a right-side up, and we can find it. – But we don’t have to. We are free. For now.

We have to believe there is a right way to live and that we can discover what it is. This is the gospel – we can enter into the eternal kind of life with Jesus right now.

Flying Upside Down: Chapter 1, Part 1

Recently a pilot was practicing high-speed maneuvers in a jet fighter. She turned the controls for what she thought was a steep ascent – and flew straight into the ground. She was unaware that she had been flying upside down. This is a parable of human existence in our times… we live at high speed, and often with no clue to whether we are flying upside down or right-side up. Indeed, we are haunted by a suspicion that there may be no difference.

Willard uses this story as a metaphor to introduce the problem. The reading is heavy in the first few chapters, but stick with it – you’ll be glad you did. The problem is that our society is incredibly fast-paced, but its priorities and understanding of morality are upside down – to the point that many doubt whether there really is a right and wrong way to live.

“Secular humanism” is an idea movement, not the work of an individual, and before it, as a whole, individuals are little more than pawns. The seeming triviality and irrelevance of the “merely academic” is a major part of what misleads us about the power of ideas.

This point is the reason to stay engaged with this section of the book. Some of it abstract or “academic” in nature, but Willard’s point is that much of our societal views are the results of ideas from many years ago. The idea that the world is an accident – we accidentally came into existence through evolution – leads to the idea that life is absurd and we find happiness by striving for progress.

The peasants now watch TV and constantly consume media. There are no peasants now.

A writer, Tolstoy, struggling with the consequences of these ideas (life is an accident), noted that the peasants – who had no knowledge of these new ideas – remained very happy. The problem is that today there are no peasants. We are constantly being fed information by media that is likely detrimental to our happiness.

What is truly profound is thought to be stupid and trivial, or worse, boring, while what is actually stupid and trivial is thought to be profound. This is what it means to fly upside down.

Here, Willard pokes fun at some “wise” saying of the day such as “stand up for your rights” and “practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty”. A more useful saying, such as “stand up for your responsibilities” is thought to be boring and disregarded for sayings that don’t actually make sense.

In fact, the popular sayings attract only because people are haunted by the idea from the intellectual heights that life is, in reality, absurd. Thus the only acceptable relief is to be cute or clever.

Willard makes the connection of ideas from years ago trickling down into our popular culture. Ideas are important. This is all setting up the groundwork or us to evaluate a new idea – well, a 2000-year-old idea, actually. Life in the Kingdom of God is our rescue from all this nonsense. Prepare your mind to take a fresh look at Jesus and his message. We’ll cover the rest of Chapter 1 in the next few days.

As always, you’re welcome to comment on any part of the reading, not just the excerpts I pulled. In addition, I will present a study question with each post. I encourage you to post your answer in the comments. This study is open to the public, so feel free to share with any who may be interested.

Chapter 1, Part 1, Flying Upside Down Study Question:

What is a message from our culture that has impacted you that is contrary to the teachings of the Bible?

For me, the message that progress, or having more, is always better. When we seek the Kingdom first, all the other good things are added to us. When we seek only for progress and more stuff, we are only more unsatisfied.

Introduction

This week's reading is the introduction. Again, we are studying a phenomenal book, "The Divine Conspiracy" by Dallas Willard. The following excerpts from the introduction are in blue italics. My commentary is sandwiched between the excerpts. Please let me know your thoughts. 

My hope is to gain a fresh hearing for Jesus, especially among those who believe they already understand him.

I believe this is completely necessary in today’s world. It’s especially striking with the interaction of Christians in popular culture. On the one hand we have some not exactly behaving like Jesus and spouting condemnation at unbelievers. On the other, critics are quick to condemn Christians for not behaving like their picture of Jesus, accepting of all behavior as equally valid. It can be so helpful to return to the Bible and study Jesus and his message so that we can actually do what He said and work to become like Him.

Dogma is what you have to believe, whether you believe it or not. And law is what you must do, whether it is good for you or not… Jesus and his words never belonged to the categories of dogma or law, and to read them as if they did is simply to miss them… He himself described his words as “spirit and life” (John 6:63).

The words of Jesus are powerful. He is fully God and fully man. When dealing with the creator of the world, to view anything He has to say as irrelevant or as a mere obligation is to not understand whom we are dealing with.

Jesus and his early associates over-whelmed the ancient world because they brought into it a stream of life at its deepest, along with the best information possible on the most important matters… The people initially impacted by that message generally concluded that they would be fools to disregard it. That was the basis of their conversion.

For some, this is not a revelation. For others, this is quite a concept. If you really believe what you say you believe, then following Jesus is the best possible way to live your life.

You will find few scholars or leaders in Christian circles who deny we are supposed to make disciples or apprentices to Jesus and teach them to do all things that Jesus said… We just don’t do it.

Dallas has written a whole book on this topic called “The Great Omission”. We’re not called to make converts, but disciples. After we accept Jesus as our savior, we are to be on a mission to be like Him – not to just stop where He found us.

In fact, it [the reason we aren’t making disciples] lies much deeper than anything we might appropriately feel guilty about. For it is not, truly, a matter of anything we do or don’t do. It is a matter of how we cannot but think and act, given the context of our mental and spiritual formation. So any significant change can come only by breaking the stranglehold of the ideas and concepts that automatically shunt aside Jesus, “the Prince of Life,” when questions of concrete mastery of our life arise.

This is a central point to the book. We need to re-examine our beliefs – in practice. Often what we say we believe isn’t what we really believe. In other words, our actions don’t line up with what we say we believe. By re-examining our view of Jesus and His instructions for us, we can move towards the end goal of being a mature believer.

More than any other single things, in any case, the practical irrelevance of actual obedience to Christ accounts for the weakened effect of Christianity in the world today, with its increasing tendency to emphasize political and social action as the primary way to serve God. It also accounts for the practical irrelevance of Christian faith to individual character development and overall personal sanity and well-being.

Grace is more than a cover up for our shortcomings. It is an empowerment to overcome them. If we believe Jesus meant what He said, then we have to believe that He will empower us to do it.

How life-giving it would be if their [individual Christian’s] understanding of the gospel allowed them simply to reply, “I will do them [teachings of Jesus]! I will find out how. I will devote my life to it! This is the best life strategy I have ever heard of!” and then go off to their fellowship and its teachers, and into their daily life, to learn how to live in his kingdom as Jesus indicated was best.

If this isn’t already where you are, it is my hope that after this book you’ll get there. Following Jesus and entering an eternal kind of life – right now – is the best way to live.

So the message of and about him [Jesus] is specifically a gospel for our life now, not just for dying. It is about living now as his apprentice in kingdom living, not just as a consumer of his merits. Our future, however far we look, is a natural extension of our faith by which we live now and the life in which we now participate. Eternity is now in flight and we with it, like it or not.

This is another central theme of the book. We begin our eternal life now – on earth. We don’t need to wait for heaven to begin to live an eternal kind of life. 

Buckle your seat belts. This book can take you to another level in your walk with God. It’s mostly just an explanation and enlightenment of scripture. Understanding and applying the Word of God can transform us. This book is just a tool along the way.

 

Switching Gears

After a brief hiatus from blogging, I'm returning with a new project. I've recently read a book that impacted me deeply. It is "The Divine Conspiracy" by Dallas Willard. I'm embarking a journey to read it again - this time studying and interacting with the material.

As part of a small group, some have joined me in this journey. If you would like to join my online small group - commit to reading the book and posting weekly - we'd love to have you. If you want to simply comment every so often, that's great, too. For those that aren't avid readers, I'm structuring the study so that you can participate even if you don't have the book. Each week, I will pull out a few excerpts from the weekly reading and then make my personal comments. If you are chose to join in and comment, I will respond to them all. For the sake of clarity, all excerpts from the book will be in blue italics. I encourage you to get a copy of the book and participate. This week is the introduction.