Jesus Loves You, This I Know, Pt. II

Jesus Loves the Porn Star.

This chapter alone may have been worth the price of the book. Craig, founder of XXXChurch, went on a speaking tour with one of the most well known porn stars in America, Ron Jeremy, to debate the merits and dangers of pornography. Pretty bold huh? Pastor vs. Porn Star. It may seem unlikely but Craig has gotten to know the man behind the wild career and he and Ron have formed a strong friendship despite their striking differences in lifestyle and beliefs.

During this speaking tour Craig makes mention of many Christians who expressed much hate for him and his cause, believing that Craig associating with a known porn star is hurting Christendom more than it is helping. He also makes mention of Ron’s friends and how they were much more accepting of him, a pastor, than the Christians were of Ron, a porn star. Think about that. The pastor is embraced more openly by the porn industry than Ron would be at most churches.

Do we see the problem here? Didn’t Jesus come not for the healthy, but for the sick? Not to call the righteous, but the sinners? And shouldn’t we be known for the same? Shouldn’t the Christian community be known as the most welcoming community in the world? After all, we all at one time were no different than Ron as far as our soul was concerned; separated from God. And we needed the grace of God to ensure us that we were indeed welcome in His presence, just as we are. As it currently exists, we often want people to come only have they’ve left their sickness at the door. Craig is living out a great example of how we can meet anyone, chief sinner or saint, and love and respect that person, even if they show no interest in “conversion.” This is how we can show the unconditional love of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Jesus Loves You, This I Know

I picked up this book at the recommendation of a youth pastor friend. Also, one of the authors is Craig Gross, founder of XXXChurch, and I had wanted to read something by him for awhile.

This was a pretty quick read. Each of the ten chapters focus on a specific kind of person that “Jesus Loves.” Jesus Loves the Bitter and Betrayed. Jesus Loves the Broken. Jesus Love the Crook. Initially, I thought this formula would ruin the book for me. After reading a chapter or two I almost gave up on it, assuming it would be the same thing in every chapter; Here’s a story of a stereotype, here is why the stereotyped person gets misunderstood/overlooked/etc, and here is why Jesus loves this person. While this is partly accurate, I’m very glad I got past the first couple chapters and through the rest of the book.

The same friend that recommended this book also tweeted the following this morning: “Self-Help books rarely contain great stories. Ironically, great stories help.” Great stories help, and that is precisely what this book is made of. Here are my thoughts on the first of two chapters that really stood out to me.

Jesus Loves the Outcast.

The other author, Jason Harper, has a favorite coffee shop that he likes to write in. Coincidentally, this coffee shop happens to sit “on the edge of the loosely dubbed Lavender District, the epicenter of Sacramento’s gay culture.” This part of town is where Jason met Gay Joe. Gay Joe had formed a very unflattering (although probably deserved) opinion of Christians in general. He had witnessed firsthand some very hateful things said by a prominent Evangelical leader and had made up his mind regarding Christ followers in general.

After meeting Gay Joe, Jason invited him to coffee, not knowing if he would accept. He did. After meeting many times for coffee, Jason and Joe got to know one another as friends. Later, Jason apologized to Joe for the pain he had endured from the faith community. He shared with him the love and acceptance that he believed Christ would have given unconditionally, even though the Church had withheld it up to that point. To his critics who question why Jason would associate with people like Gay Joe, he responds, “Because that is where Jesus would be found spending time. He would be hosting a party...where others could come to learn about his unconditional love.” I love this. Not a place where others could come and learn Christian rules, or how to overcome their lifestyle, or even the steps of the Roman Road, but a place where they could be loved.

Jesus loves the outcast, regardless of how “religion” that may dictate otherwise. How can we orient our lives so that we do the same?

A Generous Orthodoxy, Pt. II

From Chapter 3, “Would Jesus Be a Christian?”

“....Has he (Jesus) become...less our Lord and more our Mascot?

In Jesus’ day, “Caesar is Lord” was the political pledge of allegiance, required in a way not unlike, “Heil Hitler” was required in the 1930s and early 1940s in Nazi Germany. To call Jesus “Lord” meant that there is a power in Jesus more important that the power of the king of the greatest state in history. To say “Jesus is Lord” was then (and should be now!) a profoundly political statement - affirming the authority of a “powerless” Jewish rabbi with scarred feet over the power of Caesar himself with all the swords, spears, chariots, and crosses.” (McLaren, 90)

I found this chapter very insightful as McLaren examined our modern view of who Jesus was and how he called his followers to live. His conclusion essentially is that we’ve taken the things that suit us while ignoring the teachings that rub us the wrong way, ending up with a “Buddy Jesus” that we’re satisfied with while believing that the King/Master/Teacher knocking on our door is in fact the imposter.

We often live as though Christ’s teachings are mostly circumstantial. That he meant what he said, but only if certain rules apply. Yes we should forgive, but not if the person in question did something really wrong (murder, terrorism, etc). And certainly not if this is their third or fourth offense. Of course we should give to the poor, but not if its “their own fault” that they’ve become poor. And definitely not if the poor person is an alcoholic or drug addict.

We’re fine calling Jesus “Lord” as long as we’re referring to “Buddy Jesus”, the one whose rules aren’t absolute as much as they are guidelines that can be ignored if logic dictates a better way.

“Buddy Jesus” is not an option for the followers of Christ. We cannot mince his teachings. When he said to forgive, we must. When he said to love our neighbor, we have to, regardless of how unloveable they appear (or actually are). When he said to serve, this cannot only happen when it is convenient. It is our task to live as Christ, especially when it doesn’t make sense to do so in the eyes of the world. It is our choice to embrace a watered down gospel or to rise to the standard Christ placed before us, however hard it may be to accept.

Thoughts on "A Generous Orthodoxy" Part I

I don’t know what I believe about God. I know a few things that I think about God, about who He is and why He does things, but I wouldn’t say I know much more than that. I want to know more though. I want to know the whys and the hows and all that stuff. I’ve also struggled with much of what I feel is the “common knowledge” of God, and how so often I’m content with that surface level kind of knowledge.

I had been looking for a scholarly but accessible systematic theology for some time. These two qualifications made it rather hard to find what I was looking for. Either a book (or collection of books) would be far too scholarly with footnotes outnumbering actual text, or it would seem to be a “My First Bible: Theology Edition” kind of book. While not really a systematic theology by definition, Brian McLaren’s “A Generous Orthodoxy” provided me much of what I was hoping to find in a book devoted to the study of who God is.

However, while I had been looking for an easier to read, laid out plan of who God is and how He operates, reading McLaren’s book challenged my faith and trust of any such all encompassing encyclopedia of theological matters. In his closing chapter he quotes Vincent Donovan:

“The day we are completely satisfied with what we have been doing; the day we have found the perfect, unchangeable system of work, the perfect answer, never in need of being corrected again, on that day we will know that we are wrong, that we have made the greatest mistake of all (emphasis mine)” (Christianity Rediscovered, 146).

Without knowing it, I was actually desiring that which Donovan describes as the “greatest mistake of all.” Whoops. Close one. This is not a new struggle for me though, and I also assume, for many others. Who doesn’t want a nicely packaged version of who God is? Who wouldn’t spend a few days reading a book if upon completion, the reader suddenly “knew God through and through.” This was what I had been seeking and what Donovan warned against.

McLaren is the first to admit that he doesn’t have it all together. In fact, he readily admits to knowing that his own orthodoxy is probably as off the mark as any one else’s. This isn’t because he believes that he is wrong as much as he knows the total indescribability of that which we seek to observe, learn about, label and keep in a box. God is beyond systematic theologies. His will is beyond orthodoxy. He is beyond any attempt we make to describe or learn about His true ways and being. Because of this, any attempt we make to nail down an attribute of our Holy Father (including referring to Him with names such as “Holy Father”) falls drastically short of reality.

However, this does not mean that we do not try. And in this book McLaren seeks to understand and apply many of the common interpretations of orthodoxy that populate the minds of people worldwide regarding our Creator and His will for our lives. This is why the subtitle to his book reads as follows:

“WHY I AM A missional + evangelical + post/protestant + liberal/conservative + mystical/poetic + biblical + charismatic/contemplative + fundamentalist/calvinist + anabaptist/anglican + methodist + catholic + green + incarnational + depressed-yet-hopeful + emergent + unfinished CHRISTIAN.”

Now, I am not going to give my thoughts on the entire book. McLaren simply covers more than I want to re-hash here. Instead I am going to look at a few of what I felt were his most compelling chapters, the ones that stand out to me above the rest, challenged my thinking the most, and made me stretch my perception of who God is and how I relate to him.

Kai Buwalda

This post is for my brother, Kai.

Kai,

Yes, I am going to completely ignore the fact that this post is happening exactly one year from the last post. I hope you're satisfied you sucker. Enjoy a Starbucks VIA on me. It's a new kind of coffee or something, I don't know.

Marc

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