Respecting Jesus as our Teacher (18-20) -- The theme of this chapter. If we're going to be disciples (literally, students) of Jesus, then we have to respect his intelligence. This is in contrast to the typical contemporary view of Jesus:
Far too often he is regarded as hardly conscious. He is taken as a mere icon, a wraithlike semblance of a man living on the margins of "real life" where you and I must dwell. He is perhaps fit for a role as sacrificial lamb or alienated social critic, but little more. (19)
We talked about several possible sources this view of a dumb Jesus, ranging from failing to take his humanity seriously (and thereby ascribing all of his wisdom to his divine nature) to failing to take ancient people in general seriously.
Two paragraphs later, Dallas inverts my objection to mere admirers or mere worshipers of Jesus, saying, [b]ut how, then, can we admire him? And what can devotion or worship mean if simple respect is not included in it? (19)
What Jesus can teach us about (20-22) -- Dallas points to three major areas where we need Jesus's teaching and information in our lives: identity, character, and daily life.
Identity: Jesus brings us reliable information about who we are, why we are here, and what humanly appropriate motives are for doing whatever we do. This echoes Don Miller's point in Searching for God Knows What that human beings were designed to have someone outside of themselves (specifically, God) tell them who they are and what their value is.
Character: Another one of Dallas's language tricks, here reconceptualizing information as in-formation; that is, that as Jesus re-establishes our identity, he also transforms our internal character.
Daily Life: You may be very sure that if your intent is to glorify God and bless others in your actions, and you are not motivated by unloving attitudes, you will see the hand of God move with you expectantly do your work. (22) This point anticipates the chapter on Frank Laubach later in the book.
Showing posts with label Great Omission. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Great Omission. Show all posts
Friday, March 5, 2010
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Key Terms and Discussion from The Great Omission: Chapter 2
"Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven" (13) -- A slogan of bumper sticker Christianity that, for Dallas, sums up a counterfeit gospel. What the slogan really conveys is that forgiveness alone is what Christianity is all about, what is genuinely essential to it. It says that you can have a faith in Christ that brings forgiveness, while in every other respect your life is no different from that of others who have no faith in Christ at all. [The Divine Conspiracy (36)]
Vampire Christianity (14) -- A sarcastic term for those whose only interest in Jesus is his blood. Dallas emphatically insists that one cannot trust in the blood of Jesus without actually trusting in Jesus himself; and that to trust in Jesus himself must lead to conforming oneself to him.
Sin Management (14) -- Dallas's term for the basic spiritual practices of the gospel of the "Just Forgiven" bumper sticker. Since this gospel preaches forgiveness without discipleship (and therefore without transformation), there is nothing left to do with sin but manage it.
I'm currently reading a book by Wheaton professor James Wilhoit called Spiritual Formation as if the Church Mattered, with a forward by Dallas. (My impression is that they have a strong personal relationship.) In chapter 3 of Spiritual Formation, James sets up two dimensions against which to measure someone's readiness to pursue intentional spiritual formation.
First is the sins/sin axis. On the sins side of the axis, the focus is on discrete external actions in violation of a moral code. On the sin side of the axis, the focus is on the internal attitudes and motivations springing from the sin nature in the heart.
Second is the yearnings fulfilled/yearnings persist axis. On the
yearnings fulfilled side, the belief is that the thirsts and desires of our hearts should be fulfilled by our salvation/conversion; if they continue, it is a sign of failure. On the yearnings continue side, the belief is that God will continue to use the yearnings and thirsts of our hearts even after salvation/conversion; their continued existence is a sign of grace.
James then sets these up into four quadrants. The sin/yearnings persist quadrant is the one most conducive to intentional spiritual formation. The opposite, sins/yearnings fulfilled, he labels Sin Management, saying [t]he spiritual life of this quadrant is marked by striving and denial. The Pharisees were adept sin managers, highly skilled in denying glaring omissions and heaping rules on the backs of others in a strategy of painstaking prevention of sins. [Spiritual Formation (62)] I'm pretty sure Dallas would agree.
James's typology helped me resolve my difficulty with the sentence, It is amusing that people will admit to lying, for example, but stoutly deny that they are liars. (14) Read one way, I saw Dallas seemingly defending a practice I consider to be the very definition of shame: sin as identity. Read another, I also saw that Dallas was calling for a deeper appreciation for the role of sin in our lives; that is, moving from the sins side of the axis to the sin side.
Simplicity (15) -- Dallas argues that a long-run benefit of discipleship is that brings our outer and inner lives into alignment. An amazing simplicity will take over our lives -- a simplicity that is really just transparency. Dallas takes advantage of a neat linguistic parallel to contrast this with the word duplicity, pointing out that the disharmony of outer and inner lives (that is, hypocrisy) is the hallmark characteristic of the Pharisee. [T]he Pharisee always fails at some point to do what is right, and then must redefine, redescribe, or explain it away -- or simply hide it.
Power and Authority (16) -- Dallas rounds out the chapter by talking about the power and authority of the disciple. Jesus is actually looking for people that he can trust with power. A consistent biblical theme is that obedience and good stewardship are rewarded with increased authority. By pursuing the character-forming habits of discipleship, we are shaped to carry greater divine power into situations were it is needed.
The Question for Someone who want Heaven without Discipleship (17) -- [Would] you really be comfortable for eternity in the presence of the One whose company you have not found especially desirable for the few hours and days of your earthly existence[?] This has interesting echoes with the imagery from CS Lewis's The Great Divorce.
Vampire Christianity (14) -- A sarcastic term for those whose only interest in Jesus is his blood. Dallas emphatically insists that one cannot trust in the blood of Jesus without actually trusting in Jesus himself; and that to trust in Jesus himself must lead to conforming oneself to him.
Sin Management (14) -- Dallas's term for the basic spiritual practices of the gospel of the "Just Forgiven" bumper sticker. Since this gospel preaches forgiveness without discipleship (and therefore without transformation), there is nothing left to do with sin but manage it.
I'm currently reading a book by Wheaton professor James Wilhoit called Spiritual Formation as if the Church Mattered, with a forward by Dallas. (My impression is that they have a strong personal relationship.) In chapter 3 of Spiritual Formation, James sets up two dimensions against which to measure someone's readiness to pursue intentional spiritual formation.
First is the sins/sin axis. On the sins side of the axis, the focus is on discrete external actions in violation of a moral code. On the sin side of the axis, the focus is on the internal attitudes and motivations springing from the sin nature in the heart.
Second is the yearnings fulfilled/yearnings persist axis. On the
yearnings fulfilled side, the belief is that the thirsts and desires of our hearts should be fulfilled by our salvation/conversion; if they continue, it is a sign of failure. On the yearnings continue side, the belief is that God will continue to use the yearnings and thirsts of our hearts even after salvation/conversion; their continued existence is a sign of grace.
James then sets these up into four quadrants. The sin/yearnings persist quadrant is the one most conducive to intentional spiritual formation. The opposite, sins/yearnings fulfilled, he labels Sin Management, saying [t]he spiritual life of this quadrant is marked by striving and denial. The Pharisees were adept sin managers, highly skilled in denying glaring omissions and heaping rules on the backs of others in a strategy of painstaking prevention of sins. [Spiritual Formation (62)] I'm pretty sure Dallas would agree.
James's typology helped me resolve my difficulty with the sentence, It is amusing that people will admit to lying, for example, but stoutly deny that they are liars. (14) Read one way, I saw Dallas seemingly defending a practice I consider to be the very definition of shame: sin as identity. Read another, I also saw that Dallas was calling for a deeper appreciation for the role of sin in our lives; that is, moving from the sins side of the axis to the sin side.
Simplicity (15) -- Dallas argues that a long-run benefit of discipleship is that brings our outer and inner lives into alignment. An amazing simplicity will take over our lives -- a simplicity that is really just transparency. Dallas takes advantage of a neat linguistic parallel to contrast this with the word duplicity, pointing out that the disharmony of outer and inner lives (that is, hypocrisy) is the hallmark characteristic of the Pharisee. [T]he Pharisee always fails at some point to do what is right, and then must redefine, redescribe, or explain it away -- or simply hide it.
Power and Authority (16) -- Dallas rounds out the chapter by talking about the power and authority of the disciple. Jesus is actually looking for people that he can trust with power. A consistent biblical theme is that obedience and good stewardship are rewarded with increased authority. By pursuing the character-forming habits of discipleship, we are shaped to carry greater divine power into situations were it is needed.
The Question for Someone who want Heaven without Discipleship (17) -- [Would] you really be comfortable for eternity in the presence of the One whose company you have not found especially desirable for the few hours and days of your earthly existence[?] This has interesting echoes with the imagery from CS Lewis's The Great Divorce.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Key Terms and Discussion from The Great Omission: Chapter 1
The Gospel Presupposes Discipleship (3) --
All of the assurances and benefits offered to humankind in the gospel evidently presuppose [a life of discipleship] and do not make realistic sense apart from it. The disciple of Jesus is not the deluxe or heavy-duty model of the Christian.... He or she stands as the first level of basic transportation in the Kingdom of God.
The Great Omission (4) -- Here it is in one brilliant paragraph:
[T]he churches of the Western world have not made discipleship a condition for being a Christian. One is not required to be, or to intend to be, a disciple in order to become a Christian, and one may remain a Christian without any signs of progress toward or in discipleship. Contemporary American churches in particular do not require following Christ in his example, spirit, or teachings as a condition of membership--either in of entering into or continuing in fellowship of a denomination or local church.
Bait and Switch (6) -- Dallas's term for one possible response of a Christian when offered discipleship. "This isn't what I signed up for. I was told that I said a prayer and got my ticket to heaven. What's this obedience thing about, now?"
The Way (7, passim) -- Dallas routinely mentions the Way of Jesus, which as I understand it was actually the first name for Christianity. I like this because it's the primary method by which I too distinguish between between the path of discipleship (the Way) and the great world-historical religio-cultural tradition (Christianity).
What a Disciple Is (7) --
The disciple is one who, intent upon becoming Christ-like and so dwelling in his "faith and practice", systematically and progressively rearranges his affairs to that end.
One of the recurring themes of our discussion in the chapter was how Dallas made us take stock of our own discipleship as much as (or perhaps even more than) he made us cheer about his scathing critique of discipleship-less Christianity.
The Cost of Non-Discipleship (9) -- Playing off of Bonhoeffer's Cost of Discipleship and pointing back towards the first sentence I quoted in this post, Dallas points out that the cost of non-discipleship is staggeringly high. In short, non-discipleship costs you exactly that abundance of life that Jesus said he came to bring (John 10:10).
My interest in the cost of non-discipleship tends to be on its larger systematic effects on the church and the world, but it's also important to understand that cost of non-discipleship for the individual.
The Most Frightening Paragraph of Chapter One (11) --
For those who lead or minister, there are yet graver questions: What authority or basis do I have to baptize people who have not been brought to a clear decision to be a disciple of Christ? Dare I tell people, as "believers" without discipleship, that they are at peace with God and God with them? Where can I find justification for such a message? Perhaps more important: Do I as a minister have the faith to undertake the work of disciple-making? Is my first aim to make disciples? Or do I just run an operation?
All of the assurances and benefits offered to humankind in the gospel evidently presuppose [a life of discipleship] and do not make realistic sense apart from it. The disciple of Jesus is not the deluxe or heavy-duty model of the Christian.... He or she stands as the first level of basic transportation in the Kingdom of God.
The Great Omission (4) -- Here it is in one brilliant paragraph:
[T]he churches of the Western world have not made discipleship a condition for being a Christian. One is not required to be, or to intend to be, a disciple in order to become a Christian, and one may remain a Christian without any signs of progress toward or in discipleship. Contemporary American churches in particular do not require following Christ in his example, spirit, or teachings as a condition of membership--either in of entering into or continuing in fellowship of a denomination or local church.
Bait and Switch (6) -- Dallas's term for one possible response of a Christian when offered discipleship. "This isn't what I signed up for. I was told that I said a prayer and got my ticket to heaven. What's this obedience thing about, now?"
The Way (7, passim) -- Dallas routinely mentions the Way of Jesus, which as I understand it was actually the first name for Christianity. I like this because it's the primary method by which I too distinguish between between the path of discipleship (the Way) and the great world-historical religio-cultural tradition (Christianity).
What a Disciple Is (7) --
The disciple is one who, intent upon becoming Christ-like and so dwelling in his "faith and practice", systematically and progressively rearranges his affairs to that end.
One of the recurring themes of our discussion in the chapter was how Dallas made us take stock of our own discipleship as much as (or perhaps even more than) he made us cheer about his scathing critique of discipleship-less Christianity.
The Cost of Non-Discipleship (9) -- Playing off of Bonhoeffer's Cost of Discipleship and pointing back towards the first sentence I quoted in this post, Dallas points out that the cost of non-discipleship is staggeringly high. In short, non-discipleship costs you exactly that abundance of life that Jesus said he came to bring (John 10:10).
My interest in the cost of non-discipleship tends to be on its larger systematic effects on the church and the world, but it's also important to understand that cost of non-discipleship for the individual.
The Most Frightening Paragraph of Chapter One (11) --
For those who lead or minister, there are yet graver questions: What authority or basis do I have to baptize people who have not been brought to a clear decision to be a disciple of Christ? Dare I tell people, as "believers" without discipleship, that they are at peace with God and God with them? Where can I find justification for such a message? Perhaps more important: Do I as a minister have the faith to undertake the work of disciple-making? Is my first aim to make disciples? Or do I just run an operation?
Key Terms and Discussion from The Great Omission: Introduction
Taking a cue from Mike's first couple of posts on the Didache (and wanting to actually contribute something here), here are some thoughts on The Great Omission in note form. (Numbers in parenthesis are page references)
The Great Disparity (x) -- the observed difference between the hope for life expressed in Jesus and the actual day-to-day behavior, inner life, and social presence of most of those who now profess adherence to him.
I first realized the Great Disparity existed when I was in high school, and that realization has been the primary seed for all the development of my personal theology since. The Great Disparity is so omnipresent that it was very hard to discern; yet once discerned, it is so staggeringly gigantic that I wondered how I had ever missed it.
The car analogy (x-xi) -- Dallas compares the life of the average Christian to someone who has tried to economize on gas by pouring some water in his or her gas tank but is then confused about why the car isn't working. It's not that the car's badly designed or manufactured, it's that it's not being used properly.
Disciples vs. Christians (xi) -- This seems to be the key idea for the whole book.
[D]isciples of Jesus are people who do not just profess certain view ... but apply their growing understanding of life in the Kingdom of the Heavens to every aspect of their life on earth. In contrast, the governing assumption today, among professing Christians, is that we can be "Christians" forver and never become discples.
Discipleship is my personal theological hobby-horse, stemming (as the title of the book alludes to) from the Great Commission. Simply put, the Great Commission is not about evangelism -- it's about discipleship. It says "go and make disciples" -- not mere admirers, not mere converts, not mere believers, not even mere worshipers -- disciples.
A disiciple is a learner, a student, an apprentice--a practitioner, even if only a beginner.
Where common evangelicalism puts its emphasis on knowing or believing, discipleship-oriented Christianity puts its emphasis on being and becoming. Where common evangelicalism puts its emphasis your relationship to abstract doctrines, discipleship-oriented Christianity puts its emphasis on your relationship to Jesus as teacher and master.
Missionaries to the Christians (xii) -- our shared sense that our own churches are amongst those who need to be told the Good News -- a Good News that goes beyond securing life after to death to fostering life before death.
People in Western Churches, and especially in North America, usually assume without thinking that the Great Commission of Jesus is something to be carried out in other countries. .... But in fact the primary mission field for the Great Commission today is made up of the churches of Europe and North America.
My own sense of alienation from the evangelical culture I grew up in has sky-rocketed over the past year and half I've been back home. And that's given me a new appreciation for wide swaths of Scripture. The relationship between the prophets and the Jewish people, or between Jesus and the Pharisees, or between Paul and the Judaizers have all taken on new resonance because it seems to echo my own feelings for my fellow evangelicals. And the common theme there is the battle over the value of participation and membership in a particular religous culture. And it is simulataneously infuriating and comforting to discover that this is not a new dynamic, but a very, very old one.
Disicpleship, Eschatology, and Mission (xiv) -- I can't remember if this was actually our jumping off point for our discussion of eschatology last week or not, but these sentence reminded me of it:
As disciples of Jesus, we today are part of God's world project. But realization of that project, it must never be forgotten, is the effect, not the life itself. The mission naturally flows from the life. It is not an afterthought, or something we might overlook or omit as we live the life.
The area where my still-developing theology of discipleship has given me the most comfort is eschatology. Growing up, "eschatology" meant Left-Behindism. Fortunately, discipleship-oriented Christianity seems fundamentally incompatible with Left-Behindism, and I think that first sentence there captures a big part of the reason why. Left-Behindism's God is basically just biding his time before he wantonly destroys his creation. But the God-who-disciples is actually doing something, building something, creating something -- he has a world project. It won't see fruition until this creation undergoes death and resurrection, but we're not sitting around waiting for the special-effects show to kick in. We get to participate in what God's doing now to prepare for later.
The second part of the quotion is a useful corrective that I'm still soaking in. So far as labels go, I'm very attracted to missional Christianity (as opposed to the label emergent or other similar ones). And I can very easily imagine how, over time, a commitment to mission could lead to the belief that pursuing mission brings life. Dallas' statement that receiving life then flows into mission is something that I want to internalize.
The Shack in one sentence (xiv) -- The eternal life, from which many profound and glorious effects flow, is interactive relationship with God and with his special Son, Jesus, within the abiding ambience of the Holy Spirit.
My sense of calling in one sentence (xv) -- So the greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heart-breaking needs, is whether those who, by profession or culture, are identified as "Christians" will become disciples--students, apprectices, practitioners--of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.
The Great Disparity (x) -- the observed difference between the hope for life expressed in Jesus and the actual day-to-day behavior, inner life, and social presence of most of those who now profess adherence to him.
I first realized the Great Disparity existed when I was in high school, and that realization has been the primary seed for all the development of my personal theology since. The Great Disparity is so omnipresent that it was very hard to discern; yet once discerned, it is so staggeringly gigantic that I wondered how I had ever missed it.
The car analogy (x-xi) -- Dallas compares the life of the average Christian to someone who has tried to economize on gas by pouring some water in his or her gas tank but is then confused about why the car isn't working. It's not that the car's badly designed or manufactured, it's that it's not being used properly.
Disciples vs. Christians (xi) -- This seems to be the key idea for the whole book.
[D]isciples of Jesus are people who do not just profess certain view ... but apply their growing understanding of life in the Kingdom of the Heavens to every aspect of their life on earth. In contrast, the governing assumption today, among professing Christians, is that we can be "Christians" forver and never become discples.
Discipleship is my personal theological hobby-horse, stemming (as the title of the book alludes to) from the Great Commission. Simply put, the Great Commission is not about evangelism -- it's about discipleship. It says "go and make disciples" -- not mere admirers, not mere converts, not mere believers, not even mere worshipers -- disciples.
A disiciple is a learner, a student, an apprentice--a practitioner, even if only a beginner.
Where common evangelicalism puts its emphasis on knowing or believing, discipleship-oriented Christianity puts its emphasis on being and becoming. Where common evangelicalism puts its emphasis your relationship to abstract doctrines, discipleship-oriented Christianity puts its emphasis on your relationship to Jesus as teacher and master.
Missionaries to the Christians (xii) -- our shared sense that our own churches are amongst those who need to be told the Good News -- a Good News that goes beyond securing life after to death to fostering life before death.
People in Western Churches, and especially in North America, usually assume without thinking that the Great Commission of Jesus is something to be carried out in other countries. .... But in fact the primary mission field for the Great Commission today is made up of the churches of Europe and North America.
My own sense of alienation from the evangelical culture I grew up in has sky-rocketed over the past year and half I've been back home. And that's given me a new appreciation for wide swaths of Scripture. The relationship between the prophets and the Jewish people, or between Jesus and the Pharisees, or between Paul and the Judaizers have all taken on new resonance because it seems to echo my own feelings for my fellow evangelicals. And the common theme there is the battle over the value of participation and membership in a particular religous culture. And it is simulataneously infuriating and comforting to discover that this is not a new dynamic, but a very, very old one.
Disicpleship, Eschatology, and Mission (xiv) -- I can't remember if this was actually our jumping off point for our discussion of eschatology last week or not, but these sentence reminded me of it:
As disciples of Jesus, we today are part of God's world project. But realization of that project, it must never be forgotten, is the effect, not the life itself. The mission naturally flows from the life. It is not an afterthought, or something we might overlook or omit as we live the life.
The area where my still-developing theology of discipleship has given me the most comfort is eschatology. Growing up, "eschatology" meant Left-Behindism. Fortunately, discipleship-oriented Christianity seems fundamentally incompatible with Left-Behindism, and I think that first sentence there captures a big part of the reason why. Left-Behindism's God is basically just biding his time before he wantonly destroys his creation. But the God-who-disciples is actually doing something, building something, creating something -- he has a world project. It won't see fruition until this creation undergoes death and resurrection, but we're not sitting around waiting for the special-effects show to kick in. We get to participate in what God's doing now to prepare for later.
The second part of the quotion is a useful corrective that I'm still soaking in. So far as labels go, I'm very attracted to missional Christianity (as opposed to the label emergent or other similar ones). And I can very easily imagine how, over time, a commitment to mission could lead to the belief that pursuing mission brings life. Dallas' statement that receiving life then flows into mission is something that I want to internalize.
The Shack in one sentence (xiv) -- The eternal life, from which many profound and glorious effects flow, is interactive relationship with God and with his special Son, Jesus, within the abiding ambience of the Holy Spirit.
My sense of calling in one sentence (xv) -- So the greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heart-breaking needs, is whether those who, by profession or culture, are identified as "Christians" will become disciples--students, apprectices, practitioners--of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)