The Jesus Disconnect (4): Paul and J.C. Ryle On Justification, Christian Growth And Christlikeness

NOTE: Many of today’s commenters should go to New Reformation Press and buy that “Weak On Sanctification” shirt. You’d look good in it.

Some texts related to being “connected” to Jesus in salvation by faith and in growing as disciples into Christlikeness.

Justification by grace, Kingdom discipleship and growth following. No “”Jesus disconnect here”:

Colossians 1:9 And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 10 so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. 11 May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Continue reading “The Jesus Disconnect (4): Paul and J.C. Ryle On Justification, Christian Growth And Christlikeness”

The Jesus Disconnect (3): Kingdom, Discipleship and Cross

the-sower-sower-with-setting-sun-1888

The second half of the Gospel of Mark is dominated by Jesus’ focus on the cross. He begins predicting his passion, death and resurrection in chapters 8, 9 and 10, and arrives in Jerusalem in chapter 11.

On the way to Jerusalem, starting with the first prediction in chapter 8, Jesus begins a focus on discipleship in the light of the cross. The teachings and material in the early part of Mark part II seems to indicate that the calling of the disciples to the proclamation of the Kingdom was now recalibrated to the equipping of the disciples to relate everything to the cross.

Matthew and Luke have far more teaching material, but the vast majority of this material can be categorized as either “Kingdom” oriented or “discipleship” oriented. What is unmistakable in all three of the synoptic Gospels is the immense amount of time and effort Jesus put into connecting Kingdom, discipleship and cross/resurrection. There is simply no way that an honest examination of the Gospels can make the material on Kingdom and discipleship to be secondary to the focus on the cross.Continue reading “The Jesus Disconnect (3): Kingdom, Discipleship and Cross”

iMonk 101: What Was Jesus Like?

This May 2008 post is from a series I did called “The Jesus Shaped Question.” You can find it in the “Jesus Shaped” category on the sidebar. It goes along with the material in “The Jesus Disconnect.”

Mark 3:20 Then he went home, and the crowd gathered again, so that they could not even eat. 21 And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying, “He is out of his mind.”….Mark 3:31 And his mother and his brothers came, and standing outside they sent to him and called him. 32 And a crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers* are outside, seeking you.” 33 And he answered them, “Who are my mother and my brothers?” 34 And looking about at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.”

Most Christians aren’t like Jesus.

Should we even try to be? Isn’t that impossible?

None of us can be like Jesus perfectly, but the Gospel of the Kingdom calls Jesus’ disciples to hear his call and set the goal and direction of their lives to be like him. For a follower of Jesus, Paul’s words of “follow me as I follow Christ,” are translated simply, “follow Christ in every way possible.”Continue reading “iMonk 101: What Was Jesus Like?”

The Jesus Disconnect (2): How does the ministry of Jesus fit into our consideration of Jesus?

UPDATE: In the latter part of this IM essay, I deal with some of this issue.

I am continuing an extended series on how and why so many Christians are disconnected from Jesus as he is revealed in the Gospels. We began here.

How does the ministry of Jesus fit into our consideration of Jesus?

In 1982, I returned to seminary and took a job as youth minister at a church near the seminary. Because of some of my studies in seminary that semester, and because of something I heard Dr. John Piper say in a sermon, I determined to make the Gospel According to St. Mark a major life’s project.

At the time, 27 years ago, it seemed like many other resolutions that I made but probably wouldn’t keep. Surprisingly, I have kept that resolution, much to the chagrin of all those around me who have come to hear far more sermons, lessons and talks from Mark than any other Gospel, and especially to the regret of my Bible students, who have come to view my annual trek through Mark as the great mountain to be climbed in my Bible survey class.Continue reading “The Jesus Disconnect (2): How does the ministry of Jesus fit into our consideration of Jesus?”

The Jesus Disconnect (1): What and Why?

I want to write some posts exploring what I am going to call “The Jesus Disconnect.”

Nothing has impressed me more in my last few years of writing, reading and discussion than the disconnect the average Christian believer feels from the ministry of Jesus, specifically his miracles, exorcisms, teachings, training of disciples and encounters with individuals as described in the first half of the Gospels.

For many Christians, their view of Jesus is much like the movie Passion of the Christ. The story of Jesus begins with the suffering of Jesus, with the ministry of Jesus fading anonymously into the background, appearing occasionally in a few moralistic or sentimentally devotional flashbacks.Continue reading “The Jesus Disconnect (1): What and Why?”

Internet Monk Radio Podcast #140

podcast_logo.gifThis week: A surly podcast about responses to the coming evangelical collapse, and Scot Mcknight’s outstanding analysis of the evangelical Gospel.

Support the IM sponsors: New Reformation Press. New products available: New music and DVDs. Emmaus Retreat Center. A great place for your next group or individual retreat. The Devotional Christian. All the best online devotional resources in one place. E3 Sudan is church planting and training pastors in the Sudan.

Scot Mcknight’s blog.
Coming Evangelical Collapse.
Museum of Idolatry.

Intro music by Daniel Whittington. Exit Music by Randy Stonehill. Bumpers by Clay Spencer.

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Michael Bell: How To Stop The Hemorrhaging: A Follow Up To The Pew Forum Data

IM First Officer Michael Bell follows up his look at the Pew Forum Data on Changes in Religious Affiliation.

In my previous post at Internet Monk, I looked at two surveys conducted by The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life: Faith in Flux: Changes in Religious Affiliation in the U.S. that was released a few weeks ago, and which was a followup to their U.S. Religious Landscape Survey that they released last year.

religiousswitching2By working with the numbers of the surveys I was able to come up with a chart that showed how Americans have been changing from their childhood faith to their current faith. One of the key findings was that Christian denominations are losing adherents though the back door so to speak than they are gaining new believers through the front door. If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, please check out the original post, as it will help you understand some of the ideas behind this post, as well us understand the magnitude of the changes.

Today I wanted to focus on the “when” and the “why” this hemorrhaging was occurring, but as I have been pondering the data, the “when” seemed to really stand out as being important. I was reminded of my preaching classes back in seminary, when our professor, Dr. Peter Ralph, would constantly remind us to find the “big idea” that needed to be communicated from the biblical text. I think the same holds true when looking at survey data. Here is the “big idea” that jumped out at me when going through the Flux survey data and reports:

Most religious life decisions, even among those who have been open to change, has been set by age 23.Continue reading “Michael Bell: How To Stop The Hemorrhaging: A Follow Up To The Pew Forum Data”

What Did Jesus’ Version of Community Look Like?

Commenter: Please explain what you mean by:”community as Jesus exemplified it”. Thanks

It is the community that Jesus created and demonstrated during his earthly ministry.

I would describe it as:

Cross cultural: Jesus crossed every available cultural barrier to announce and practice the Kingdom.

Counter cultural: Jesus was offering an alternative to the dominant cultural and religious options in his world.

Inclusive: Jesus was creating community that included all of the excluded at every level. He dd this– as he did all of his community movement– with total intentionality.Continue reading “What Did Jesus’ Version of Community Look Like?”

Riffs: 05:13:09: Scot Mcknight on the Individualized “gospel”

From Scot Mcknight’s Kingdom Gospel series at Jesus Creed. I did a bit of creative editing.

I wonder what John would think of the gospel I sketched at the beginning of this chapter:

God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.
But you have a sin problem that separates you from God.
The good news is that Jesus came to die for your sins.
If you accept Jesus’ death, you can be reconnected to God.
Those who are reconnected to God will live in heaven with God.

Every line of that statement is more or less true. It is the sequencing of those lines, the “story” of that gospel if you will, that concerns me and that turns Jesus’ message of the kingdom into a blue parakeet. And it is not only the sequencing, it is the omitting of major themes in the Bible that concerns me. What most shocks the one who reads the Bible as Story, where the focus is overwhelmingly on God forming a covenant community, is that this outline of the gospel above does two things: it eliminates community and it turns the entire gospel into a “me and God” or “God and me” gospel. Who needs a church if this is the gospel? (Answer: no one.) What becomes of the church for this gospel? (Answer: an organization for those who want to do that sort of thing.) While every line in this gospel is more or less true, what concerns many of us today is that this gospel makes the church unimportant.

I believe this gospel can deconstruct, is deconstructing, and will deconstruct the church if we don’t change it now. Our churches are filled with Christians who don’t give a rip about church life and we have a young generation who, in some cases, care so much about the Church they can’t attend a local church because too many local churches are shaped too much by the gospel I outlined above.

Continue reading “Riffs: 05:13:09: Scot Mcknight on the Individualized “gospel””

Guest Blogger: Introducing Steve Scott

I’m sure that many of you have noticed that I have been publishing essays by Michael Bell. I’m now going to introduce a second “occasional” contributor: Steve Scott.

I’ve been impressed with Steve’s blogging at “From the Pew” for quite a while. We share many of the same perspectives and Steve has been a positive and helpful commenter here at IM. You can now look forward to him writing once a month or as he has something worthwhile to say. I also hope you’ll be a regular reader at “From the Pew.” As you might expect, Steve and I don’t completely agree (note the Rushdoony reference), and that’s in keeping with the environment I try to encourage here at the most diverse Christian discussion in the blogosphere. His journey is unique and I look forward to reading his contributions.

I’ve asked Steve to describe some of his journey in evangelicalism so you can know a bit more of where he is coming from as a contributor.

I “became a Christian” in 1994 at the age of thirty. I put this in quotes because my conversion was a long, arduous process rather than a point in time. For simplicity, I use 1994 because it is the time when I started attending church regularly.

I was tossed into the fire from the very beginning. In 1989 I discovered a teacher on the radio who emphasized the Bible heavily, and for the first time I considered my sin and my destiny seriously.Continue reading “Guest Blogger: Introducing Steve Scott”