right now

In the video below notice some incredible stuff:

1. There are people coming from places that do not hear much about Jesus to places where they can hear about Christ in a positive way.
2. There are people from other religions that become followers of Jesus and start their own churches.
3. There are people who, after following Jesus, go back to their home country and share Jesus with friends and family
4. There are some many incredible people traveling all over the planet.

(The narrators and makers of the video are from Scotland, they are great folks and I had a chance to work with them on their latest project about atheism, science, and Christianity.)

They go and define the four types pretty clearly. You’ve got to get the book (Permanent Revolution) to read the whole thing and honestly the book is really worth a read.

The types are:

INVESTORS. The investor sees evangelism as walking with people through the entire process of conversion,
INVITERS. They woo others to accompany them into strategic environments that allow them greater exposure to Jesus.
CONVINCERS. Convincers are particularly adept at making persuasive and compelling presentations of the gospel.
CONVERSERS. Not everyone is ready to have an intense, concentrated encounter with the gospel. Some people need to be exposed gradually to the message in ways that allow them to process and internalize its meaning and significance for their lives. Conversers are especially equipped for this because, like investors, they are more comfortable with helping someone discover the meaning of the gospel in an incremental fashion.

I am working through the book and am constantly asking myself which way is it that God is using me. Hirsch and Catchim go through the five gifts to the church described in Ephesians 4: Apostle, Prophet, Evangelist, Shepherd and Teacher. They call this APEST. Worth a read. More later.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while now that reading the Old Testament is kind of like watching a foreign film. It’s kind of the same thing like from the video.

The plots are all different in their details and are harder to grasp, after all the Old Testament is both history and kind of like a foreign film. I really don’t always get what they are talking about. I mean, the main plot is clear but all the rich details seem to be lost. I guess that’s what is helpful about taking a rest from all the types of stories that we tell in America. At least taking a rest will help me not read American story plots into Old Testament stories.

I decided if I didn’t make the effort I could turn the story of Ruth and Boaz into a romantic comedy. Enter Owen Williams and Rachel McAdams, or Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler.  But that’s what people do. Here’s just one illustration, Sixty Acres and a Bride available from Bethany House. I know, shocking.

So I thought I’d give it a year and clear them out. To replace them I decided to read through the story part of the Old Testament, Judges through 2 Chronicles over and over again for the year. About 3 to 5 chapters a day should do. No pressure, no particular schedule.

It has been almost a month so far and I’m learning a bunch. One thing I certainly would suggest you DO NOT do is read 2 Kings before going to bed. Nope, not a good idea. I was trying to relax when I read about this king who had 70 royal heirs (young men to kids) decapitated and stacked the heads in front of the city gate. Then he filled a pagan temple full of pagan priests making them think he was joining them in celebration and then he cut all of them down with the sword. Anyone who got out also got cut down. Yep, hard to get to sleep after reading all that.

I’ll give you periodic updates on my journey to a different mind.

An idea is the most contagious thing. Jan Wessele and I talked to leaders at the Western Europe Call to All conference this month. Together we encouraged a personalized evaluation of ministry in Europe. We showed how ministry to the Last, Least, and Lost can be used to diagnose the ministries we do. It shows if we are working mainly with Christians, and how focused we are on caring for the needy and marginalized.

Here is how one church planter’s ministries looked:

The three large circles and the yellow fish are the areas of ministry to the marginalized, needy, and those without Christ. The dots are the church planter’s ministries. They spent 15% of their time helping immigrants, 10% at a hospital caring for seniors, 20% doing evangelism/discipleship, and the rest was given to the Christians of the church. You can see that most of their ministry was to Christians. They were only doing a little evangelism/discipleship with friends. Their mercy ministries and justice ministries were focused mostly on helping Christians.  Notice how the red and green dots are only on the rim of the “Lost” circle. Jan encouraged everyone at the conference to chart their ministries on the graphic. “Where does your ministry fit?”

Then we talked about how to apply the three circles to a European context. It can be used to diagnose a part of the city, a town, region, or even country.

One of the most encouraging results of the talk we gave was the number of people who said they would take the concept to their ministries and discuss it. One leader said he would take it to Paris next week and present it at another conference.

The church is here to reach out to the last, least, and lost, to share the good news of Christ and his transforming power. Jesus saves and transforms lives and communities today. That transformational power “is the same as the mighty strength he (God) exerted when he raised Christ from the dead” (Ephesians 1:19-20).

You can get all of the presentation, papers, and handouts from the talk here.

The European spiritual landscape is as diverse as its cities and populations. The gospel of Christ may be simple and straight forward but the context into which we want to bring the gospel is complex spiritually, physically and socially. The complexity of this landscape highlights the need for a robust framework for understanding it.

The 3L framework described in the papers below shows the three areas of the Last (social need), the Least (physical and situational need), and the Lost (spiritual need). They combine biblical principles and European social and demographic data to present a holistic or kingdom approach. This includes Europe’s social settings, the physical and situational needs people have in those settings and their spiritual need in relationship to Jesus Christ. The framework can be used to diagnose European Spiritual need as well as help evaluate ministries.

The Downloads:

Short paper tabloid size: 3l-framework-short-tabloid

Short paper A3 size: 3l-framework-short-a3

Long paper: Holistic Framework for Understanding Spiritual Need in Europe

Infographic/MindMap of the 3L concept: As a jpg or As a png

PowerPoint with Notes explaining the Infographic/MindMap: Here

PowerPoint showing how to use the 3L Framework to Diagnose ministry and map spiritual need: Here

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Donate via the US Center for World Missions

Super. But how do you get to 211 degrees? If you constantly live your life at 150 degrees then a little extra effort is not what you need…you need a lot of effort.  Michael gives a short list of four things to take you from 211º to 212º sending you to the top. My personal favorite is “Stop planning. Stop stalling. Just get out there and do it.” I knew these church planters in Europe who wrote a 200 page plan before they started to disciple a single person. Get moving is great advice. But it is great advice for someone who is seriously under achieving as well as the person who just needs to give a little more effort.

Here is short TEDx video from a motivational speaker who has some good ideas how to get moving. Think about applying this to how you follow Jesus. “Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” 1 Corinthians 15:58

Matthew 2:13 – 15
“Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” And he rose and took the child and his mother I night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, ‘Out of Egypt I called my son.’”

So, not only was Jesus born in an animals feeding trough, had to be hidden away so people would not kill him, but add refugee status to the list. I do think it’s important to see that Matthew is making a parallel here with Israel. Jesus, being Israel’s king, was also called out of Egypt.

Craig Keener adds to this, “But all four stories in Chapter 2 also surround place names rooted in Scripture; Jesus is ” forced to wander from place to place,” King of the world hostile to him…. The world’s treatment of Jesus likewise promises little better for his followers (10:23 – 25); they must expect hostility, false accusations, and even death for Jesus’ name (10:17 – 39; 13:21; 16:24 – 27; 24:9 – 14; cf. 1 Thessalonians 3:3; 1 Peter 4:12 – 13). This also fits the motif of withdraw from opposition that characterizes Matthew’s narrative and undoubtedly instructs his community.”

Long quote, but you can see why it’s important. This is not the sanitized nostalgic nativity of wealthy suburban America but is more in line with an oppressed majority world poor urban society. I find Jesus’ refugee status more instructive for the persecuted believer in a hostile Muslim or Hindu context than with a 40%+ churched and Christian majority worldview dominated place we live here in Georgia.

I find this quite challenging and it draws me to pray for the persecuted Church and for believers who may be confused about how to live out new found relationship to Jesus in a hostile culture, “… withdrawal from opposition… undoubtedly instructs his community.”

This withdrawal, I believe, is certainly not for contexts where there is no persecution that is physical in nature. In this case I think we should integrate with society, incarnate the life of Jesus among those who do not have a relationship with him and allow them to feel the beauty of Christ’s love. But where physical persecution increases there withdraw from opposition must increase. First the withdraw from open expression of faith to sharing faith quietly, then toward a more physical absence as dangerous persecution increases. Though that makes sense, I struggle with the truths of Romans 10:14 “How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?”

Why was he told to return to Israel instead Nazareth where Jesus was prophesied to grow up? I can only guess at the answer since I don’t see even a hint at what could be in this part of the story.

Maybe Joseph wanted to take King Jesus to Judah, to Jerusalem, and find a way to make a rebellion in order to place Jesus on the throne. During Jesus’s later ministry his disciples and most of the crowds along with the Jewish leadership either feared this or longed for it. So I think it’s pretty reasonable to say that Joseph thought this as well. From all his dreams, he knew Jesus would be the Savior but, like the others, most likely thought of a political deliverer who would reestablish Israel’s spiritual and political vitality. And like everyone else Joseph would’ve had it wrong.

So why not tell Joseph to go directly to Nazareth? Probably because he would not have understood. Better to tell him to come back and let his own fears prepare him for the next dream telling him to go to Galilee and Nazareth.

So, he got general instructions to go to a country and then, when he was ready, more specific instruction. This shows God working together with Joseph.

I was surprised when it dawned on me that the Nativity story was teaching me about how to follow God. It was teaching me about how to listen to God and how God leads. In the end I pray this prayer:

Father, as you direct me from one ministry to another I commit to paying close attention to where you are specifically leading. I recognize that I may be going to a place of service for one reason, for something that I really do not understand, so that you can place me where I can be most useful for you. That place may not be what I thought or why I thought I should be there but it will be but was planned by you.

He quotes a lot of Bible verses that talk about a knowledge and how the connected to understanding God. Two of those verses are:

“We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,” (2 Corinthians 10:5, ESV)

“So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31–32, ESV)

So you can see how truth and knowledge are intertwined as far as the authors concerned. he says, “Ultimately it is ideas, not armies, that rule the world” (p. 158). On the next page he says this:

“The fact that the rule of Satan begins in our minds, when we choose to believe his deception, and accumulates in the oppressive political institutions we build, means that untruth is the foundation of slavery. Proclamation of truth, therefore, is a basic means of setting people free from oppression and exploitation. Jesus said, ‘then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free’”

He goes on to say, “Often we fail to see that the oppressive and exploitative social structures survive not because of the strength of their institutions or their physical force, but by the spread of faith in the structures. People believe the falsehood and therefore allow themselves to be exploited.”

I know that this needs to be developed more, but I find it fascinating that not only biblical theological truth needs to be taught in a society but also philosophical truth, scientific truth, and economic truth needs to be taught in a society in order to free that society from exploitation and oppression.

The gospel of Jesus Christ sets us free from sin spiritually setting us free to love and obey God and opens us, in the honesty of truth, to begin to explore the truths in science, economics, and society so that large portions or even an entire society can be largely free.

Now I have to admit, that the larger effect and the more global concepts of how Christianity impacts society is something somewhat new to me. For someone trained in theology that’s kind of embarrassing to admit. On the other hand, I think that my training has focused more on smaller Christian communities, churches, and their development rather than on societal reconstruction, community building in a secular context, or larger considerations like that of a whole town, city, or nation. It’s completely fascinating and I look forward to reading more on the topic. And looking forward to sharing with you.