Imagine the Difference
What would our culture look like today if the church lived as the salt and light that Christ said we in fact are? How might our society be transformed if every Christian and every local church functioned according to their true identity as salt and light? Can you imagine? These are not hypothetical questions. These are real questions for real times to real people – to us. Sometimes we may reflect on how bad off our culture is and bemoan the fact there’s nothing we can do about it. Yet the Church in every age has found itself in a similar struggle. We can learn much from Christians in earlier generations. Lessons from History Note the following examples of Christians who made an impact in their day, an impact that eventually led to their culture’s significant transformation. For all of its virtues, the mighty Roman Empire was a decadent place. It was in the midst of that Empire the church was born. When the early Christians weren’t being persecuted for their faith, they were, at best, only being tolerated. Additionally, they were merely one faith on a buffet table of many faiths. Sound familiar? It’s impressive, therefore, that this small, seemingly insignificant group of marginalized and oppressed people could so powerfully influence such a mighty Empire, so much so it would eventually be declared the official religion of Rome. What happened to bring that about? Many things to be sure, but consider these two examples: Rescuing Babies First of all, it was customary for unwanted babies to be discarded in the garbage heaps of Rome. Usually, such a child was not born the desired sex for the family and was seen only as a liability. The family would take the baby down to the garbage heap and leave the child there to die. The early Christians kept a sharp eye out for such things and their response was amazing. When babies were “thrown away,” our brothers and sisters in the early church would go to the garbage heaps, retrieve the children, and take them home to raise them as their own. Costly Compassion Second, throughout Rome’s history there were times when devastating and deadly plagues broke out in densely populated living quarters. The response of most Romans was to leave as quickly as possible in hopes their own lives would be spared. But our brothers and sisters in the early church remained behind. Why? To care for the sick and dying. To show Christ’s love, even in the midst of the devastation. That sacrificial servant-mentality cost some Christians their lives. But it also accomplished something great. It revealed the life-transforming power of the gospel through an outward witness. It showed Christian discipleship isn’t merely for Sunday mornings. It declared to all of Rome that Christians didn’t just “talk the talk” but they also “walked the walk.” The Result As a result many people turned to Christ. Christianity grew. Jesus Christ was mightily exalted. A culture began a process of positive transformation. These two examples show us what can happen when Christians function as salt and light in their world. The early Christians took seriously the call of Christ to live as the salt and light that he said they already were. Matthew 5:13-16 is a wake-up call to the church today. Jesus Preaches We find these words of Jesus about being salt and light on the heels of the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3-11). These familiar words of Jesus are found at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. It’s there Jesus shows us a picture of what every Christian should look like. He says in Matthew 5:3-10, [3] “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. [4] Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. [5] Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. [6] Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. [7] Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. [8] Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. [9] Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. [10] Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. These words describe what every Christian should look like. These aren’t to mark the “super spiritual” among us. These characteristics are to mark all who follow Christ – everyday, ordinary, rank-and-file Christians. These characteristics are countercultural. They describe countercultural men and women whom Christ asserts are salt and light for a dark and decaying world. We cannot easily imagine these words printed as a vision statement on Wall Street or in the hallowed halls of Washington D.C. or in some Hollywood executive’s office, can we? These are not the valued character traits in many places of power and influence. The State of the Church Yet, we sometimes find these same characteristics absent in the Church as well. According to George Barna, the greatest problem in the Church today is, instead of the Church influencing our culture, the culture is influencing the Church. We don’t look much different from the world. Barna writes, “Two out of every three American adults claim that the United States is a Christian nation. Don’t believe it. Never have so many been deceived. Based on an analysis of 131 measures of distinctive attitudes, values, beliefs and behaviors, we have developed a means of assessing the influence of the Christian community in America. This evaluation is based on a comparison of the similarities and differences between Christians and non-Christians. The data demonstrate that although Christians are distinct in some areas of thought and deed, they generally represent an invisible and ineffective presence in the U.S. Surprisingly few Christians have developed a holistic, integrated and balanced form of Christianity that provides non-believers with a viable lifestyle alternative to consider.” And then, after he reveals that unbelievers and Christians are virtually identical in many spheres of life, Barna concludes, “The bottom line is that in the dimensions of life where Christians can truly influence their world – i.e. in the non-religious domain – we have failed to demonstrate the power of our faith. Christianity is not losing influence in America because it is overmatched by the challenges of the day; it is losing its impact because believers have been unsuccessful at merging faith and lifestyle outside the walls of the church. Non-believers expect us to have different religious beliefs and practices; those differences fail to impress them. Only when those beliefs and practices shape every other walk of life do they sit up and take notice.” This is an important insight. In the Beatitudes, Christ tells us about the inward and personal character of his followers. Then he makes an important shift. He tells us it’s impossible to follow the norms of the Kingdom – to be his disciples in the world – in a purely private way. Donald Carson comments, “The righteousness of the life you live will attract attention, even if that attention regularly takes the form of opposition. In other words, the Christian is not poor in spirit, mournful over sin, meek, hungry and thirsty for righteousness, merciful, pure in heart, a peacemaker – all in splendid isolation. Our Cultural Commission No, these countercultural norms, faithfully practiced in a sinful world, make up a major aspect of our witness as Christians. That’s why Jesus follows up the Beatitudes with his teaching about salt and light, what we might call our Cultural Commission, our outward witness to the world. Jesus develops two metaphors to give us a picture of how his disciples must, by the lives they lead, leave their stamp on the world. He calls us salt and light. This is what I call Kingdom Discipleship. Consider these questions.
I know many of you do much of this already, but can we agree we have much further to go? Jesus told us plainly that we are salt and light to a world in need. We’ll unpack in more detail what it means to be salt and light in the next two chapters. As I conclude this chapter, I want to share this: I’m on a recruiting mission. I’m looking for a few good men and women. I’m looking for Kingdom Disciples. Kingdom Disciples What is a Kingdom Disciple? A Kingdom Disciple isn’t simply someone who has a few right beliefs about God, Jesus, salvation, and the Bible. It’s not someone who’s only concerned about his or her personal salvation. It’s not someone who merely attends an occasional worship service or Bible study, listens to Christian radio stations, says a blessing before lunch at a restaurant, or gives to charity. Those are all good things to be sure. They’re important things. But if that’s what our view of discipleship is, then we have a truncated understanding of what it means to follow Christ and thus limit our ability to participate in transforming our culture for Christ. Chuck Colson wrote in his book, How Now Shall We Live?, the following: “Right after signing the contract for this book, and while still plagued by writer’s remorse (was I really convinced that this book needed to be written?), my wife, Patty, and I visited old friends for a weekend and attended their local evangelical church, which is well known for its biblical preaching. I found the message solidly scriptural and well delivered. That is, until the pastor outlined for the congregation his definition of the church’s mission: to prepare for Jesus’ return through prayer, Bible study, worship, fellowship, and witnessing. In that instant, all lingering doubts about whether I should write this book evaporated. Don’t get me wrong. We need prayer, Bible study, worship, fellowship, and witnessing. But if we focus exclusively on these disciplines – and if in the process we ignore our responsibility to redeem the surrounding culture – our Christianity will remain privatized and marginalized. Turning our backs on the culture is a betrayal of our biblical mandate and our own heritage because it denies God’s sovereignty over all of life.” A Kingdom Disciple is a follower of Christ who understands that because Jesus is Lord over every sphere of life, our faith is therefore, a total, balanced, and integrated world and life view. As a consequence, such a follower of Jesus Christ lives in faithful response to that truth in the various areas of his or her life. It’s only this kind of radical, biblical discipleship that will transform our culture for Christ. This is nothing more and nothing less than what Christ has called us to be in the Sermon on the Mount. Our faith ought to pervade every aspect of who we are – as individuals, husbands, wives, employees or employers, church members, neighbors, citizens, and so on. The Dutch theologian, Abraham Kuyper, put it this way. He said, There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: “Mine!” A Social Religion What if we lived our lives as though that were true? John Wesley and George Whitefield did. It’s been said that England was on its way to its own bloody revolution, like France before it, were it not for these men and the gospel they preached and lived. They preached a gospel that took in the totality of life. John Wesley screamed from the rooftops that Christianity is a social religion. Yes, it absolutely deals with an individual’s personal relationship with Christ. That’s essential. But that personal relationship must bear fruit corporately, socially. The church is a covenant community, not a village of hermits. We must be here for one another, and as we are, we can help transform our culture. The revivals of the early Methodists produced not only spiritual revival, but brought forth political, educational, and economic reform in England. Lives were so completely and radically changed by the gospel of Christ, that a violent revolution was avoided. This is our heritage. Jesus declares in Matthew 28:18, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” Paul says in Colossians 1:15-17: He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. [16] For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. [17] He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (emphases mine) Can there be any doubt that these texts, and others like them, teach that Jesus Christ is the Lord over the entire universe. And if he is, what does that mean to us? What will that truth look like in our lives? How can that truth transform, not only individual lives, but families, churches, workplaces, neighborhoods and communities, a culture, a world? Walking Points
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The Shape of Love
Love is love. This unhelpful tautology has seemingly won the day with Christians and non-Christians alike. It works well as a slogan but offers little substance for how God calls us to live a life of love. Instead, the Bible teaches us there is a shape to love. The love God calls us to looks like something. It has content to it. It is first and foremost received from God, then directed back to God, and then, lived out toward neighbor. It’s sacrificial, others-centered, joyful, and obedient. This life of love is the Way of the Lord, and the reason for the title of this study. The Ten Commandments are an expression of the love Jesus commands in his summary of the Law. The great commandment is to love God with our whole being and the second commandment is like it, to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. But even that word from our Lord Jesus is general, and even vague. Yet he could speak in such a way because he knew he was summarizing something more detailed and specific, something his first-century audience would have understood. In speaking of the two great commandments, Jesus was really summarizing the moral Law of God, the Ten Commandments. The first table of the law, for example, which contains the first four commandments, focuses primarily, though not exclusively, on our love for God. The second table addresses the nature of neighbor-love, which as we learn throughout Scripture, is also an expression of our love for God. In other words, the way of loving God and neighbor looks like something specific. The commandments are not platitudes. They are concretely helpful. And the rest of Scripture is a commentary on what this love for God and neighbor looks like. The prophets, Jesus, and the apostles all shed light on the height, width, and depth of what it means to love God and others in the way God has prescribed in the Ten Commandments. More Than Meets the Eye By the time of the first century, many in the Jewish religious community had reduced the Ten Commandments to external rules and regulations that could be manipulated. But Jesus came along and reminded them that obedience to the Law had always involved the motives of one’s heart. It was not merely about behaving in the right way. It had always been about doing the right things, in the right way, for the right reason, with the right attitude. Of course, a standard like that immediately leads one to self-discovery, or at least it ought to. When you come to understand, for example, that “not murdering” another person is more than not taking the life of another person, but includes not hating them or being unrighteously angry toward them, you begin to realize how far you fall short. Furthermore, when you consider that each commandment carries with it a positive side, such as desiring that same person’s best interest and doing what you can to help them, then a legalistic framework really begins to crumble. Such a realization ought to cause us to run to the grace of God found in the work of Christ, for he was the only one who faithfully lived out a perfect life of righteousness. His sacrificial love on the Cross paid for our inability to live a life of perfect obedience to God’s Law. Morality Revealed by God What we learn as we study the Ten Commandments is that morality is fundamentally theological. That does not mean irreligious people cannot live moral lives, but it does mean when they do so, they are borrowing from a theistic framework. For their worldview cannot justify their way of living. There are secular forms of ethics. But those systems are usually forms of utilitarianism. They base their view of what is right and wrong on whether something works (whatever “works” means) for the common good (whatever “common good” means). A secular ethic is not grounded in that which is immutable, transcendent, and objective. It is not a revealed ethic. It is dependent on king or crowd. What is considered normal, or even good, is determined, so to speak, in the voting booth of public agreement and alignment. Absent from such a worldview and ethic is an objective standard, revealed by an immutable and transcendent Creator, who not only created the universe, but also each and every person, in God’s own image. Christians believe that having such an ethical standard is good, not only for individuals, but for families, communities, workplaces, societies, and ultimately, the world. A commitment to such an ethic does not mean every moral decision is clearly understood or that every command is easily interpreted and applied in every situation. But it does mean we have a firm foundation from which to start as we seek to faithfully live in this world. Real Freedom Contrary to popular notions, freedom does not mean being untethered to any moral restrictions in one’s life. Nor is desiring to obey God a form of legalism. Instead, we should understand that obedience to God is true love. And this kind of love produces real freedom, which is the ability to live the life for which we were created. That is not a life of legalism or bondage. The Law of God provides freedom to become all that God created and redeemed us to be, as well as delivering us from a path of self-destruction and potentially hurting others along the way. We don’t live this way in order to earn points with God, but such a life is evidence that God is doing a great work in us. God is molding and shaping us into something we cannot possibly imagine – his grand masterpiece – the very likeness of his Son. How could such knowledge lead us to anything but joyful and grateful obedience? The Heart The heart is the heart of the matter. God gave us his moral law to reveal to us his character and will for our lives. God’s Law does provide structure and rails to keep us safe. God revealed this way of life for us because he has our best interest at heart. He really does want what is best for us and thus has revealed the way for us to live. But more than that, in and through Christ, God has recreated us once again in his image. His very Spirit indwells us. God not only wants us to live this way because it is best for us. God wants our hearts. He wants us to desire to live this way because we love him, want to please and glorify him, and because we love others. He wants us to love what he loves. It is God’s sanctifying process for helping us become like him… in what we desire, the way think, how we speak, and in the manner in which we conduct ourselves in this world. And not only is this what is best for us here and now, but God is also training us for eternity. Thanks be to God. A Word About Each Lesson It will not take you long to see that some of the study questions have many Bible verses to look up. You might even say an obnoxious amount of Bible verses. And that’s true. But they are there for a few important reasons. First, they are included to show you how widely the Bible speaks on the particular commandment of each lesson. These Ten Commandments are not isolated only to Exodus and Deuteronomy. They are repeated, interpreted, and applied throughout the rest of Scripture. Second, the verses are there to reveal that God’s commands are not to be understood and applied in a simplistic fashion. The Ten Commandments are not only prohibitions. That is, they are not only forbidding us to behave in certain ways, but they also point us to the birthplace of those behaviors. Our desire for sin festers in the human heart and sometimes finds its ways into our thought-life, as well as the words we speak and the actions we take. Third, the variety of Scripture is there to remind you that there are positive, godly ways to live out the commands. The Ten Commandments are not merely a list of things not to do. They also guide us in a God-honoring, life-affirming, Christlike way of living in this world. The Last Reason for All the Scripture And that brings us to the last reason for all the verses, which is also why we have the Law in the first place. The first time I read the Sermon on the Mount, with a level of maturity and understanding, I immediately understood how far short I fell of living according to this standard that Jesus had set before me. And frankly, I was distraught. What hope did I have of faithfully and consistently living in this way, even if I tried my best every single day? And who among us does that? But that was also a key moment in my life for understanding grace. It’s the point of the Law, at least a part of the point. We cannot perfectly live this prescribed way of the Lord. Yet it is still the standard. So, what do we do? We turn to Christ, who did perfectly live it out. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Savior of the world, Lord of all creation, and Light of life did perfectly fulfill all righteousness in his life, death, and resurrection. His sacrificial and substitutionary life, death, and resurrection is what we trust in. We trust in him, not only to forgive us for our sins, but to impute his righteousness to our account. We died with Christ in his death and were raised to new life with Christ in his resurrection. And now, not only are we forgiven; not only are we new creatures in Christ; but the very Spirit who raised our Lord Jesus from the dead lives in each person who trusts in him. Therefore, Christ can live his life in and through ours. And When We Stumble We are not called to live the way of the Lord in our own strength. But Christ guides and empowers us through his gracious Spirit. The reason God has revealed this way to us is for us to become like Christ. It’s the path by which we are progressively molded and shaped into his likeness by the Spirit of love. We will stumble along the way. But even the grief and conviction we experience when we fail is the gift of a loving Father disciplining those he loves. His discipline is gracious correction to get us moving along the right path once again. My Advice for Each Lesson Thus, my advice is to answer each question however you see fit. You can write down your reflections for each verse of Scripture. Or, you can read all the verses and write down your summary statement of what they all mean. Or, you can read half of them, a third of them, or even a fourth of them. It’s up to you. My goal is not to provide you with a legalistic framework in a study which hopes to show you why legalism is neither godly nor livable. But I would be remiss if I didn’t at least encourage you to go the extra mile and try to read as many verses as you can in each lesson, and to think deeply about this way of the Lord prescribed for us. If you think about the character of God and the ways he has worked throughout redemptive history, then you recognize that even though we may not understand all the things God has included in his Word, we should realize that there are no “throw away” verses. They are all there for a reason, especially when they relate to who he his is, his way of salvation, and his path to holiness. My Prayer Ultimately, we are here to glorify God. We want to please our loving God so that when others see our good works, they will give praise to our Father in heaven (Matthew 5:16). My prayer is that this study will enlighten, encourage, and equip you to know God’s will, the way of the Lord, and that by it, God’s Spirit will carry on to completion the great work he has already begun in you until the day of Christ Jesus (Philippians 1:6). |
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