Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Evangelicals have to face it (like Roman Catholics of 16th century had to): Increasingly, our version of Good News is neither news nor good.
So herein lies the choice for those of us who are Christians. We can either stay within the Christianity we have mastered with the Jesus we have domesticated, or we can leave Christianity as a destination, embrace Christianity as a way of life, and then journey to reality, where God is present and living in every person, every human community, and all creation.
The emerging church movement has come to believe that the ultimate context of the spiritual aspirations of a follower of Jesus Christ is not Christianity but rather the kingdom of God. ... to believe that God is limited to it would be an attempt to manage God. If one holds that Christ is confined to Christianity, one has chosen a god that is not sovereign. Soren Kierkegaard argued that the moment one decides to become a Christian, one is liable to idolatry.
When I pray the Lord's Prayer, I begin with the first word, "Our. . ." (see Matthew 6:9) and I stop and ask myself, "Who do I include in this Our?" I remind myself that the story of God is bigger than my personal story, bigger than the story of my religion, bigger than the story of all humanity, and bigger than the story of all creation. In the kingdom of God, these four stories are all really my stories - all at the same time - woven together, giving meaning and life to each other.
Jesus offered a single incentive to follow himto summarize his selling point: 'Follow me, and you might be happy-or you might not. Follow me, and you might be empowered-or you might not. Follow me, and you might have more friends-or you might not. Follow me, and you might have the answers-or you might not. Follow me, and you might be better off-or you might not. If you follow me, you may be worse off in every way you use to measure life. Follow me nevertheless. Because I have an offer that is worth giving up everything you have: you will learn to love well.'