If Jesus started a religion...

It seems that theologians and Bible readers from all denominational camps are grasping, maybe for the first time, the global and epic proportions of Jesus, the cross, his kingdom, and the renewal of all things. We are waking up to the God of all people, who has a plan for the entire creation, grander than a few people smiling more often than the year before.

Why then is the church, which apparently (and mysteriously), is the flesh of this epic, grandiose Jesus, living on earth, still such a small solution? Why is the God of all life and all people represented by a comparably tiny religion with cozy, “always been that way” beliefs and practices? And we think that it Jesus that turns people away! How terribly arrogant of us. We congratulate ourselves, “We gave them a tract, now it’s up to the Spirit and predestination to do the rest.”

It seems that church folk don’t realize how insignificant their cute traditional practices, beliefs, and insider language seem to a humanity which struggles to pay its bills and end its wars. Tell an unbeliever that you believe that, in Jesus, the church is the answer to the evil and sin and the boredom of the world. They may laugh or scowl, not because they disagree with the problem, but because the ultra-conservative, middle class, white crowd most churches attract seems like the last “answer” an outsider could imagine.

And our apologetics assume that Jesus is a choice along the same plane as Buddha, Mohammed, or humanism. If Jesus is prime rib among foods, we invent him as a candy bar, because that is what the kids are after! Something doesn’t taste right. If Jesus is the Word from the beginning, the Word become flesh, the Word of life and resurrection and new beginning, we prefer to sell him as a better founder of a better religion, with better rules, and a better reward.

If Jesus came to begin a new religion, frankly, I want no part in him.

As a prophet, Jesus showed that religion wasn’t working; it wasn’t doing what God had in mind. As a teacher, Jesus showed that humans were the point of holiness, not a healthy reputation. As the Savior, Jesus showed that death was not a problem for God. As God in the flesh, Jesus showed that new creation was not only possible in him, it was the point. And this was the point and purpose God had, and has, for all people. This Jesus is whom Christianity is founded upon

No wonder Christianity as a religion is so, to speak practically, ineffective. Maybe it’s because it’s not what Jesus had in mind when he formed his resurrection community. Maybe because “Jesus is Lord” means more than a bumper sticker can convey. And if we have come to such a grand understanding of salvation, it is time our churches aren’t institutions among institutions—our God, not a god among gods. If we have come to an understanding of resurrection, it is time church has the distinct flavor of life.

What is the Bible here for? An unfinished response

It seems if we examined the Bible from an outsider’s perspective, we would have no reason to believe it is for us. If I steal my neighbors mail and find a bill yet unpaid, I am not concerned for myself. So, with Scripture, it seems we have stumbled across the mail of God, He as the sender, people of ancient tongues, tribes, and cultures as the recipients. Everything written is deeply rooted in place, time, and presuppositions that, frankly, have little or no sway on contemporary life. This, at least, is what one may observe without traditional Christian indoctrination.

Tradition has made it more difficult than ever to understand the Bible as no more than an answer book, a timeless, absolute collection of promises to treasure until Jesus takes us away to a better place. How much more advantage the unchurched have! They read Paul writing to the Philippians. “For I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance.” Not a formula of thanksgiving, not a complement to us as its readers, not an absolute principle for succeeding in times of trouble. The non-Christian reader might correctly perceive this. For the churched, it is all the above and working its way to a line of bumper stickers. We love to let the Scriptures speak to us, even though it seems they have no intent in doing so.

However, if we see Scriptures as providing a framework, a story, which they quite accurately do—an epic of the creator God with plans, promise, people, purpose for His world, yet uncompleted—the poems, the parables, the prophesy seem to fit together, they seem united in purpose. We see glimpses of God, often incomplete (just showing His backside, I suppose), but altogether true and living. And we, thousands of years removed from the actually events, find a story that we can’t help but to find ourselves in. we are there, in its midst. And we chose the roles—in Adam or in Christ?—and we get to experiment (“taste and see”) if the way of Jesus is really the answer to the whole thing. The Bible claims it is. Yummy.

Mars Hill Bible Church, January 7

I visited Mars Hill tonight. I am amazed at the air of ignorance felt there, in regards to the controversy clouding in and crowding in on the place from the outside. I felt quite idolatrous even thinking of Rob Bell in a critical, consumerist fashion. Is he giving me what I am used to hearing? Was that a wise choice of words? How dare he be funny? And even examining the worship. Yes, of course, they would play that song. It’s so Mars Hill. Can you imagine? Struggling to worship as I myself try to understand the theology of the church?

Yet the hype seems to die every time I visit. I am sick of examining the church as a phenomenon, whether at Mars Hill or West Cannon, or elsewhere. I want to be a part of Jesus in the world. In his body, doing what he does. This is what spurred me to write this “Abigeauty” thing, if I do in fact write it. In technical terms, it is a struggle between the philosophy of looking back at the Bible—trying to model the worthy characters, follow all commands as timeless law, being an Acts style church—contrasted with what I suppose is what Mars Hill is at work on: Living and breathing as a moving, working body of Jesus in the world he has placed us in, as living out the projection of Scripture and this “new covenant” in Jesus’ blood. In doing this, Mars Hill has ignored commands, it would seem, like allowing a woman to be a deacon or pastor (a position with a different role for them than a traditional church). But if specific, cultural commands like this are to remain forever, how different is this covenant than that of Judaism? New look, same (not so great) taste. Or, if 2 Corinthians 3 teaches what I propose, it is the taste of death. If the old letter kills, would a new “letter” kill as well? Yet if what we were doing was being Jesus to our world in a holy pleasing way, how is a woman teaching an adult Sunday school class somehow disobedient? Surely it meant something in Paul’s day, but something about that kind of Biblical interpretation grinds against me terribly.

All these thoughts came about because a woman was interviewed on stage, telling her “story” of taking a teaching job in a Grand Rapids alternative high school. Rob used it as a launch pad to speak of Jesus’ teaching on the Good Samaritan. He asked a question of the story, “Who was the real priest? Who truly revealed God?” Anyways, after the service, a conservative friend of mine said, “I never thought I would hear a woman preacher tonight.” What a taboo topic in my circles. And how ridiculous! The issue of a woman’s role in the church has become the determining factor of a church being “liberal” or “conservative”. It seems so much smaller than the way of Jesus.

The Purpose of Posting

I am concerned that the way of Christ has become so, well, narrow. If God’s story is as epic as the Bible makes it seem, why is Christianity such a small answer, an option among the others? Why are church people so similar, church culture so…sanitary? The God of the universe must be more engaging than we are making Him seem. Part of my concern stems from the way we look at Scripture, always looking back at it, never using as a lens to look forward, to dream. That word has had some harsh treatment in some Christian circles. A shame. What if the new covenant, built not with letters, but in human hearts is not as certain as we have so often made it? What if God needs to be revealed differently to each generation, though He Himself doesn’t change? What if difference among Christians isn’t the problem, but the path to knowing the fullness of God? Understanding and ignorance are the paradox, not the problem. This is the paradox of God. And many (even me, I think) find it beautiful.