Well, in my ongoing campaign against the over-emphasis of proclamational gospel preaching, I submit this jumble of thoughts and rants:
Check the link:
http://blog.visionnavigator.com/2008/07/poverty-in-suburbia.html
“To win in combat it is not enough to simply know thy enemy, one must know one’s own self. Understand what parts of the self also exist in the creatures across the field of battle. If you defeat your own demons, when you encounter your targets you will have half the battle won already - you will find in them what you found in you. Evangelism then is the task of pointing the device of experience at others after which you have pointed it at yourself – this is the sympathetic element of love. Love in the heart of the protagonist is an important factor in the successful communication of the gospel. If you cannot love, you cannot communicate the love of God – all you can do is convey the information via rumour. When the New Testament says: “we love” it comes through the experience: “He loved us.”
18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation:
19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
20 We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. 2 Cor 5:18-20
Reconciliation through Christ via an appeal through us. We were reconciled and an appeal comes through us. Therefore, when proclaiming: BE RECONCILED TO GOD! Don’t just say the words – convey your own personal experience of reconciliation through the process of relational discipleship! Make the appeal of reconciliation to “them” when you can show reconciliation working in you and in the life of your community.
“What causes dissensions and factions among you? Is it not your desires that battle within you?”
Suburban life (which isn’t always technically in a city’s suburbs), the context within which the large majority of churches are “successful” in our day and age, is a place where consumerism, the economy of desire, and gain are worshipped. If these churches are going to be prophets of reconciliation there, we will need to topple the idols of power, prestige, and position here, within the inner life of the Christian community. I mean, come on Christian church, at least try to look like you are not the same organization as Amway!
Stop using your personal and corporate resources to be somebody “big” and waste them on the ministry of reconciliation – reconciliation that is not just spiritual – but social and physical as well! You might find along the way that your community grows in unanticipated ways – not in human resource units of capital, but in reconciled Children of God!
jason.
