Zondervan Blog

"Honey, I Saw a Shocking Man in the Marketplace Today" [Excerpt]

 

Mark Buchanan leads us into an ancient marketplace — the kind frequented by Jesus — and I don't think you'll be the same when we leave it.

Find out how Jesus's behavior in the marketplace shocked the respectable people of his day. This may change who you want to see in the church crowd on Sunday morning. [Excerpt from Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.] -Adam Forrest, Zondervan

 

A trip to the ancient marketplace

Mark Buchanan

Ancient markets were dirty places. You stood cheek by jowl with a ragtag bunch of sneezing, sputtering, coughing humanity. Mobs with filthy hands, open sores, nasty contagions, jostled shoulder to shoulder. All handled the same merchandise. Ten people groped nectarines, dried figs, pistachio nuts, and the eleventh person bought and ate them. Twenty people, some whose bodies had not seen water in a fortnight, tried on sandals before one man finally purchased and wore them.

 

Tablefuls of crockery and basketry and jewelery, of fresh vegetables and dried peppers and ham hocks and bread loaves, of leather aprons and cotton jerkins, all were caressed by a hundred fingers that also grubbed gardens and swabbed counters and dabbled in places unmentionable.

 

Everyone steeped in the broth of everyone else's breathing and sweating

At the market, small pieces of the debris of each and all were swapped about freely. Humanity's earthiness was bartered along with its wares. Everyone steeped in the broth of everyone else's breathing and sweating. Everyone took home a little souvenir from everyone else's personal collection, a memento or three from the man who slopped pigs, the woman who cleaned latrines, the boy who caught rats...

 

How to stay clean in the market

The Pharisees were careful, well-bred people. They took many necessary and wise precautions whenever any one of them was reduced to a visit to the market. Picking up some bug — the sniffles, a lingering cough — was the least of their worries... Their codebook for cleanliness, Leviticus primarily ... dealt with a different kind of uncleanness: moral, religious, spiritual. An open sore wasn't just infectious; it was a token of sin and a threat to intimacy with both God and others. Certain kinds of food were not just writhing with parasites or teeming with cholesterol... they were despised things that put those who ate them at risk of sullying themselves and alienating God...

 

Jesus' disciples ... are men without scruples.

The Pharisees and lawyers are not offended ... because of the disciples' glaring lack of hygienic discipline; they're offended because of their conspicuous lack — indeed, their out-and-out defiance — of well-established and widely agreed-upon moral standards. [For example, see Mark 7:1-5.] Jesus' disciples are scofflaws. They flout tradition with recklessness. They trespass clearly marked boundaries and vandalize the no-trespassing signs on their way across. They are men without scruples. They are men devoid of good sense, good breeding, good manners. They are men who, if their rabbi can't restrain them, then sterner measures should be employed.

 

All's to say, this scene that Mark records should in no way surprise us. To give his non-Jewish readers a little orientation ... Mark inserts parenthetically a comment about Jewish protocol for visits to the market. This is not just for Pharisees; it's for "all the Jews." These scruples — flagrantly thrown off by Bartholomew and the two Jameses and Peter and Judas, that whole sorry mob — are to be the badge of the law-abiding.

[Jewish readers of Mark's story would] be on the side of the Pharisees against Jesus and his unruly disciples. That would raise the alarm.

 

The sick invade the market

Even more, what would alarm [Jewish readers] — or, more likely, send them into paroxysms of moral shock — is the scene where "[People] ran throughout that whole region and carried the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he went — into villages, towns or countryside — they placed the sick in the marketplaces. They begged him to let them touch even the edge of his cloak, and all who touched him were healed" [Mark 6:53-56].

 

Look what gets hauled into the marketplace, and look who goes touching it. This portrait of people openly, deliberately placing the sick in the marketplaces reinforces every scruple a good Jew has about such places: avoid them, and when you can't, take a good, hot, long shower as soon as you get home. For someone to openly, deliberately bring sick people into such places, and for anyone to openly, deliberately touch them ... is, well, scandalous.

 

In Jesus ... holiness is no longer a hothouse flower that wilts on contact. It is a cedar of Lebanon.

Mark no doubt juxtaposes these two scenes from the marketplace to set up a stark and sharp contrast, and to underline how radically Jesus changes the rules. In Jesus ... holiness is no longer a hothouse flower that wilts on contact. It is a cedar of Lebanon, the balm of Gilead, and even the edge of his cloak spills with healing. His holiness is not a delicacy to be primly guarded; it is an invading force that overwhelms resistance. It is a force to be reckoned with, not some keepsake to be safely stowed away.

 

How the market is like the church

What I want to emphasize here is that this is a template for the church. The market is a classic in-between place, where cultures and classes come together. Markets intersect the rich and poor, the old and young, the good and bad, the beautiful and sordid. It's everyone's world in general, and no one's in particular.

 

The way the traditionally religious inhabit such places is that they don't; they make forays into them, guarded, priggish, stealthy, squeamish, fleeting. In and out. They rush in, holding their noses, closing their eyes. They get what they need. They rush out, and try to scour any residue of the place from skin and heart and mind.

 

[Jesus] is unstoppable with redemption. He is a holy terror.

The way Jesus inhabits such places is subversively, massively, invasively. He comes with healing in his wings [Mark 6:53-56]. He moves toward those who move toward him, the kingdom of God on a collision course with a world half pleading, half defying. His arms are spread wide, to make more of himself, to gather more into himself, to pour more out of himself. He is large with compassion. He is unstoppable with redemption. He is a holy terror.

When the kingdom within him collides with the world as it is, the kingdom will break that broken world, break and break it until it makes it anew. The lame will walk, the blind will see, the mute will speak, the deaf will hear. The foolish will become wise, the cowardly brave, the stingy generous. Angry people will first taste peace, in their bones, and then start making peace, from their hearts. Bitter people will forgive. The joyless will become joyful.

This is, I said, a good template for the church.

- Mark Buchanan

 

Q: Does your church resemble an ancient marketplace? Why or why not?

 

Learn More

Learn more about Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.

 

Suggested Posts

Unity: The Christian's Calling Card via Mark Buchanan
How Can We Share God's Peace? via Mark Buchanan
The Smell of the World that Jesus Died for via Margaret Feinberg

(Image and some styling above are web-exclusive features not included in the text of Your Church Is Too Safe. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

Unity: The Christian's Calling Card [Excerpt]

 

Potent stuff today from author/pastor Mark Buchanan: Why "oneness" is superior to "equality;" the benefits of pursuing church unity; and what's at stake if we don't. Excerpt from Mark Buchanan's book Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.

A brief open letter to Mark: "Dear Pastor Buchanan, your writing on unity convicts my introverted soul. For your next book, please write "Your Life Is Too Safe: The Introvert's Field Guide to Joining Community."  -Adam Forrest, Zondervan

Equality vs. oneness

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The Bible is little interested in equality. It aims much higher than that. From Genesis to Revelation, it calls us to this deeper, greater, tougher, sweeter thing: oneness. Oneness in our relationship with God. Oneness in our relationship with our spouse. Oneness with our relationships with other Christ-followers. Oneness in the church.

 

Oneness beats equality every time, because equality demands sameness. To be equal to you, I have to be as smart and strong and kind and generous as you. But oneness presumes difference. To be one with you, I have to accept your gift of otherness. I can be weak where you're strong, and vice versa. Oneness requires my life to complement yours. It calls us to complete one another.

 

Mark Buchanan

In marriage, for example, who wants equality? "We're even" is hardly a motto for lifelong affection. Whereas oneness is intrinsically cooperative, equality is inherently competitive, a recipe for endless one-upmanship. Or worse: a recipe for disaster. Equality was the false dream of Marx and Lenin, an ideology so unworkable in real life that its architects created one of the deadliest and darkest social nightmares in history. On a more personal level, equality is what people strive for in a divorce: half the assets, half the money, half the time with the kids. The scales must be exactly even then. But in a thriving marriage, the husband can be good at cooking and the wife at house repairs, each serving the other, and the resulting oneness means they both eat well in a house well kept.

 

Oneness, dwelling together in unity, is a good and pleasant thing in itself, much better than equality, and much, much better than animosity.

 

God's call to oneness

A church unified is ... a pageantry of the kingdom played out before a broken world to convince those who are far away to come near.

So God calls the church to oneness. He does that so that we can enjoy the goodness and pleasantness of it. God is a giver, and "every good and perfect gift" is from above [James 1:17]. But he has another reason for calling us to unity: nothing rehearses the kingdom of God better than our oneness. A church unified is an ensign and a showcase of the kingdom. It's a pageantry of the kingdom played out before a broken world to convince those who are far away to come near...

 

We join a church not because it's already whole, pure, and mature but to help it become so.

Church unity, Paul says, is a gift of the Spirit held together by the presence of Christ ("the bond of peace") rooted in the character of God ("there is one God") [Ephesians 4:1-17]. Yet even with all this — the gift, the glue, the root — unity still requires our every effort to keep, something that anyone who's been part of a church community for more than, say, three weeks knows is true. We join a church not because it's already whole, pure, and mature but to help it become so...

 

What's at stake?

If we can't live reconciled lives with one another, how will God make his appeal through us? We will be sweet water and salt water coming from the same spigot. We will be walking, talking contradictions. If we lack oneness with those already in the church, how will we possibly convince anyone outside it that this is God's main business, reconciling the world to himself in Christ? They'll see right through our little facade.

 

Unity ... is our diplomatic calling card.

Unity within the church is the heart of our appeal. Living reconciled lives with other believers validates our message to a fragmented, isolated, divided world. Unity among us vouchsafes our ambassadorial authority. It is our diplomatic calling card. Without it, the emperor — or ambassador — has no clothes.

- Mark Buchanan

 

Learn More

Learn more about Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.

 

Suggested Posts

How Can We Share God's Peace? via Mark Buchanan
What Peter and the Church Have in Common via Samuel Wells

 

(Some styling above is a web-exclusive feature not included in the text of Your Church Is Too Safe. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

Seek and ye shall be surprised [Excerpt]

 

Yesterday Mark Batterson shared his experience with trying to Force a Miracle. Here's the story's unexpected conclusion — a real-life example of "seek and ye shall find," and how the finding will often surprise ... ye!

I love how this story hints that God is directing the scene, but Mark and his unnamed friends have their roles to play. That is exciting, because it's true in our stories too!

This story is from Mark Batterson's book The Circle Maker: Praying Circles Around Your Biggest Dreams and Greatest Fears.

-Adam Forrest, Zondervan

 

The strange meeting

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I almost said no to a miracle.

 

A couple who had just started attending National Community Church requested a meeting, and I almost denied the request because they said they wanted to talk about church government. I love talking about the mission and vision of the church. Church government? Not as much! Plus, I was fighting a book deadline, so I didn't have much margin in my schedule. So I almost said no, and if I had, I would have missed out on a miracle.

As we sat in my office above Ebenezer's Coffeehouse, they peppered me with questions about bylaws, financial checks and balances, and decision-making protocols. And while I felt a little defensive at the time, I realize now that they were simply doing their due diligence...

 

After answering nearly ninety minutes worth of questions, they ended by asking me about our vision. I had so much pent-up passion after talking about policies and protocols that I just let it rip. I shared our vision of starting a Dream Center in Ward 8, the poorest part of our city and the primary reason the nation's capital is always in the running for murder capital of the country. I talked about turning our coffeehouse on Capitol Hill into a chain of coffeehouses, with all the net profits reinvested in missions. I talked about launching our first international campus in Berlin, Germany. And I shared our vision of launching multi-site campuses in movie theaters at metro stops throughout the greater Washington area. Then the meeting came to a rather abrupt and awkward ending. They said they wanted to invest in National Community Church, but they didn't say how or how much. They left, and I was left scratching my head.

 

A surprising phone call

I wasn't sure anything would come of that meeting, but a few weeks later, they asked my assistant for a phone appointment. On an otherwise uneventful Wednesday afternoon ... I received one of the most unforgettable phone calls of my life.

 

"Pastor Mark, we wanted to follow up on our meeting and let you know that we want to give a gift to National Community Church." My mind immediately started racing...

 

"We want to give a gift, and there are no strings attached. But before I tell you how much we're going to give, I want you to know why we're giving it. We're giving this gift because you have vision beyond your resources." I'll never forget that phrase: "vision beyond your resources."

 

If the vision is from God, it will most definitely be beyond your means.

The rationale behind the gift was just as meaningful as the gift itself. And that rationale has inspired us to keep dreaming irrational dreams. Those four words, vision beyond your resources, have become a mantra for the ministry of National Community Church. We refuse to let our budget determine our vision. That left-brained approach is a wrong-brained approach because it's based on our limited resources rather than on God's unlimited provision. Faith is allowing your God-given vision to determine your budget. That certainly does not mean you practice poor financial stewardship, spend beyond your means, and accumulate a huge debt load. It does mean that you take a step of faith when God gives you a vision because you trust that the One who gave you the vision is going to make provision. And for the record, if the vision is from God, it will most definitely be beyond your means.

 

Having vision beyond your resources is synonymous with dreaming big. And it may feel like you're setting yourself up for failure, but you're actually setting God up for a miracle. How God performs the miracle is His job. Your job is drawing a circle around the God-given dream. And if you do your job, you might just find yourself standing waist-deep in three feet of quail.

 

"We want to give the church $3 million dollars." I was speechless. And I'm a preacher.

 

It was one of those holy moments when time stands still. I heard it, but I could hardly believe it. I was blindsided by the blessing... God's provision came out of nowhere...

 

It's not our man-made plans that move the Almighty; the Almighty is moved by big dreams and bold prayers. In the awkward silence of my speechlessness, I heard the still small voice of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit hit the rewind button and reminded me of a prayer circle that I had drawn four years before... [Mark tells that story in the post "Lessons Learned from Trying to Force a Miracle."]

 

Do you want God to surprise you?

Over the past year, I've been repeating one prayer with great frequency: "Lord, do something unpredictable and uncontrollable."

 

If you want God to surprise you, you have to give up control.

That is a scary prayer, especially for a control freak like me, but it doesn't scare me nearly as much as a life void of holy surprises. And you can't have it both ways. If you want God to surprise you, you have to give up control. You will lose a measure of predictability, but you will begin to see God move in uncontrollable ways!

 

Anything could happen. Anyplace. Anytime.

- Mark Batterson (@markbatterson)

 

Want to receive our encouraging and informative blog posts by email or RSS? Subscribe to Zondervan Blog.

 

Learn More

Learn more about The Circle Maker
Watch session one of The Circle Maker DVD Group Study

 

 

Further Reading

Lessons Learned from Trying to Force a Miracle via Mark Batterson
When the Answer to Prayer Is Bigger Than Our Brain via Mark Batterson

 

 

(Some styling above is a web-exclusive feature not included in the text of The Circle Maker. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

 

Lessons Learned from Trying to Force a Miracle [Excerpt]

 

Have you ever ever prayed for something that would advance God's kingdom, but your plan didn't work out? This can be disconcerting, to say the least.

"This could be God saying 'Not yet' instead of 'No,'" a friend says. But a delay is mysterious when we see a clear need for God's intervention. "Why would God wait?" I've thought. "Doesn't he know the timeframe I'm working with? I only get about three score and ten years to make a difference!"

These concerns come out dramatically in this true story from pastor and author Mark Batterson. This story is from his book The Circle Maker: Praying Circles Around Your Biggest Dreams and Greatest Fears, and I hope you find it as encouraging as I did.

-Adam Forrest, Zondervan

The $2 Million Dollar Miracle

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One day, I was praying for God's provision when I felt a prompting to pray for a $2 million miracle. The first thing I had to do was decipher whether this prompting was just my own desire [for my non-profit] to be debt free or whether it was the Holy Spirit who dropped that promise into my heart. It's tough to discern between natural desires and holy desires, but I was about 90 percent sure it was the Holy Spirit who put that promise in my heart. I had no idea how God would do it, but I knew I needed to circle that promise in prayer.

 

I got what I thought was a $2 million idea for an online company called GodiPod. com. Lora and I invested the capital to get the business off the ground, but that $2 million idea turned out to be a $15,000 personal loss. In retrospect, I think I was trying to manufacture the miracle for God.

If we repent, God always recycles our mistakes.

This is what we often try to do, isn't it? When God doesn't answer our prayer right away, we try to answer it for Him. Like the day Moses took matters into his own hands and killed an Egyptian taskmaster, we get ahead of God. But when we try to do God's job for Him, it always backfires. Trying to get ahead of God cost Moses forty years. Of course, even then, God redeemed the forty years Moses spent as a fugitive tending sheep by prepping him to tend His sheep, the people of Israel. If we repent, God always recycles our mistakes.

The one upside to our failed business is that I did learn some valuable lessons about unanswered prayers that are worth far more than the $15,000 hit we took on GodiPod.com.

If God answered [our] selfish prayers, they would actually short-circuit the purposes of God in our lives.

First of all, I came to the humble conclusion that our prayers are often misguided simply because we're not omniscient. I'll be the first to admit that I've drawn some prayer circles around the wrong things for the wrong reasons, and God didn't answer those prayers the way I wanted Him to! If we were absolutely honest, we would have to admit that most of our prayers have as their main objective personal comfort rather than God's glory. If God answered those selfish prayers, they would actually short-circuit the purposes of God in our lives. We would fail to learn the lessons God is trying to teach us or cultivate the character God is trying to shape in us.

 

A second lesson learned is that no doesn't always mean no; sometimes no means not yet. We're too quick to give up on God when He doesn't answer our prayers when we want or how we want. Maybe your deadline doesn't fit God's timeline. Maybe no simply means not yet. Maybe it's a divine delay.

I learned that we shouldn't seek answers as much as we should seek God.

Finally, I learned that we shouldn't seek answers as much as we should seek God. We get overanxious. We try to microwave our own answers instead of trusting God's timing. But here's an important reminder: If you seek answers you won't find them, but if you seek God, the answers will find you. There comes a point after you have prayed through that you need to let go and let God. How? By resisting the temptation to manufacture your own answer to your own prayer.

 

It would have been easy to cash out on the $2 million promise after GodiPod.com failed, but I keep circling that promise. I still believed God was going to answer that prayer somehow, someway, sometime. I would have never guessed that the payoff would happen in a meeting about church government, but I stopped trying to manufacture my own answer and simply trusted that God would give an answer when I was ready for it. Then one afternoon, right around three o'clock, God came out of nowhere and delivered on His promise with a holy surprise...

 

God has surprised me so many times that I'm no longer surprised by His surprises. That doesn't mean I love them any less. I'm in awe of the strange and mysterious ways in which God works, but I have come to expect the unexpected because God is predictably unpredictable. God always has a holy surprise up His sovereign sleeve! The only thing I can predict with absolute certainty is this: the more you pray the more holy surprises will happen... 

- Mark Batterson (@markbatterson)

 

Watch for the rest of this story on Zondervanblog.com tomorrow! To receive more encouraging and informative blog posts by email or RSS, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.

 

Learn More

Learn more about The Circle Maker
Watch session one of The Circle Maker DVD Group Study

 

 

Further Reading

When the Answer to Prayer Is Bigger Than Our Brain via Mark Batterson
Closed Door Stories by the Zondervan Team

 

 

(Some styling above are web-exclusive features not included in the text of The Circle Maker... This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

 

How Can We Share God's Peace? [Excerpt]

 

What is the church's role in extending God's peace to the world? Mark Buchanan gives perspective in this excerpt from Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.

 

Mark Buchanan

The primary gift God gives to those who trust in him is reconciliation with him. But the primary gift the people of God give to those who are reconciled to God is a community of reconciled people. We give them the gift of our own wholeness and oneness. We give the gift of community. We invite them to be part of a people where everyone makes "every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace" [Ephesians 4:3].

 

God calls us out of darkness and into marvelous light [1 Peter 2:9]. But his intent is that "if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another" [1 John 1:7]. So God prepares us to be a people who draw and who welcome every tribe and tongue and nation into the light by first making us light. And he does that, in part, by bringing those who are far away near. He does that by making the community of the converted also the community of the reconciled...

 

One sign that God has returned to dwell in the center of our lives and of our churches is that we become a living testimony of what we promise. We promise that in Christ all become new creations, no longer seeing others according to the flesh. We promise that in Christ we have the peace of God and the God of peace. We promise that we through Christ receive God's love and forgiveness, and then extend it — with authority — to the whole world. We promise all this, but then claim exemption for ourselves in some petty matter or another.

 

When God steps into the center, those who once were part of us, and now are not, come home. They come back. God's personal faithfulness to them and righteousness for them become their daily portion.

 

What before was rumor becomes reality.

 

We become living testimony of the new life we promise to others. May our churches be the gathering places for this reconciled community.

- Mark Buchanan

 

Learn More

Learn more about Your Church Is Too Safe: Why Following Christ Turns the World Upside-Down.

 

Suggested Posts

The Weight of Your Past via Mark Buchanan

 

(Image and some styling above are web-exclusive features not included in the text of Your Church Is Too Safe. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

The Prisoner's Prayer [Excerpt]

 

Our late friend, Chuck Colson, relates how some prisoners he knew reacted to the gospel. Excerpt from The Faith: Given Once for All by Colson and Harold Fickett.

 

But the other criminal rebuked him. "Don't you fear God," he said, "since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong." Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise." Luke 23:40–43

 

'Jesus, You're innocent. You're holy. I'm guilty. Remember me.'

I ask inmates to put themselves in the place of the good thief and to pray just as He prayed, "Jesus, You're innocent. You're holy. I'm guilty. Remember me."

 

Repentance and the desire to be in Jesus' company are the crucial elements of any sincere conversion.

The good thief's understanding of his own sin, his repentance, and his desire to be with Jesus made it possible for him to be saved — and for Jesus to answer his prayer. Repentance and the desire to be in Jesus' company are the crucial elements of any sincere conversion.

Thousands of times around the world I have seen the power of God work in the most remarkable ways through such simple prayers, whole groups of inmates and the poor praying out loud, individuals weeping, many responding with open confessions of faith. I have seen some of the hardest, toughest, meanest looking convicts dissolve in a flood of tears. In some prisons, I have literally been mobbed afterward by weeping convicts. They get it.

Repentance and acceptance of Christ's saving work bring with them a new understanding of one's own worth that at first may seem paradoxical. However gravely I have sinned, Christ still thought I was worthy of His sacrifice. That's grace, indeed; that's love!

 

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One inmate in a Florida prison looked like thousands I've met; missing teeth, tattooed, his face scarred by dissipation and a depraved life. In tears he said to me, "All my life people have told me I was no good, I would never amount to anything. For the first time in my life today, I feel like I'm worth something." Another inmate in one of the maximum security prisons in America, who turned out to be a Mafia leader, fell to his knees crying. "Until this day I have never felt any good," he sobbed. "Now I know I can be forgiven and be decent. Now I have a reason to live."

As the Scriptures say, "While we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).

- Chuck Colson

 

Learn more about The Faith.

 

Suggested Posts

The "Great Proposal" of the Gospel via Chuck Colson
Chuck Colson's Call to Christians via Colson & Zondervan Blog
Beyond Crime and Punishment: The Prison Fellowship Ministry via Philip Yancey & Zondervan Blog

(Some styling above is a web-exclusive feature not included in the text of The Faith. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

Gender Stereotypes in Church: Margaret Feinberg on Gender's Role in the Pew & in Pursuit of God

 

The church may depend on gender stereotypes more than God does.

Yesterday the Her.meneutics blog (Christianity Today's blog for women) posted about Margaret Feinberg's experience of pursuing God. This is a topic which Margaret has discussed with great insight in Zondervan Bible studies such as Pursuing God's Beauty and Pursuing God's Love, and in her recent book Hungry for God.

 

 

The Her.meneutics blog asked Margaret if her view of pursuing God is related to her view of gender. Margaret replied, "My personality informs [my spirituality and experience of God] far more than gender ever could."

Then Margaret added something that has Twitter abuzz: 

Gender often remains an acceptable way to stereotype people in the church. I think we're all made in God's image—God's beautiful, breathtaking, complex image and it is good.

Margaret goes on to discuss how male leaders and local churches can encourage women to use their gifts in ministry. If you're interested, I recommend you read the post on the Her.meneutics blog.

 

What Do You Think?

Do you feel like your church views you as a gender stereotype? Share your thoughts in a comment on this post.

As a youngish man, I don't feel like my local church has stereotyped me too badly. For every Wild Game Dinner, they also host a film discussion (which is more my speed). I realize this isn't everyone's experience and I'd like to hear yours.

- Adam Forrest, Zondervan

 

Also of Interest

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Margaret Feinberg on Women in Politics (Zondervan Blog post).
Margaret (@mafeinberg) blogs at margaretfeinberg.com.

Learn more about her book Hungry for God.

 

 

(This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's opinions are their own, and are shared for information purposes only. To receive new blogposts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

An Unlikely Evangelist: What D. L. Moody's Life Demonstrates about Prayer & the Spirit [Excerpt by Jim Cymbala]

 

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Excerpt from Jim Cymbala's new book Spirit Rising: Tapping into the Power of the Holy Spirit.

 

When God's Spirit moves, his purposes are revealed and accomplished in ways that no committee, personality test, or computer program could ever figure out.

 

D. L. Moody is a great example of that. No one ever would have expected him to be one of the greatest evangelists of all time. Moody was initially a shoe salesman and basically uneducated. He was a short, overweight man and not very good-looking. He had a slight speech impediment and a rapid-fire delivery when he spoke.

From a cartoon of D. L. Moody, dated 1875.

 

After he became a Christian, he started working with children on the streets of Chicago, working with the YMCA, and later handing out tracts during the Civil War. Though he never went to seminary, his work bore fruit, and eventually he was invited to England to preach.

 

While he was there, well-trained, velvet-tongued pastors sat in amazement at his preaching. Many of their churches were dead, and the kingdom wasn't being extended. But along came Moody, and the crowds followed. Despite his limitations, God’s blessing was evident. The guy couldn’t even pronounce Daniel correctly. He said Dan'l. And more difficult names like Nebuchadnezzar? Not even close.

 

A man known only by Mr. Reynolds once described the first time he met Moody:

The first meeting I ever saw him at was in a little old shanty that had been abandoned by a saloon-keeper. Mr. Moody had got the place to hold the meeting in at night. I went there a little late: and the first thing I saw was a man standing up, with a few tallow candles around him, holding [a young African-American boy], and trying to read to him the story of the Prodigal Son; and a great many of the words he could not make out, and had to skip. I thought, If the Lord can ever use such an instrument as that for his honor and glory, it will astonish me. After that meeting was over, Mr. Moody said to me, "Reynolds, I have got only one talent: I have no education, but I love the Lord Jesus Christ, and I want to do something for Him: and I want you to pray for me." I have never ceased from that day to this, morning and night, to pray for that devoted Christian soldier.

In a sense, Moody was nearly semiliterate. I once saw a letter written by Moody that was reproduced in Love Them In: The Life and Theology of D. L. Moody, by Stanley N. Gundry. Any sixth grader could do better. There were no capital letters, and commas and periods were few and far between. He would have been laughed at today when we judge ministry by slickness of delivery style and not by spiritual power. Yet this man preached to millions of people with no sound system and became one of the best-known evangelists in the history of Christianity. He led thousands to the Lord and went on to found three schools and a university.

 

We're not all called to be a D. L. Moody. But regardless of how we're set apart, it is God's responsibility to equip us... Sometimes the work encompasses world-changing missions, such as that of Moody. At other times, the work is much more personal and closer to home...

 

[Get off the Sidelines with the Spirit's Power]

Just as each member of the human body functions differently from the others, the Spirit energizes each of us in the body of Christ to fulfill God's purpose. Without the Spirit's power being exercised, we tend to sit on the sidelines, inactive and unfulfilled. Worse, we are tempted to critique those actually "in the game" trying to proclaim Christ and serve his people. Anyone can criticize the efforts of another believer, but at the judgment seat of Christ, we will answer for ourselves only, not another...

 

Christ didn't die on the cross so that we would spend our time as Christians on earth merely sitting around waiting for his return. Jesus said, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few" (Matt. 9:37). The reason for the shortage today is that too few are yielded to the Spirit whom Christ sent to us. But there's still time, and we have a patient, merciful Savior on our side.

 

Who knows how God can use you if you step out in faith and let the Holy Spirit take control? We're not called to be spectators watching from the stands as the prince of darkness goes about to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10). Jesus said there is a shortage of workers, but the actual work will be done by God's Spirit through you and me doing things beyond our wildest imagination. It all begins when you offer yourself to serve.

 

And then we can pray the prophet Isaiah's prayer, "Here am I. Send me!" (Isa. 6:8).

- Jim Cymbala (@jimcymbala)

 

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Learn more about Spirit Rising

More Posts You May Like

Will God Help Imperfect People? via Jim Cymbala
Power from Heaven via Jim Cymbala 

 

(Image & some styling above are web-exclusive features not included in the text of Spirit Rising. Image attribution: "Prayer and Praise," a Vanity Fair "Spy" Print of D.L. Moody, dated April 3, 1875; courtesy darvillsrareprints.com. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

 

 

Then, on Sunday...

Hi Creativity, Meet Ministry... (The UNTITLED Blaine Hogan Interview)

 

Blaine Hogan's UNTITLED: Thoughts on the Creative Process is a declaration of war against the blank page.   

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In this interview with long-time creator Blaine (Creative Director at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, IL) you will get a taste of his insights on attacking the blank page, executing vision, getting more out of contemplation, and as Blaine writes, "creating beauty from the inside out."

 

Full disclosure: Blaine's UNTITLED eBook isn't published by Zondervan, but I believe you creators (writers, pastors, teachers, worship leaders, and artists of all stripes) will be encouraged and empowered by Blaine's perspective. I look forward to hearing your comments! -AF

 

ZBLOG: In UNTITLED you ask, "Is there anything in my work I love so much I would eat it?" That's my first question: What are you hungry for?

 

Blaine Hogan

BLAINE: Movement. Heart movement. In myself first and then in an audience. I'm starving for and always on the lookout for something that I find deeply moving. As I continue to explore this discipline of the creative process, I find that the more I can discipline myself to being open and to exploring various corners of things, the chances for finding things in this vein dramatically increase. And when I find something that moves me, I want to eat it. I want to internalize it, through the lens of my own story — then I want to figure out the best way to tell it.

 

ZBLOG: You support artistic "fringe exploration" and "rebellion," but you also observe, "sometimes artists get so carried away with their rebellion they begin to wage war with their own center of gravity." What is your center of gravity? And how do you recommend other artists stay centered?

BLAINE: Put simply, the continually refining work of Christ in my life. I grew up Catholic so I find myself repeating the Lord's Prayer throughout the day without even knowing it. For me this has always been centering. Contemplation is another thing I use to stay centered. Probably everyone reading this works in a fast paced environment, and the opportunity for silence and meditation I imagine is rare. However, if we aren't quiet, I'm not sure we can stay centered. When we stop we recognize our breath — something we didn't "work" to do. It just happens. This is the cosmic mystery of Christ within us. We center ourselves when we stop.

 

ZBLOG: A good number of people I know, both non-Christians and Christians, believe that creative thinking and doctrinal thinking are at loggerheads. Do you see a tension between the artist's work and the theologian's? Or can Michaelangelo and Martin Luther sit at the same table?

 

What Does Joel the Prophet Have to do with Jesus? [Excerpt from "How to Read the Bible through the Jesus Lens"]

 

I picked up How to Read the Bible through the Jesus Lens and dared author Michael Williams to show how the Book of Joel focuses on Jesus. This is what I found in Williams's book. -AF

 

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Give me what I deserve! We all might want to think twice about demanding that, because what we think we deserve might diverge significantly from God's judgment on the matter.

The prophet Joel ministered during the time when a severe drought and locust plague were crippling the land. God's people had evidently assumed that divine blessing was their right, no matter how corruptly they lived. But God reminded them by means of these natural disasters that abundant life was realized only in relationship with him. When that relationship was ignored or allowed to fade, then the protective barriers against death and destruction were lowered and the enemies of life could charge in. In Joel, this phenomenon is called "the day of the Lord." It is a day when the consequences of turning away from God and the need for his salvation are realized.

 

Joel reminded them that when ... they unplugged themselves [from God, the life-generating power source], it wouldn't take long before things in their lives got awfully dark.

God's people were looking forward to the day of the Lord as a day when God would judge all those other people who had rejected him and gone their own way. It was hard to come to terms with the fact that God's judgment could include them as well. They needed to return to him and recommit themselves to their relationship with him in order for there to be any rescue from the dangers that stalked them down the dark alleys they had taken. So Joel called for fasting, prayer, and mourning (2:12). For God's people the good things of life would not come about because they were somehow better than other people, but because they were plugged into the unfailing, life-generating power source. Joel reminded them that when by their faithlessness they unplugged themselves, it wouldn't take long before things in their lives got awfully dark.

 

Joel saw in the immediate disasters of drought and locust plague vivid reminders of the coming day of the Lord when God's judgment would be amplified to a global scale. Everyone on earth would come to a place called "Jehoshaphat," which means "the Lord judges" (3:2, 12). The ultimate day of the Lord is coming when comprehensive and final divine judgments will overwhelm mankind like a colossal tsunami and make the devastating drought and locust plague of Joel's day seem like minor inconveniences. Then, too, the only island of life in a sea of death and destruction will be found in relationship with God.

 

The prophet Joel, from an 18th-century Russian icon.

 

[Joel through the Jesus Lens]

The apostle Peter quoted from Joel's prophecy on the day of Pentecost after Jesus' resurrection and ascension (Acts 2:17–21), indicating that Jesus' death on the cross was our day of the Lord, when God's judgment for our disobedience was experienced on our behalf by our sinless representative. Joel told God’s people of his day that the disasters they were experiencing were the natural result of abandoning God, and their effect was intended to remind them that their life was found in God alone.

 

On the coming final day of the Lord, when all nations will gather before the Lord for judgment, the one and only criterion that will hold any sway before the Judge of all the earth will be relationship with him. Those who have such a relationship through faith in Jesus Christ will enjoy the life that flows from that relationship. Those who don’t have such a relationship will experience the dire consequences. Jesus experienced those dire consequences so that all who come to the Father through faith in him can be assured of life. He is the one who will do the judging on the day of the Lord, and he knows the sheep that belong to him [see Matthew 25:31-32].

Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead. The day of the Lord is coming. Joel sees "multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision" (3:14). Those who decide to turn to God for life through faith in his Son will have nothing to fear on that day. They will be safe and secure inside the stronghold of his love (3:16). Why would anyone choose plan B?

 

[What this Means for Us Today]

To experience [a foretaste of the restoration of all things], we have to make sure our chairs are scooted up to the table of God's grace.

Believers today live between "days of the Lord." Jesus has already experienced our day of judgment and has enabled us even now to enjoy a foretaste of the restoration of all things that will take place when he returns again on the final day. To experience that foretaste, however, we have to make sure our chairs are scooted up to the table of God's grace. Only in our relationship with the source of life can we expect to realize true life for ourselves. We can only really live when we live together with him...

 

We may look forward to the day of Christ’s return with confidence that he has paid the price for our sin. But more than that, we may look to our Lord for life. As long as we are trusting in him, we will never be disappointed and we will never have to fear. Instead of the day of the Lord being a "dreadful" time for us (2:11), it will be a time of rejoicing, of fruitfulness, and of security (2:19–27)...

 

There are many who are hoping that their lives will have been "good" enough to merit a pass on the day of judgment. Others are waiting for the day to come when they can finally experience life. Some are just trying not to think about the coming day of judgment. How easy it is to resolve all of these concerns about that day through faith in Jesus Christ! Jesus offers us his own righteousness to replace our blameworthiness, unshakable joy to replace our circumstantially determined happiness, and justifiable confidence in him to replace our justifiable doubt in ourselves. The day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision (3:14). Let's decide for life in Christ.

-Michael Williams

 

Watch the "Jesus Lens" Web Event

Want to know more about reading the Bible through the Jesus lens? Watch the discussion with author Michael Williams.

 

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Learn more about Dr. Williams's book, How to Read the Bible through the Jesus Lens.

 

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Looking for Your Life's Purpose? via Michael Williams
Esther, Mordecai & Jesus via Michael Williams

-Adam Forrest, Zondervan

(Images & some styling above are web-exclusive features not included in the text of How to Read the Bible through the Jesus Lens. Image attribution: By 18 century icon painter (Iconostasis of Kizhi monastery, Russia) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. This post does not represent the views of Zondervan or any of its representatives. The writer's personal opinions are shared only for information purposes. To receive new Zondervan Blog posts in your reader or email inbox, subscribe to Zondervan Blog.)

Watch the "Jesus Lens" Web Event