The Gospel, God's Love, and Family

A friend recently shared this video with me.  It is a 20 minute "round-table" discussion about the Gospel, God's love, and family.  Much of what they discuss is in the context of parent-child relationships, but I am convinced most of what they say can and should apply to our relationships in our church family.  And by "church family" I do mean family because that is what the church should be - a spiritual family united in Jesus.

As I watched I certainly thought a lot about my kids, but I was struck with how well Paul and Elyse articulate the essential approach to making disciples - a relationship of love whereby I communicate the character and knowledge of God to someone else.  Just about everywhere they reference "parent" and "child" you could substitute "discipler" and "disciple" respectively.

Breaking Down Hirsch's Video

If you haven't watched Alan Hirsch's short video on discipleship and consumerism scroll down and watch it.  I resonate with nearly everything he says in the video, and I've watched it a number of times now because I find it so compelling.  I like it so much that I want to break down his major points:

1. Discipleship and Disciple-making are foundational for any movement.  If we fail at this point then we fail at every point.
2. The culture is making disciples whether or not we are, and if we want to make disciples we have to account for this cultural influence.
3. Those who are discipled by Western, secular culture are first and foremost consumers.  A sophisticated confluence of media, advertising, etc. are crafting our self image and shaping our desires.
4. This consumerism is a religion in essence.  It is defined by what we consume and is the search for meaning, identity, purpose, and belonging tied to the consumption of products.  It is the most compelling alternative to Christianity in the Western world today.
5. Christian discipleship is about becoming more and more like the one we love - Jesus.
6. We worship Jesus through our obedience, through our becoming like Him.  This is over against the idea that worship is mainly about words (e.g. music).
7. You cannot build a church on consumers because they have no commitments beyond their own needs.  In contrast, disciples of Jesus have already given up their own agendas and forsaken their own needs.  One can build a movement with true disciples.

I love this.  Hirsch puts first things first - make disciples or fail.  The culture is effectively making disciples, and if we don't subvert consumerism and provide a compelling alternative (i.e. the Gospel) we will not effectively build the church.

This encouraged me

In my opinion this video is a bit overstated on a few points, but the overall message is on target.  Our mission is to make disciples, and we must think Biblically about what contexts facilitate that mission best.

In a word...

I've been thinking more lately about the simplest explanation for why I do not support "institutional" church but choose instead to pursue an alternative expression. I think I can sum up my explanation with just one word - love.  The story behind this summary is simple.

I grew up in the institutional church, attending services on Sundays and Wednesday nights and attending a private Christian school 5 days a week. Therefore, I had heard about love a lot since it's discussed again and again in the Scriptures. I think I even memorized 1 Corinthians 13 at one point.

However, I never came close to grasping the awesome importance of love until the Holy Spirit overwhelmed me on a hike in Devil's Den state park during my junior year of college.  All the Scriptural truth I had learned growing up, my bitter disappointment with life, and my profound loneliness coalesced in a moment. It was a divine encounter which fundamentally altered the trajectory of my life.

From there I had a series of 3 pivotal relationships with men who taught me how to follow Jesus. In other words, they loved me and taught me how to love; they discipled me.

After those experiences the Scriptures appeared differently to my eyes. All the discussion about love - how it fulfills the whole law, how it is the goal of our instruction, how it is the greatest commandment, etc. - suddenly had unprecedented clarity. I understood why everything is worthless without love (1 Cor. 13:1-3).

At this point I began to evaluate my priorities - how I spent my time, where I put my energy, etc. My evaluation led me to spend more time pursuing relationships so that I could love other men like I had been loved. I pursued these relationships in both one-on-one and communal contexts - having coffee, lunches, etc. with guys and then spending time with them together on a weekly basis to share life on a broader level. Conversely, this led me to drop Sunday morning services and other institutional activities so far down the priority list that there simply wasn't room for them in my life anymore.

In the time since I left the institutional church I got married, had three kids, began home-schooling, and became a foster parent for the state of Arkansas. My responsibilities have grown immensely, and my belief in putting first things (i.e. love) first has like-wise grown. Loving Jesus by loving others is the most effective way I have found to obey the Scriptures, combat the sin in my heart, and grow my faith as I treasure Christ above my personal comfort.  I don't have time, energy, etc. to put toward something that is less effective, nor do I believe I have the Biblical right.

I'm convinced that the institutional nature and structure of the predominant form of church in America today does not fundamentally facilitate and empower love-filled, Christ-centered relationships.  That's not to say it doesn't aid these kinds of relationships at all.    However, given the importance of love in the Scriptures such an institutional form of church is far from ideal in my opinion because it emphasizes too many activities and focuses too many resources on things which don't directly facilitate love.  I strongly believe we should organize ourselves in such a way as to make relationships central, and that our times together should focus on growing the seed of love planted in us by the Holy Spirit.

To be clear, I don't believe this is an issue of personal preference or pragmatism.  The issue isn't that institutional church doesn't "work" for me.  I believe this is an issue of taking the Biblical commands to love seriously.

Here's the logical progression as I see it:

1. What is our commission?  To make disciples.
2. What is a disciple?  One who observes all the commands of Jesus.
3. What is the summary of all the commands of Jesus?  Love.
4. Through was avenue is love best communicated?  Relationships.

A few natural questions:

• Is this an oversimplification?
• Am I overstating the importance of love?

Discipleship and Consumerism

A few years back I read Alan Hirsch's The Forgotten Ways.  He has an insightful analysis of what he calls "Christendom" which is essentially what I call "institutional church" that may be worth the price of the book by itself.  However, the most profound thing I read was his observations about consumerism and specifically how it has impacted our Christian culture.  In his opinion, of all the religions competing with Christianity today in Western culture consumerism is the most powerful and dangerous.  Yes, he believes consumerism is a religion, and I'm hard pressed to disagree with him.  This video is a wonderful synopsis of his perspective: