The message we get loud and clear from God coming to earth as the man Jesus, is that we (our world, our culture, our people) are in great need of being rescued. Isn’t that the Bible’s main theme (Old and New Testamant)? God rescuing people? I believe it is, and that is why I believe that as Christ’s body incarnate on earth, indwelt with his Spirit, his church’s work is to do the same. We are in the business of rescuing and transforming the world culture and making disciples to Jesus and his kingdom’s culture. That is the mission God has sent us out on (Matthew 28:18-20).
The church doesn’t exist for the church’s sake. The church is for giving itself away. Something that exists for its own sake consumes and takes in order to build onto itself. But like the yeast in Matthew 13, which continually gives itself away, so is the kingdom of God. As Christ-followers, we first give ourselves away to God, then to each other, and then to those outside of our groups in acts of love, justice, and service. We do this in imitation of our Christ, who gave himself away to us when he said to take and eat the bread, that is like his body (which he broke for us), and to take the wine, which is like his blood (that he poured out for us) and drink it. Take it, he says, it’s me. I’m giving myself to you, for you. And when he asks us to pick up our crosses and follow him, he is asking us to do the same.
Brian and I want to help Christ-followers to do just that. We don’t want our ministry to consume in order to build onto itself, and we don’t want to sell anything for anyone else to consume either. It’s not about consumption, or marketing or relevance. It’s about making disciples into the sacrificial way of Jesus.
We don’t want to do youth ministry or church ministry or any ministry anymore if it means selling a product to spiritual consumers. We want to invite people to join us in committing to follow Jesus, and then show them how to give themselves away like he did.
The rich young ruler in Mark 10 wanted to get heaven from Jesus. Jesus told him to risk everything and follow him. The young man couldn’t do that so he went away sad. The religious expert in Luke 10 wanted to get heaven from Jesus. Jesus said to love (God and neighbor), but this man wanted to know what he was going to get out of that arrangement (he wanted to know who was going to be his neighbor). He missed the point.
Three GREAT articles on the subject:
-Spiritual consumption vs. kingdom culture production on futuristguy
-Two different kinds of following (taking and giving) on NextReformation
and
-Denominations/church shopping as consumerism on Jesus Manifesto
Also, Andrew Jones on YouTube talking about the kingdom of God as yeast.
