In Martin Luther’s essay, “The Freedom of a Christian,” we read the following: “I believe that it has now become clear that it is not enough or in any sense ‘Christian’ to preach the works, life, and words of Christ as historical fact, as if the knowledge of these would suffice for the conduct of life.”

WWJD Is a Bad Question

Luther is claiming that asking “What Would Jesus Do?” is a bad question for your spiritual formation. Luther continues: “Yet, this is the fashion among those who today are regarded as our best preachers…and such teaching is childish and effeminate nonsense.” Luther’s 16th century words are still relevant today.

Thankfully, Luther explains why he considers WWJD a bad question:

There are some who have no understanding to hear the truth of liberty and insist upon their goodness as means for salvation. These people you must resist, do the very opposite, and offend them boldly lest by their impious views they drag many with them into error. For the sake of the liberty of the faith do other things which they regarded as the greatest of sins….Use your freedom constantly and consistently in the sight of and despite the tyrants and the stubborn so that they also may learn that they are impious, that their laws and works are of no avail for righteousness, and that they had no right to set them up.

Are You Offended by the Gospel?

Don’t get all excited because you now have a great theologian giving you a divine sanction on your favorite sins. Luther spends the rest of his essay talking about what it looks like to love God and your neighbor. He is no antinomian.

But do get angry if you’re offended by the gospel. That can be a good thing because it points you to some good news—that the remedy for guilt and condemnation is NOT your better law-keeping or adherence to your well-polished moral sense, but faith in the law-keeping of Jesus. Because of Christ, you are already vindicated in the eyes of God. God’s riches of forgiveness and freedom from guilt, condemnation, and shame are offered not on the basis of working or measuring up. Rather, you have a right standing before God because of the righteousness of Christ.

So, what would Luther do? In the face of suffocating religion and moralism, he would offend boldly and celebrate the liberty of faith for the sake of the gospel.

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Does Your Passion Have a Slow Leak? Click | View Series

Jesus Had an Internal Blueprint

Through the years, thoughtful students have studied the life and ministry of Jesus Christ from many and varied points of view. He is teacher, healer, evangelist, prophet, and discipler, to name just a few of his perceived roles. He spent days in some places and moved on rather quickly from others, leaving needs unmet and questions unanswered. He seemed to know when to stay and when to leave. He had an internal blueprint, a road map that seemed to guide him where he went, how long he stayed, what he did, and with whom he spent his time.

Well-Balanced, Well-Paced, and Well-Prepared

Jesus had an ability to know when to say “yes” or “no” to a perceived need (Mark 1:35-39; Luke 5: 15-16). He knew when it was time for rest and time for work. He accomplished more in 3 and a half years than many do in a lifetime. He never seemed to be in a hurry or “be driven onto a reef of frustration by other people’s demands.” He was well-balanced, well-paced, and well-prepared as each new day dawned. We can learn much as we observe what Jesus did and didn’t do.

In her excellent and provocative book, Jesus, CEO, Laurie Beth Jones made the following observation about the varied-but-focused ministry of Jesus. “Jesus had tremendous energy, and he knew how to direct it. He was so clear about his mission that he avoided many real and potential energy leaks.”

Avoid Energy Leaks

Everything I have read and studied about leaders leads me to believe that they are very careful about these “energy leaks.” It is easy to spend time, but the wise invest time for maximum impact. The area where we win or lose this battle is how we spend time with people. Those we decide to invest in are either passion builders or passion stealers.

A leader is a person who is always on the lookout for other potential leaders to discover, develop, and deploy. But if we are not careful, all our energy can leak out to passion stealers, stranding us on a sandbar of mediocrity and ineffectiveness.

To be continued.

Resurgence Literature

Re:Lit is a ministry of Resurgence. There you will find a growing line of books to help guide the resurgence of the new reformed. Find out more.

How NOT To Be a Missional Church series: Click | View Series

The missional church movement has been good and bad. On a positive note, let’s focus on the bad. I want to suggest three ways to not be a missional church. In continuation of the series, this post examines some of the defects of social action-driven mission.

Social Action-Driven Mission

This approach probably creates the best community of the three mentioned in this series. A socially-minded and active church attracts socially-minded non-Christians. When my City Group recently cleaned five apartments from top to bottom for some homeless women and children, we all got a little closer. There’s something about being on a common mission—the sweat, the jokes, the empathy, and the memory–that unites folks. Creating a missional memory strengthens community and mission. It also raises questions with non-Christians you serve. But is social action enough?

1. Social action-driven mission isn’t unique to the church.

There are plenty of non-Christians engaged in social mission—serving the poor, the needy, the abused, and the homeless. They don’t need a church to engage in social mission. There are thousands of non-profits that can do this. What sets the church apart? If we are banking on social mission to be the unique contribution of the church, we’ll lose the game, and more importantly, the souls.

2. Social action doesn’t create new community.

Although social action mission creates community, it doesn’t create new community. Regenerated, new creation is the unique work of God the Spirit (Tit. 2.11; Gal. 6:15) through faith in the Son (Tit. 3:6-7; 2 Cor. 5:17). If we convert people to community and social mission alone, and not to Christ, we offer a very incomplete gospel. Regeneration is both social (Matt. 19:28) and spiritual (Tit. 3:5). The Spirit, not social mission, makes men new.

3. Social mission can lead to liberal church.

When we reduce mission to social action, we run the danger of becoming a socially-minded liberal church that neglects large stretches of the Bible requiring repentance and faith in Jesus. When missional communities focus on social mission alone, they disregard their evangelistic identity, gifting, and responsibility as the church of Jesus Christ, the Jesus who died and rose to make all things new—people and products, souls and society.

This series has attempted to identify some of the shortcomings in expressions of missional church. When mission is driven by events or evangelism, or social action, we engage in incomplete mission. When we engage in incomplete mission, we offer an incomplete gospel to our neighbors, towns, cities, and world. In a future series, I will take a more positive tack by exploring three areas that promote being a missional church.

This series is based on Jonathan Dodson’s talks at the LEAD ’09 conference.

Re:Train

We are launching The Resurgence Training Center (Re:Train) to prepare leaders for ministry locally and around the world. Additional details and downloadable application form here.

How NOT To Be a Missional Church series: Click | View Series

The missional church movement has been good and bad. On a positive note, let’s focus on the bad. I want to suggest three ways to not be a missional church. In continuation of the series, this post examines some of the defects of evangelism-driven mission.

Evangelism-Driven Mission

These churches focus almost exclusively on evangelism. Their view of the gospel leads them to see social action as optional. For them, mission is synonymous with evangelism, and evangelism is highly programmatic. They focus on training individuals through evangelism training programs, apologetics, and use of evangelistic tracts. What’s wrong with learning evangelistic presentations, memorizing apologetic defenses, and using tracts?

1. Evangelism-driven mission is often answer-based and heaven-centered.

These churches train individuals and teams “How to present the gospel” in a brief period of time. Typically, these programs look for the person being evangelized to offer a specific answer. For example, “If you died tonight and stood before God and he said: ‘Why should I let you into my heaven?’ What would you say?” Notice that the questions are answer-driven. The goal is to get someone to say the right answer and to believe the right facts, like “Jesus died for my sins.” What we need is less belief and more faith.

In his new book, The Future of Faith, Harvey Cox makes a helpful distinction between belief and faith. He writes: “We can believe something to be true without it making much difference to us, but we place our faith only in something that is vital for the way we live.” We can believe without it making a difference.

Many Americans believe that Jesus died on the cross for their sins, but it makes very little difference in their lives. They possess mere belief. This mere belief undermines the gospel. What we need is faith. Moreover, mere belief in the right answer baits people, not with Christ, but with heaven. It is heaven-centered, not Christ-centered. In evangelism-driven mission, Christ is subordinated to the treasure of heaven, instead of heaven being subordinated to the treasure of Christ. The goal is heaven, not Jesus. Answer-driven and heaven-centered evangelism leads to nominalism and distorts the gospel. Evangelism-driven mission can undermine, not advance the gospel.

2. Evangelism-driven mission can be defensive and fact-oriented.

Training in apologetics has its place; however, when our approach to non-Christians is driven by apologetics, we very often reduce people to projects. Apologetic mission can foster too much defense and too much offense because it aims at the head to the exclusion of the heart, to change someone’s mind, but not their lives. Just because someone agrees with our facts and embraces our logic doesn’t guarantee true conversion. We need to be prepared, not only to defend the faith, but to love people intelligently. Most objections to the gospel have existential and personal roots. If we can get beyond the arguments to the idols of the heart, we can show just how tremendously superior and satisfying Jesus is to whatever they love, desire, and pursue most!

3. Evangelism-driven mission is often outdated and fails to contextualize.

The methods used are often prepackaged and outdated. Evangelistic programs falsely assume that our listeners still understand the meanings of sin, Christ, and faith. But very often, they hear something very different, like legalism, moral teacher, and mere belief. When we fail to express the gospel in context and vocabulary that our listeners can understand, we fail to share the gospel. Christ dated and contextualized himself to all kinds of people so that his message would make sense and connect with their deep needs for redemption. Using packaged illustrations and methods assumes a one-size-fits-all, but the Incarnation reminds us that the gospel is much more personal and dynamic.

4. Evangelism-driven mission is individualistic.

This approach to mission trains individuals, not communities. It reduces the gospel to a conversation between two people, without focusing on embodying the gospel in communities. Statistics have shown that individuals are consistently converted to communities before they are converted to doctrines. Our methods are often doctrine-driven and individualistic.

Jesus prescribed a kind of communal evangelism in John 17, where our community is so redemptive and rich that it points people to Jesus. Paul called for a distinctive discipleship in churches that set the community of faith forth as an example, as salt and light in their cities, attracting others to them. Individualistic evangelism doesn’t create community because it doesn’t convert people to the church. It aims at converting individuals to a set of answers and to heaven. Evangelism-driven mission has very little to do with the Jesus of the Church, the Head of the Body.

To be continued.

This series is based on Jonathan Dodson’s talks at the LEAD ’09 conference.

Resurgence Literature

Re:Lit is a ministry of Resurgence. There you will find a growing line of books to help guide the resurgence of the new reformed. Find out more.

How NOT To Be a Missional Church series: Click | View Series

The missional church movement has been good and bad. On a positive note, let’s focus on the bad. Over the next few posts, I want to suggest three ways to not be a missional church. We’ll organize these reflections under three headings:

1. Event-Driven Mission
2. Evangelism-Driven Mission
3. Social Action-Driven Mission

Event-Driven Mission

These are churches that, in the name of mission, throw block parties, do Easter egg drops from helicopters, hand out water at intersections, do gas buy-downs, or even, as was recently suggested to me, do coffee buy-downs. What’s wrong with these approaches to missional church?

1. Event-driven mission is works-based.

It begins on the wrong foot, the foot of action instead of the foot of identity. It makes mission out to be an act of man, not a participation in an attribute of God. Mission is something we are before it’s something we do. Event-driven approaches to mission turn mission into an event, something that is optional for the super-spiritual, gets us points with God, and gets him on our good side. But God can’t be bribed by mission or anything else. Event-driven mission builds mission on works, not grace.


2. Event-driven mission is very often consumerist.

The event approach to being a missional church often appeals to consumerism, not to genuine social or spiritual needs. It aims at the consumer-in-want-of-stuff, not the sinner-in-need-of-grace. These attempts at mission appeal to the consumerist longing for a deal, instead of the sinner’s deep down longing for redemption. They try to buy people off: “I’ll give you an Xbox if you come to my church. I’ll pay for your gas if you visit on a Sunday.” If you have to pay people to come meet Christians, something is seriously wrong with your understanding of gospel and mission. Event-driven mission makes appeals based on idolatry, not grace.


3. Event-driven mission doesn’t work very well.

In urban contexts, people can smell a bait and switch a mile away, and that is exactly why they left the church (if they were in it in the first place). If we want to reach non-Christians in a post-Christian context, then we will have to prove to them that they cannot be bought off, that we are a real community, and that we care about them enough to live next door to them, eat with them, work with them, suffer with them, rock out with them, and be with them. Event-driven mission is a bait and switch.

To be continued.

This series is based on Jonathan Dodson’s talks at the LEAD ’09 conference.

Pastor Dad

Every dad is a pastor. The important thing is that he cares for his flock well. Pastor Mark Driscoll's new eBook offers spiritual insights on fatherhood. Get it here.

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Missional cultural engagement is a challenge. How far does one go to engage culture? According to missiologist Ed Stetzer, that is the nature of contextualization. In his recent post Ancestor Worship and Taiwanese Christians, Stetzer gives some helpful guidelines on contextualization as well as this short video of a Taiwanese believer explaining the difficulty of contextualization in his culture of ancestor worship.

Rain City Hymnal

The first offering from Re:Sound is the Rain City Hymnal. Listen online and get the record from the Re:Sound website. Find out more.

Today Jews around the world are celebrating Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, which is considered the holiest and most solemn day of the year in modern Jewish practice. What relevance does this Jewish celebration have for Christians? Biblically, quite a lot.

Yom Kippur is also known as the Day of Atonement, which is the climax of the Old Testament sacrificial system and is the most solemn day on the Jewish calendar. It was a day of great bloodshed and a day on which the gravity of humanity’s sin could be seen visibly. Because of its importance, it eventually became referred to simply as “the Day.”

The Center of the Pentateuch

The primary section in Scripture concerning the Day of Atonement appears in Leviticus 16-17. This passage functions as the center of the book of Leviticus, which is itself the center of the Pentateuch. This day speaks of the Lord’s gracious concern both to deal fully with his people’s sin and to make them fully aware that they stand before him, accepted and covered in respect of all iniquity, transgression, and sin (Lev 16:21).

On this day, the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies to atone for the sins of Israel in order to avert the holy wrath of God for the sins of the past year and to remove their sin and its stain from them. Two healthy goats without defect were chosen. They were therefore fit to represent sinless perfection.

Two Images of the Atonement

The first goat was a propitiating sin offering. The high priest slaughtered this goat, which acted as a substitute for the sinners who deserved a violently bloody death for their many sins.

Then the high priest, acting as the representative and mediator between the sinful people and their holy God, would take the second goat and lay his hands on the animal while confessing the sins of the people. This goat, called the scapegoat, would then be sent away to die in the wilderness away from the sinners, symbolically expiating or removing the sins of the people by taking them away.

The sacrifices of the Day were designed to pay for both sin’s penalty and sin’s presence in Israel. The shedding of blood and the sending off of the scapegoat were meant to appease God's wrath against sin and to cleanse the nation, the priesthood, and even the sanctuary itself from the taint of sin (Lev 16:30).

The Lamb of God

The Day of Atonement was a foreshadowing of Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, and our great High Priest who is able to sympathize with us in our weakness. These great images of the priest, slaughter, and scapegoat are all given by God to help us more fully comprehend Jesus’ bloody sacrifice for us on the cross.

Jesus’ fulfillment of the Day of Atonement is why we are forgiven for and cleansed from our sins. To preach anything else is to proclaim a “different gospel,” which is no gospel at all (Gal 1:6-7). Spurgeon drives this point home: “Many pretend to keep the atonement, and yet they tear the bowels out of it. They profess to believe in the gospel, but it is a gospel without the blood of the atonement; and a bloodless gospel is a lifeless gospel, a dead gospel, and a damning gospel” (Sermon 1667).

Jesus Christ fulfills and accomplishes forever what the two goats symbolized. The Old Testament sacrifice of animals has been replaced by the perfect sacrifice of Christ (Heb 9:26, 10:5-10; 1 John 2:1-2 and 4:9-10). Christ paid sin’s penalty (Rom 3:25-26 and 6:23; Gal 3:13). He redeemed us (Eph 1:7), paying the price that sets us free (1 Cor 6:20; Gal 5:1). He turned away God’s wrath (Rom 3:25) and reconciled believers to God (Eph 2:16) so we can be forgiven for our sins and cleansed from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).

Re:Train

We are launching The Resurgence Training Center (Re:Train) to prepare leaders for ministry locally and around the world. Additional details and downloadable application form here.

Jesus didn't waste time with stupid questions

Question: How many angels dance on the head of a pin?

Answer: Who cares?

Though Jesus allows questions from his disciples, he doesn't follow the pattern so common today that says "there is no such thing as a stupid question." In fact, there definitely is such thing as a stupid question.

What should I know?

People want stupid questions answered because it makes them feel better, or it gives them a sense of power. We want to know the answer to every question, and we are quite uncomfortable with ambiguities. Both the Pharisees and the disciples ask questions that don't have meaningful answers, and Jesus often replies to them by answering a different question that does have a meaningful answer. The questioners probably felt like they were receiving an insincere answer—but they forgot who it was talking to them. They are not God and therefore should be saying, "I'm not worthy to know what to ask—what should I know?"

The Pharisees try to to trick Jesus by giving him difficult quandaries, like with the woman caught in adultery, or the Jews accusing him of lying about coming from heaven. Jesus sidesteps these questions and points to the accusers' sin, Jesus' righteousness, and the Father's sovereign hand.

This is a series of reflections on how Jesus made disciples, based on the book of John.

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Jesus exposed his heart

When Lazarus died, Jesus wept in front of his disciples. God cried.

His disciples got to see the depth of sincerity that Jesus felt toward the people they were ministering to. This mission is not just a job to pay the bills, or some sort of pointless adventure—Jesus meant it. The wages of sin are right before us, and it's worth God crying over.

We should show emotion too. If we don't have emotion we should pray for a softened heart, because every day in ministry the effects of sin are laid bare. The practical implications of sin are so atrocious, and the goodness of our holy and just savior is so real, that we ought to have overflowing emotion at times. Our disciples must see this, they must know that it's real beyond the point of head knowledge, and that it's real even in the deepest depths of our hearts.

Jesus was cautious in his interactions with his disciples

Jesus showed emotion in front of his disciples, but he didn't entrust himself to them because he knew what was in their hearts. In other words, he didn't put his trust in his disciples because he understood the implications of total depravity. His disciples were sinners, and they would disappoint. Jesus was clear that he was absolutely dependent on the Father, and his disciples would need to be as well.

The goal of discipleship is not to put faith in the next generation; the goal is to put faith in God's unfolding and sovereign plan.

This is a series of reflections on how Jesus made disciples, based on the book of John.

Vintage Jesus

A theological journey chasing Jesus through Scripture and pop culture. Timeless answers to timely questions about the most important man who has ever lived. Find out more.

This video is worth taking a few minutes to think about—what are some of the ways that you should change some of your ministry methods to tell more people about the principles of Scripture that we hold so dear?

If you're in a feed reader, click through to see the embedded video above.

Here's the statistic I want to know:

How many people first hear about the gospel of Jesus through online ministries?

I know that when I was a brand new Christian I would fire up RealPlayer and listen to a megachurch pastor in California preach each week. That was until I heard about this fiery young pastor in Seattle who was preaching to hundreds of tattooed 20-year-old punk rockers about God's anger at sin and salvation through Jesus Christ—the rest is history.

New Super Secret Project

Here at Resurgence headquarters we're preparing a super secret project that will begin to bring some of these ideas a few steps further. The project will require a small team. If you're dedicated and willing to beta-test a new Resurgence project, please send me a tweet @mikeyanderson or let me know through Facebook (facebook.com/mikeanderson).

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