If He is not Lord of all...

Heaven knows how many times a preacher have scared the living daylights out of me whenever the topic of Lordship has been preached in the church’s pulpit. I can’t even count how many times I’ve raised my hand or almost came and marched in front of the sanctuary to acknowledge Christ’s Lordship whenever a preacher would utter the cliché’ ‘if Jesus is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all’.

Between Pentecost and the Second Coming...

...Christians are called to live in the world. So it is imperative that we should get involved with what's happening in the world.

"The task of the Church between ascension and parousia is therefore set free both from the self-driven energy that imagines it has to build God’s kingdom all by itself and from the despair that supposes it can’t do anything until Jesus comes again. We do not ‘build the kingdom’ all by ourselves, but we do build for the kingdom. All that we do in faith, hope, and love in the present, in obedience to our ascended Lord in the power of his Spirit, will be enhanced and transformed at his appearing."
N.T. Wright
Surprised by Hope p. 143

This is one of the reminders that I think I might need to put into a permanent sticky note in my head as a Christian who oftentimes forget to keep in touch with reality as it ought to be viewed from a Christian perspective.

I am sure that I am not alone with this problem.

I often struggle with living out my faith in light of the glorious hope of Christ’s return that I in a way have at one point in my life looked forward to as an instant escape from my personal problems and my inability to live out a faith that not only actively pursues a righteous life but also that of a just society.

Again I am pretty sure that I am not the only one who has struggled with this dilemma.

I believe that we have settled for an escapist eschatology that sees the ultimate purpose for humanity as being sucked into the sky for some disembodied eternal bliss.

This eschatology, has been horribly detrimental to the Church. It has taught us to either flee from the realms of ecology and social justice because God is concerned about the “spiritual” and not the physical (Conservative Protestantism) or to care about them without much good theological reason (mainline Protestantism). If we want to actually appreciate, care and love creation and each other, then a reworking of our eschatology is in order.

This is one of the main themes of N.T. Wright's book entitled: Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, which reminds us that we in the Church have, for long time now, forgotten what the Bible actually teaches about heaven, hell, and the resurrection.

Because a clear understanding of such theological themes as he said would ultimately change our view of worship, Scripture, prayer, justice, mission, beauty, and everything else. Because when we came to faith in Christ, we must remember that we entered a whole new world that was started by the resurrection of Jesus and will be completed when he returns. Our job is to live in that world.

N.T. Wright is a British New Testament scholar whom Christianity Today has described as one of the top five theologians in the world today. After serving three years as the canon theologian of Westminster Abbey, Wright became the Bishop of Durham in 2003 – the fourth highest ranking position of authority in the Church of England. Although he is quite unpopular among evangelicals Bishop Wright is one of those contemporary theologians that I admire for his honest self-criticism of present day Christendom as well as for his dry wit and God-given skill to articulate the same issues within the Christian faith that I myself am also struggling with. J.I. Packer has described Wright as “brilliant” and “one of God’s best gifts to our decaying Western Church,” and I count myself as among those like Packer who is thankful for Wright’s gift of writing about the God whom I believe.
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on judgement...

“What's the difference between 'seeing sin' in someone else's life and confronting it, and having a critical spirit?”

This is a very good question to pose in this day and age within churches. It seems that in all churches there exists some form of moral police that are always on the lookout for some brethren struggling with what they perceive as 'sin,' and then go on to start their diatribe about how they are 'holier than thou' and that if one doesn't repent according to their personal moral standards they will go on to tell that that perhaps they are not a Christian or perhaps that person is not 'saved' or that person is a 'backslider' and so on without looking at themselves and their lives.

Not only is this true for individual Christians this can also be true with whole congregational bodies assuming doctrinal superiorty over other churches. One does not need to go far to encounter a Baptist pastor claiming that only baptists are faithful to what the Bible says, or Congregational Fundamentalists who believe that Pentecostals are lower Christians, or Evangelicals who say that Mainline Protestant Churches are preaching 'another gospel' for advocating social justice instead of leading people to Christ.

It is with this thought in mind that I am deeply encouraged by an article that was written by Lisa Harper, in Christianity Today where she says:

“ We must remember the only One worthy of condemning us chose instead to pardon us. Then—in light of our own sinner-saved-by-grace stories—when the Holy Spirit impresses us to confront someone who's messed up, we'll do so with honesty, compassion, and humility. Our motive will be one of real restoration instead of self-righteousness. “

I believe the problem lies at the core of our hearts for as a people who have yet to reap the fullness of our salvation, - we are still struggling with the concept of grace, we find it hard to exhibit it precisely because we have yet to fathom the extent of God-given grace.

It is my prayer that as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons (and daughters), the redemption of our bodies. (Romans 8:23).