I was privileged last week to be able to pick him up from that prison and drive him to another prison outside of London (a category D open prison – for the transfer inmates who qualify are released on licence from one prison to make their own way to the new prison and must report in by a certain time.)

The experience was both moving and challenging. It was moving to see my friend be visibly overwhelmed by a freedom he hadn’t experienced for a long time. Little things that I take for granted in everyday life were an emotional experience as he remembered, just for a few hours, what life outside of prison was like. Trees, Hills, Birds, Houses, McDonalds reststops and lunch whereever and whenever we wanted to take it on the way, were overwhelming things for him. I was glad to be able to share the experience with him, and it will be a memory I will treasure for the rest of my life.

But it was challenging too…and here’s the big thought:

When was the last time I was overwhelmed by the freedom I have in Christ?

Jesus said “If the son sets you free, you will be free indeed”, and then he gave up his life so that we might receive this freedom. Yet do I truly act free? Do I understand the freedom I have? Am I overwhelmed by what Jesus has done for me – raiding the prison, setting me free from the chains that were keeping me captive, and giving me a new “Anything is possibly for him who believes” life.

Or do I forget the freedom that I have: either taking it for granted, or allowing the enemy to deceive me into stepping back into the prison and shutting the door?

The world is bound up in all kinds of mess, and what it needs most are a people who live as if they are truly free. A people who are daily overwhelmed by the freedom they have in Christ. A people who exercise that freedom by going into their world with a faith that “I can do anything through him who gives me strength” and who set about the task of helping others find freedom in Christ.

So, are you free? Do you need to be overwhelmed by a fresh revelation of that freedom? Are there any areas of your life where you’re actually in bondage and you need to be set free? There’s good news for you:

“If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” – Jesus in John 8v36

This post, which a pastor-friend of mine retweeted just about sent me over the edge. The author quotes statistics which suggest that the USA is very open to the gospel, talks about faith to overcome fear being required to share the gospel. And then he says most of all we have to develop relationships with those outside the church.

I don’t want to be beligerent or be pedantic about something the author might not have intended. But this is a funny conclusion to draw. I went to comment on it, but it wouldn’t let me. So here are my thoughts on the matter….

I agree relationships are important. If we are to be salt and light and fruitful for God then we must engage with the unbelieving world around us. However, they’re not the only factor – and possibly not as important as many have made them of late. If anything your statistics show that people are far more open than we think – and probably need less weight of relationship than we assume.

Jesus was called friend of sinners because he spent time with non-religious types. However, I don’t get the impression he spent very long at all before sharing the life-giving message of the gospel. He loved people enough to do it quickly. In fact, if you consider how long his earthly ministry was, and how much he travelled, he simply couldn’t have done “friendship evangelism” in quite the way most people use the term.

I have some friends who I have known for many years who I eventually played a part in leading to Christ. The sad truth is that much of the time when I said I was “building relationship” I was actually too immature and insecure to share the gospel. I also have friends who I am now still sharing the gospel with and trusting to get saved – but I shared the gospel with them quite quickly and continue to build relationship with them while continuing to share the gospel.

I can also say that the most in-depth, open, and well-received gospel conversation I have had recently was with somebody I met on the street and had no relationship with before meeting them.

The difference between Jesus and the angry guy on the street corner is not the relationships he had with unbelievers. It’s that he lived and communicated the gospel with compassion, grace, mercy, clarity, prophetic accuracy etc. People found that compelling – whether they had relationship with him or not.

As Rice Broocks said recently, “Evangelism is not just relationship: You don’t have to know a drowning person to save their life” http://www.churchplanting.com/2011/06/21/evangelism-is-not-just-relationship/

“…Christian leadership is not an end itself… It’s about mission, about helping others come to know Christ and transforming society evermore into the likeness of how God in his kingdom would want it to be. So it’s critical that when we’re working with and developing younger leaders that we don’t sell them ‘leadership’… if we want to sell them anything we sell them a vision of the kingdom of God…”

“In this hour of all-but-universal darkness one cheering gleam appears: within the fold of conservative Christianity there are to be found increasing numbers of persons whose religious lives are marked by a growing hunger after God Himself. They are eager for spiritual realities and will not be put off with words, nor will they be content with correct ‘interpretations’ of truth. They are athirst for God, and they will not be satisfied till they have drunk deep at the Fountain of Living Water. This is the only real harbinger of revival which I have been able to detect anywhere on the religious horizon.”

Any spiritual awakening or revival starts with a people who are hungry for God, seek him desperately, and are not content with anything less than knowing him personally and being satisfied in his presence.

Book recommendation– “Serious Times” by James Emery White

The culture we live in

We are entering into a new age of church. Historian Christopher Dawson suggested that there have been six identifiable ages in relation to the Church. Each lasted three or four centuries, and each followed a similar course. He contended that each of these ages began and ended in crisis. The heart of each crisis was an intense attack by new enemies — within and without the church. These attacks, in turn, demanded new spiritual determination and drive by the Church.Without this determination and drive, the Church would have lost the day. We are standing in the middle of another one of those crises, and at the beginning of another age.

Previous generations always had the concept of God.No matter how dark, they wouldn’t have thought to have a world without God. A world where we start with ourselves and look to develop truth from there. But this is what we have in the world around us. The issue is not philosophical atheism – where people are aware of the arguments, think it through, debate, and come to a philosophical conclusion that there is no God. This is not even at the heart of secular religion, and not the principal challenge to the Christian church.

The heart of the matter is FUNCTIONAL atheism. There is a rise of people who don’t just spend time thinking about religion and rejecting it. They’re just not thinking about it. There are three things that shape culture: Education, Mass Media, Upper Echelons of legal system. God is/has been systematically removed (or opposed by) these three in our society.

Our culture is feeling the sickness of its disease.

Lack of vision – nothing in culture calling us to be more than we are. Lack of values – producing empty souls. There is a world operating apart from God and finding it can’t handle it without him. Nietzsche – “God is dead and we have killed him. How shall we the murderer of all murderers ever comfort ourselves”

People are ‘metro-spiritual’. People are open to all things spiritual but are not discriminating. People will believe anything and everything. The heart of the cultural challenge has never changed. It is the element of TRUTH. (played clip from Colbert report – ‘Truthiness’). Facts vs feelings. Truth comes from the gut. Actual facts don’t matter. What we feel is true does.We live in ‘wikiality’ – what is true for us is true. Whatever we agree together is true is true. Truth is determined by the tribal community – and culture is breaking down into small tribes.

Played Will Ferrell clip from Talladega Night – what Jesus do you like to pray to? Prayers at table, praying to baby Jesus, conversation about which Jesus you like best and want to pray for.

Challenges that our culture brings

You as an individual can embrace whatever you like as truth – but don’t you dare say that it is something that anyone else/everyone else should embrace. Such things divide culture – and this should not be allowed. The challenge is, if you cannot say what is not Christian then you cannot tell what is Christian. Specific challenges for us in our world:

The Christian faith has lost its public voice.

We’ve become muted. And when we do open our mouths we look like fools. We have lost it over the issue of tolerance. When you take a stand on something being true you are accused of being intolerant. There are three types of tolerance:

1. Legal Tolerance: Your right and freedom to believe what you want to believe. Nothing in the Bible, or Biblical characters to take away people’s freedom to believe or worship.
2. Social/Relational Tolerance: If Jesus stood for anything he stood for this. He was called a friend of sinners. Always accepted people where they are.
3. Intellectual Tolerance: Says that everything is equally good and equally true. This is what the Christian faith rejects – BUT ACTUALLY SO DOES EVERYONE ELSE.

When people talk about tolerance, people mean 1 and 2, but not 3. Yet Christians have given up 3 and lost the right to speak clearly on intellectual issues.

Quote: “We need Christians. Where are they? Here’s all we get from Christians – feeling and philanthropy. Where’s the hard thinking?”

Played Penn’s video blog (Penn says) on the Christian who gave him a Bible. He respects him and thinks he’s a good man because he cares enough to share his faith. Quote: “How much must you hate someone to believe in eternal hell and not tell people about it”

We’ve also lost our language.

Oxford junior dictionary does not contain the word sin.Words that have been taken out: Disciple, saint, abbey, bishop, altar, chapel, Christian, monk, sin.

We expect that in our culture. But what about us? We are also removing these words from our language. Sin -> sickness. Lust -> sensuality. Anger -> Expressing emotions

Christianity -> Happiness, Niceness, earned heavenly reward. Christianity – and the gospel – is being eroded. If you have lost the term evil, it’s difficult to speak about events like 9/11. Following 9/11 Millions flocked to churches, but they didn’t find anything that made them want to stay.

If we’re not careful we’re not going to have anything to offer the world that it doesn’t already have.

At James’ church they held a ‘Text your questions weekend’ Poll on the number 1 topic you’d like to hear discussed. Answer was sin. Developed a series called “wicked” – based on Genesis 1-3.

People do not want our truth to be watered down. It just needs to be presented right. James spoke at Harvard on truth – the nature of absolute truth, and how Jesus claimed to be THE truth. He was expecting a lot of intellectual debate and challenges. He was not met with any. Instead he fielded lots of questions to deepen their understanding. They were hungry to know what truth would mean if it were to exist.

“It is the neglect of dogma and doctrine that makes for dullness. The dogma is the drama” – Dorothy Sayers

Thoughtful christians tend to be more concerned about fitting in and being hip than being prophetic speakers of truth.When we interact with a secular world, people should sense that we are different and have something they don’t have. If we’re not careful we find we have nothing to offer the world. The world is hungry.

The goal is to serve up truth and Jesus raw and unfiltered so that it explodes in people’s lives. We can do cool stuff and be relevant, but there is an end in sight and it’s a bloody cross and a crucified saviour. Being trendy won’t ultimate reach people or change them. Only the truth of the gospel will

Don’t get me wrong, I love church people. I am very blessed to have grown up in a Christian family, gone to Sunday school, youth group, Christian Union, and all the rest. I am blessed to have a rich spiritual heritage, and have benefited from knowing many faithful, mature Christians along the way.

However, if we’re really following Jesus and doing what he’s asked (i.e. going into all the world and making disciples) then our churches shouldn’t be filled with people who have my background. There should be people who have never crossed the door of a church before. People who have never been trained in the ‘proper’ way to behave in church (praise God!). People who have messy, broken, sinful lives, who are in the process of being changed by Jesus.

And then, of course, we have the greater reality that people like me need to get: That no matter how ‘churchified’ I might be, I am a long way from being perfect and am in desperate need of Jesus to help me, and change me.

That’s why I loved the book “No Perfect People Allowed” by John Burke when I read it a few years ago. A few weeks ago I attended a conference hosted by Willow Creek called “Come As You Are (but don’t stay that way)” – with John Burke and James Emery White. In the following posts I will be passing on my notes from the sessions.

Interviewer: You suffered much and died for the whole world. What have you done about making known that love to all the people in the world?

Jesus: I have asked Peter, John, Andrew, James and others down there to make it known, and for the people they tell to tell others, and so on.

Interviewer: Yes, but suppose they don’t?

Jesus: I have no other plans.

Jesus started and ended his ministry with one plan in mind, to call a group of people to himself, make disciples, and send them out to make other disciples.

When it comes to sharing the good news of the gospel, Jesus has one plan: For every believer to go into the world and  make disciples and make a difference.

He has no other plans.

From @edstetzer http://ow.ly/3nHs6:
Rather than seeking to be the next big thing – the church version of “America’s Got Talent” – let’s become the next transformative thing. Instead of our neighbors saying, “Wow, you’ve got a big church,” let’s create a movement where they say “Wow, your church makes a difference in our community, and around the country.”