"Living like Jesus"

Blake gave me this book when he was clearing out his bookshelf, and after reading it cover-to-cover, I can see why. If I were into rating books (and I’m not), I’d give this one a C+, mainly because of its superficiality. By superficiality I mean it’s one of those books that skims the surface, so to speak, without plunging into the depths (and plunging is what I’m all about). The book is also full of clichés, and the thing I don’t like about clichés is that they don’t require any thought, and they don’t provoke any thought either. All that said, there are some pretty solid chapters, albeit surface-level, and here are a handful of quotes:

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“The modern church wants to accept only half of God. It seeks to renegotiate God’s revelation. It substitutes a new covenant and a new God who offers forgiveness without holiness… The modern church wants a cosmic Santa Claus who produces wealth, health, and happiness to bolster our good feelings and self-esteem. We prefer a divine Buddy who smiles kindly at sin with an ‘Aw shucks, pal, we all mess up sometimes.’ The modern church wants to forget sin. We prefer to write our own guidelines for happiness. The modern church wants to neglect repentance and sanctification. We prefer to replace holiness with happiness. Is it really any wonder that so many contemporary Christians and churches are disastrously weak and disgracefully ineffective?”

“Biblical salvation is for more than just reconciliation with God. It must also transform the character and lifestyle of believers. Genuine faith in Christ brings repentance, a radical turning away from sin, and a new life of holiness. God’s standard, Jesus insisted, is clear: ‘Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.’ (Matt 5:48). We never quite arrive in this life, but in the power of the Spirit we can be wondrously changed. We can overcome sinful patterns. ‘Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.’ (Gal 5:24). Paul teaches that Christ has bridged the vast gulf between a holy God and sinful people. Believers can now look directly into the holy, tender face of God and behold his glory. As we do that day by day, we ‘are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory.’ (2 Cor 3:18). As we keep our eyes fixed on Christ, the Holy Spirit actually remakes our broken personalities, conforming us more and more to the very pattern of Jesus of Nazareth. Nor is salvation merely an individual affair. The church is supposed to be a new, redeemed community—a little picture of what heaven will be like. Jesus Christ ‘gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.’ The early church broke down the sinful dividing walls that created hostilities between women and men, Jews and Gentiles, slaves and masters. In Christ’s new transformed community, they were truly one. And their redeemed unity and mutual love was part of the gospel Paul preached (Eph 3:1-6).”

“It is a glorious paradox that the best way to happiness is not to seek it directly. Someone has rightly said that Christ ‘died not to make us happy, but to make us holy.’ But holy living is not dull and burdensome. When we make personal happiness and self-fulfillment our goal, we reap the stifling boredom and evil that come from ever growing self-centeredness. But when we seek holiness rather than happiness, we get happiness too.”

“Most Christians mimic the world. They are often as self-centered, as sexually promiscuous, as racist and materialistic as their unbelieving friends. They worship wealth, commit adultery, file for divorce, and destroy the environment like their neighbors…. Blatant, disobedient conformity to the world has plagued Christianity for centuries. We have launched vicious crusades to slaughter Muslims, we have fabricated ‘biblical’ arguments to justify slavery and racism, we have participated in programs—indeed even the Holocaust itself—against the Jews. Now, as the modern world redefines happiness as individual self-fulfillment and ever expanding material abundance, we construct new gospels of wealth and self-esteem. The world sneers at our hypocrisy, convinced that Christians, who largely defy the One they allegedly worship, have nothing to offer.”

“[Neglecting] prayer should be absurdly wrongheaded. The greatest Christians of the ages all tell us how important it was to them. Our Lord and Savior makes utterly astounding promises to those who pray. Still we struggle to squeeze out a few minutes for prayer… Like everybody else, I suppose, I comforted myself with the reminder to avoid legalism. It is not a sin to miss a day here and there. Then it dawned on me that when you are missing six mornings out of seven, legalism is no longer your problem.”

“Prayer is important because we are engaged in a life-and-death battle with Satan. Paul urges the Ephesians to ‘pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayer.’ (6:18) Why? Because he knows we are in a spiritual battle. ‘For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dork world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.’ (v. 12) Who are the rulers and authorities? When Paul uses these words, he is talking about two closely related things. He is referring to evil social systems and distorted cultural values that twist and corrupt people. But Paul also means that behind these distorted human institutions lie demonic spiritual powers that fight against the Creator and seek to destroy the good creation God made. Therefore, Paul knows that in every encounter with twisted cultural values and social systems, we are also doing battle with the hosts of Satan. And Satan can only be defeated through prayer."

“[At] the beginning of the twentieth century, one branch of Christianity—the ‘social gospel’ branch—realized the need to focus on social action. At the same time, another large group—the evangelicals—felt called to focus on evangelism. For decades they criticized each other. Social gospel people claimed that Jesus and the rest of the Bible compel us to care about the physical needs of people. And they were right. Evangelical folk insisted that according to Jesus and the Scriptures, nothing is as important as a living relationship with God in Christ. And they too were right. Tragically, foolishly, each side used the other side’s sinful neglect of one half of Christian mission to justify their own stubborn neglect of the other half. The result has been lopsided, ineffective churches.”