Irresistible Revolution

Yes! I admit it. I, like everyone else have been reading the book "irrresistible revolution". It has been going around a lot recently. This book is a mix between the author sharing stories of his life, that make living as a crazy Christian seem a lot more radical but also do-able. So here goes a quote from Chapter five "Another way of doing life"

"if you ask most people what Christians believe, they can tell you, 'Chrsitians believe that Jesus is God's son and that Jesus rose from the dead.' But if you ask the average person how CHristians live, they are struck silent. We have not shown the world another way of doing life. Christians pretty much live like everybody elsel; they just sprinkle a little Jesus in along the way. And doctrine is not very attractive, even if its true. Few people are interested in a religion that has nothing to say to the world and offers them only life after death, when what people are really wondering is whether there is life before death.

As my teacher Tony Campolo used to ask 'Even if there were no heaven and there were no hell, would you still follow Jesus? Would you follow him for the life, joy, and fulfillment he gives you right now' I am more and more convicned each day that i would. dont get me wrong. im exited about the afterlife. we are going to party like there's no tomorrow (umm, and there won't be). and yet i am convinced that Jesus came not just to prepare us to die but to teach us how to live. Otherwise, much of Jesus' wisdom would prove quiete unnecessary for the afterlife. After all, how hard could it be to love our enemies in heaven? and the kingdom that Jesus speaks so much about is not just something we hope for after we die but is something we are in incarnate now. Jesus says the kingdom is 'within us' 'among us' 'at hand' and we are to pray that it comes 'on earth as it is in heaven'. no wonder the early Christian church was know as the way. it was a way of life that stood in glaring contrast to the world. what gave the early Christians integrity was the fact that they could denounce the empire and in the same breath say 'and we have another way of living. if you are tired of what the empire has to offer, we invite you into the way' even the pagan emperor Julian confessed 'the godless Galileans feed our poor in addition to their own'. the way has little cells multiplying all over that ole empire. of course, everyone was forewarned that in this kingdom everthing is backward and upside-down - the last are first and the first are last. the poor are blessed and the mighty are cast from their thrones. and yet people were attracted to it. they were ready for something different from what the empire had to offer.

coming out of college, my friends and i were pretty unwilling to 'conform to the pattern of this world' as the Scriptures say (rom 12:2) we knew all to well that there is a broad way that leads to death and that most peopple would take it, but we also knew that there is a narrow way that leads to life, and we wanted to find it (mayy 7: 13-14)....

... an expreriment in truth

my friends and i had a hunch that there ismore to life than what we had been told to pursue. we knew that the world cannot affor the American dream and that the good news is that there is another dream. we looked to the early church and to the Scriptured and to the poor to find it.

When Dorothy Day recalls the beginning of the Catholic Worker movement, she says very unassumingly 'we were just there talking and it happened....'





My most favorite part of this chapter is on page 120.

"one, there was a small group of kids who decided to go to a park in the middle of the city, and dance and play, laugh and twirl. as they played in the park, they thought that maybe another child would pass by and see them. maybe that child woudl think it looked fun and even decide to join them. then maybe another one would. then maybe a businessman would hear them from his skyscraper. maybe he would look out the window. maybe he would see them playing and lay down his papers and come down. then maybe another businessman woud walk by, a nistalgic man, and he would take off his tie and toss aside his briefcase and dance and play. maybe the while city would join the dance. maybe even the world. maybe...regardless, they decided to enjoy the dance.

We went to the ghetto. We narowed our vision to this: Love God, Love people and follow Jesus (which is similar to Mission Years vision: Love God, Love People, nothing else matters)
We had no idea what we were getting into. We had no big vision for programs or community development. We wanted only to be passionate lovers of God and people and to take the gospel way of life seriously. Some of us dropped out of school; some finished. Some of us were pursuing careers; others left them.
Since those early days we've made plenty of mistakes and have never learned the secret to not hurting each other. we have begun asking new questions and have challenged each other to risk more. Some of the faces have changed, some of us are still here. Now some of us are married and some have chosen singleness, and some have kids. We recognize each of these choices as a gift. we have created some healthy structures and rhythms of our communal life...

The next sections is entitled "Shouting the Gospel with our lives" I encourage all of you to read this book and get an image of what the Christian life could be like. Get encouraged by hearing about someone who has been able to do amazing things for Christ and hes just a normal guy.

Im still not done with the book. By no means is this book perfect. There are certain things I dont like. I was talking to Katie and i told her that i felt like it was a mix between an autobiography, and an evangelism/christian living book. and thats ok. And now as i look on the back, it actually is categorized as Christian Living/ Spiritual Growth/ General by Zondervan the publisher.

My next books on my list to read are
Everybody wants to Change the world (practical ideas for Social Justice by Tony Campolo and Gordon Aeschliman. Ive already read some parts of it, and he got me real exited about the environment.
and The treasure principle by Randy Alcorn. I got it at Roy Weece's funeral. I never got the privaledge to meet him. But i went to his funeral with the college age staff. This testimony makes me think a lot about my finances and the amazing things God can do when we let go of the purse strings.