MrCrowder.Com

I’m ready to bring this little girl home. That is all.

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 13:43:40 -0600

I’m ready to bring this little girl home. That is all.

We’re not called to live lives of detached spirituality or serial do-goodery. We’re...

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 09:37:15 -0600

We’re not called to live lives of detached spirituality or serial do-goodery.

We’re called into the life of Jesus.

What does that look like, you ask? Sometimes pictures do more than words.

Lately I’ve been troubled by the misuse of the Bible, and perhaps more deeply the complete...

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 15:13:14 -0600

Lately I’ve been troubled by the misuse of the Bible, and perhaps more deeply the complete misunderstanding of its aim, purpose, and the conditions and opportunities from which it arose.

So this morning, while reading through today’s lectionary reading, I was looking at a small part of Hebrews and became overwhelmed by the amount of ways the passage could be abused if it wasn’t approached from a proper perspective.

And then it hit me, at a disconcerting but hopeful level, that I’m not always right. That I don’t always have the “perfect” perspective. And even if I did, there’s no way to get even a handful of people to see everything the way I see it, much less a lot of people. So where’s the hope?

Where’s the hope in that?

Here’s what occurred to me:

At the heart of every moment of Scripture, from small to large, is the condition of the human heart.

Now, you could make the argument that God is at the heart of every moment of Scripture, or Jesus, or something a little more holy. But all I mean is that the transformation Scripture is constantly beckoning and pointing to is primarily a matter of the renovation of the heart.

So I think we mistakenly go to Scripture to quickly, both personally and communally (I’m thinking about the sermon here) with “what does God want me to do?”.

But perhaps we should be more content asking “who does God want me to be?”.

It’s an incomplete answer, but I find hope in it.

Let’s start there.

"In the events of his life, words, death, burial, & resurrection, Jesus unleashes the grace and..."

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 10:07:28 -0600

“In the events of his life, words, death, burial, & resurrection, Jesus unleashes the grace and love of God upon the world, renovating hearts and calling people to a deep, Spirit-enabled allegiance to the loving and holy Creator of the World.”

What It Means to be a Modern Evangelical

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 09:53:38 -0600

What It Means to be a Modern Evangelical:

I wrote this article for the PolicyMic online magazine. It’s brief and of course doesn’t answer every question about Evangelicalism, but I was excited to address some issues I saw plaguing the perceptions of Christians in the West.

So, who wants to drill a clean water well with us in October?...

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 11:46:34 -0600

So, who wants to drill a clean water well with us in October? Nicaragua sound like fun?

The Villain, the Hero, the Victory

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 10:55:18 -0600

The Villain, the Hero, the Victory:

I wanted to share, on this site, some of my teaching points from last night’s @PubNightDallas. I think there was some interesting traction with the victory of God and how it helps make sense of Jesus’ “good news” claim of the Kingdom of God.

the conquering of the evil within: a transformed heart/life/world

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 09:19:00 -0600

Over the years, I’ve wrestled with what I believe to be a shallow understanding of sin, repentance, and forgiveness.

For a lot of us, those words are inherent with religious meaning that we don’t have to think twice about…

Sin means I’ve done something wrong and God’s not happy with me.
Repentance means I should stop doing that something wrong and feel really, really bad about it.
Forgiveness means that even though I did something wrong, it’s ok because Jesus still loves me and he’ll love me even more if I stop doing that something wrong.

This, above, is what I’m talking about. Even as I typed it, I cringed. It feels/felt so self-focused, so rudimentary, so.. inaccessible.

Seems contradictory, at first, that something that’s been grossly simplified could also be inaccessible. However, I feel that when something is stripped of it’s depth and taken out of any broader vision of life that it loses its power.

It’s not accessible simply because everyone can repeat it. It’s very inaccessible because, often, we’re not sure what to actually do with it.

It’s not accessible to a lived existence.

N.T. Wright addresses this issue well in the last few moments of “Simply Jesus:”

…in Luke’s gospel, the risen Jesus tells his followers to go and announce to the world that a new way of life has been opened, the way of “repentance” and “forgiveness” (24:47). To us Westerners, that sounds a bit gloomy, as though it’s a perpetual act of contrition, dredging up our “sins” in order to hear someone declare them forgiven (until next time!). But it’s far, far bigger than that. The old creation lives by pride and retribution: I stand up for myself, and if someone gets in my way I try to get even. We’ve been there, done that, and got the scars to prove it. Now there is a completely different way to live, a way of love and reconciliation and healing and hope. It’s a way nobody’s ever tried before, a way that is unthinkable to most human beings and societies as—well, as resurrection itself.” Precisely. That’s the point. Welcome to Jesus’s new world.

Welcome to Jesus’s new world.

When we reduce the concepts of sin, forgiveness, and repentance down to absolving us of personal guilt for moral wrongdoings, we miss the fact that embedded within this language is the larger picture of healing and restoration that God is ushering into the world.

The evil within the hearts of men and women and creation itself is much deeper than social vices, though they are included in this picture of what’s drastically ailing the Creation. We aren’t simply trapped by sinful practices—we’re walking in a defeated, broken, damaging cycle of hopelessness. We are, daily, transformed more and more by an image of hope that will always fail us.

Always.

And so Jesus offers something greater. A transformed heart, a new way of life, as a part of the new Creation-world he is inaugurating.

Forgiveness and repentance are not simply absolution language. They are reconciliation language!

It’s not simply that we are awful, rotten and bad but God will forgive us for being bad if we say the magic words.

It’s that we were created for the Glory of God, for a way of life, and yet we chose another way of life—a life glorifying ourselves. But Jesus offers a chance to be reconciled to our original purpose! He, through his death and resurrection, sets us free from the endless, defeated cycle of self-glorifying-pursuits-that-end-in-failure.

He transforms us. Our hearts. Our lives. He sets us on a new path to walk (to live!) for something greater than ourselves—the God who lovingly called us all into existence.

"Death, like a great ugly giant, would do its worst, and pour out its full weight upon [Jesus]. And..."

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 12:37:40 -0600

“Death, like a great ugly giant, would do its worst, and pour out its full weight upon [Jesus]. And the creator God would overcome it, showing it up as a defeated enemy.”

- Simply Jesus | NT Wright

Ideashare: How to Have a Missional Meal

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:45:50 -0600

This past Sunday night, we hosted a really fun event called “How to Have a Missional Meal.” Full disclosure, it was based on some of the concepts in Tim Chester’s A Meal With Jesus and a few videos from the Verge Network.

It was a 90 minute event that included a meal, teaching, conversation, dessert, and a challenge to leave and make a difference (including a gift to send people on their way a little more “equipped”). The teaching and conversation bits were short and continuously switching to keep the night moving—none of the teaching elements were more than 7-8 minutes long.

Here’s a quote from the intro that explains what we were going for:

We often don’t consider how food, and specifically eating meals, is related to what God has created us for. In fact, it’s not just food but it’s generally the very mundane, ordinary things of life where we have the most opportunity to see the presence of God at work. These are also, since they seem to be so mundane, the easiest opportunities to miss.

But, no more. Tonight we want to start to condition ourselves to see God at work everywhere, particularly through food and table fellowship.
We want to start being people who expect God to show up when we sit down to eat with others, and then hopefully we’ll start seeing God show up everywhere.

Why am I blogging about this? Because I have an entire evening of teaching content, conversation questions, and outlined programming, and I’ll pass it along to anyone who wants it.

So, please contact me if you’d like the curriculum to use at your church!

Power & Kingdom: A Glimpse of What's to Come

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 09:54:28 -0600

Power & Kingdom: A Glimpse of What's to Come

Even something grand seems finite in the proper perspective.

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 10:12:33 -0600

Even something grand seems finite in the proper perspective.

"If we only praise God in the favorable circumstances, or circumstances that work out exactly how we..."

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 14:00:05 -0600

“If we only praise God in the favorable circumstances, or circumstances that work out exactly how we want, then we concede that we believe “what’s best for us” is to be happy, successful, comfortable, safe, and easy. What’s more, we concede that we believe God’s job is to make those things happen. But beware, easy lives rarely lead to satisfied existences.”

Daddy & Yenenesh. Help us bring this little girl home by...

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 15:33:47 -0600

[Flash 10 is required to watch video.]

Daddy & Yenenesh. Help us bring this little girl home by clicking here.

"The citizens of the heavenly city were actively seeking the peace and good order of the earthly..."

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 10:11:05 -0600

“The citizens of the heavenly city were actively seeking the peace and good order of the earthly city.”

- David Bosch

One of the questions I’ve heard thrown about recently is: Is the Good News truly, well,...

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 22:18:45 -0600

One of the questions I’ve heard thrown about recently is:

Is the Good News truly, well, good?

Those who claim that Jesus is indeed King, that he has visibly and powerfully enacted the reign of God that will extend into eternity with transformation, the vanquishing of evil & destruction, and liberation from everything that distracts us from being pure, unadulterated citizens who are faithful to King Jesus, are faced with a question.

And it’s not, actually, “is the Good News good?”

It’s far more personal:

Are we Good News?

"Since we are all creatures of flesh and blood, Jesus took on flesh and blood, so that by dying he..."

Thu, 17 Nov 2011 09:03:05 -0600

“Since we are all creatures of flesh and blood, Jesus took on flesh and blood, so that by dying he could destroy the one who held power over death—the devil—and destroy the fear of death that has always held people captive.”

- Hebrews 3:14-15, The Voice translation

Can I get an amen?

Freedom is scary. It’s paralyzing. Yes, we are no longer being controlled or...

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 10:01:05 -0600

Freedom is scary. It’s paralyzing.

Yes, we are no longer being controlled or manipulated…

But we now are no longer able to control or manipulate.

You see, the problem is that we want to be God. We want to shape something in the image of the...

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 17:36:37 -0600

You see, the problem is that we want to be God.

We want to shape something in the image of the created, not the Creator, so that we can control & manipulate it. So we can play God without directly admitting it.

But ultimately, we want to be God.

This is a problem for lots of reasons, but I want to point out one:

We’ll never have the power to achieve what it is we ultimately want and need, therefore we’ll trap ourselves in an unending hell of our own making that we are insufficiently equipped to escape.

"Our culture hero is not the artist or reformer, not the saint or scientist, but the entrepreneur."

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 08:28:40 -0600

“Our culture hero is not the artist or reformer, not the saint or scientist, but the entrepreneur.”

- From “The Entrepreneurial Generation,” a fascinating NY Times article. I am, of course, wondering what this means for us as we minister to and with communities of Jesus followers in the midst of such a cultural shift.

MrCrowder.Com

I’m ready to bring this little girl home. That is all.

We’re not called to live lives of detached spirituality or serial do-goodery. We’re...

We’re called into the life of Jesus.

Lately I’ve been troubled by the misuse of the Bible, and perhaps more deeply the complete...

"In the events of his life, words, death, burial, & resurrection, Jesus unleashes the grace and..."

What It Means to be a Modern Evangelical

So, who wants to drill a clean water well with us in October?...

The Villain, the Hero, the Victory

the conquering of the evil within: a transformed heart/life/world

"Death, like a great ugly giant, would do its worst, and pour out its full weight upon [Jesus]. And..."

Simply Jesus | NT Wright

Ideashare: How to Have a Missional Meal

Power & Kingdom: A Glimpse of What's to Come

Even something grand seems finite in the proper perspective.

"If we only praise God in the favorable circumstances, or circumstances that work out exactly how we..."

Daddy & Yenenesh. Help us bring this little girl home by...

"The citizens of the heavenly city were actively seeking the peace and good order of the earthly..."

David Bosch

One of the questions I’ve heard thrown about recently is: Is the Good News truly, well,...

Are we Good News?

"Since we are all creatures of flesh and blood, Jesus took on flesh and blood, so that by dying he..."

Freedom is scary. It’s paralyzing. Yes, we are no longer being controlled or...

You see, the problem is that we want to be God. We want to shape something in the image of the...

"Our culture hero is not the artist or reformer, not the saint or scientist, but the entrepreneur."