This is symptomatic of what we are seeing in government where Christians somehow think that gaining earthly power will usher in the Kingdom of God. It removes God’s work “beneath the surface” and leads to coercion, which is antithetical to the way God works and the way that Jesus modeled.
Thanks for this. Ever since I've read your book "Faithful Presence" and based on my dissertation under your direction, I have seen my pastoral calling as helping inherited older congregations to accept a new ministry of presence in their communities. I have seen some congregations change tact and began to sail with the wind of what God is doing. Unfortunately, I have had congregations that continued to sail into the teeth of the wind of change hoping to arrive back at where they were decades ago.
Agree with virtually all of what you've put forth here. But also note that Wesley, Wilberforce, and others CHANGED the society they lived in not by just "making space for Jesus" in discussions but also by entering the lists in Parliament, etc. to abolish slavery in Great Britain and its holdings (while contemporaries like Whitefield irenically "opposed" slavery in theory, but still held slaves and profited from them themselves. And then used that prosperity to fund Whitefield's great well-known "evangelistic" trips to North America.... I think you're right that many earnest servants of the Lord need to recognize that their calling may not be as Messianic in scope as they delude themselves (and others) into thinking it is. But SOME believers ARE called to not merely "make a space for Jesus at the table of consideration and discussion" but to lock arms with Martin Luther King, Jr. and John Lewis and demand that the government honor its verbal commitments by putting their might where their mouth is.
the relationship between legislation and the work of the spirit among a people - is complex. The work of God,, and his movement among a people ..can lead to legislation ... John Lewis SNNC prayer meetings ... led to a some lunch counter 'sit-ins'... people being present among the injustices of Jim Crow south etc... which led to 50+ such lunch counter small gatherings in Woolworths ... which grew ... ground up...to what later became the civil rights movement ... Legislation then codified what was happening in the social changes .. but if that's all that happened... or if the work of justice moved toward dependence solely on legislation .. the real work of transforming will be lost ... it will become a work of preserving justice ... and become stagnant ... and a "new Jim Crow" will take shape (Michelle Alexander)... This was Charles Marsh's argument in Beloved Community ...
And the recognition you also make here that "the work of God, and his movement among a people can lead to legislation" . Also. I agree that the kind of "make USA legally 'the Kingdom' " as the new House Speaker and his ilk advocate is NOT the solution but only another shoehorn for authoritarianism to slide into power. Guess I'm hopelessly nostalgic for the times 40 years ago when believers and seekers on "both sides of the aisle" in US government would argue all day about what was the BEST way to bring justice to bear on the society, and then go out to supper together and discuss what they'd been reading in their personal devotions that morning.
This is symptomatic of what we are seeing in government where Christians somehow think that gaining earthly power will usher in the Kingdom of God. It removes God’s work “beneath the surface” and leads to coercion, which is antithetical to the way God works and the way that Jesus modeled.
💯💯 yes! this is so true. God doesn’t need us to grab political power, and in fact we’re often working against Him when we do.
Thanks for this. Ever since I've read your book "Faithful Presence" and based on my dissertation under your direction, I have seen my pastoral calling as helping inherited older congregations to accept a new ministry of presence in their communities. I have seen some congregations change tact and began to sail with the wind of what God is doing. Unfortunately, I have had congregations that continued to sail into the teeth of the wind of change hoping to arrive back at where they were decades ago.
Agree with virtually all of what you've put forth here. But also note that Wesley, Wilberforce, and others CHANGED the society they lived in not by just "making space for Jesus" in discussions but also by entering the lists in Parliament, etc. to abolish slavery in Great Britain and its holdings (while contemporaries like Whitefield irenically "opposed" slavery in theory, but still held slaves and profited from them themselves. And then used that prosperity to fund Whitefield's great well-known "evangelistic" trips to North America.... I think you're right that many earnest servants of the Lord need to recognize that their calling may not be as Messianic in scope as they delude themselves (and others) into thinking it is. But SOME believers ARE called to not merely "make a space for Jesus at the table of consideration and discussion" but to lock arms with Martin Luther King, Jr. and John Lewis and demand that the government honor its verbal commitments by putting their might where their mouth is.
the relationship between legislation and the work of the spirit among a people - is complex. The work of God,, and his movement among a people ..can lead to legislation ... John Lewis SNNC prayer meetings ... led to a some lunch counter 'sit-ins'... people being present among the injustices of Jim Crow south etc... which led to 50+ such lunch counter small gatherings in Woolworths ... which grew ... ground up...to what later became the civil rights movement ... Legislation then codified what was happening in the social changes .. but if that's all that happened... or if the work of justice moved toward dependence solely on legislation .. the real work of transforming will be lost ... it will become a work of preserving justice ... and become stagnant ... and a "new Jim Crow" will take shape (Michelle Alexander)... This was Charles Marsh's argument in Beloved Community ...
Yeah: your FIRST sentence here.
And the recognition you also make here that "the work of God, and his movement among a people can lead to legislation" . Also. I agree that the kind of "make USA legally 'the Kingdom' " as the new House Speaker and his ilk advocate is NOT the solution but only another shoehorn for authoritarianism to slide into power. Guess I'm hopelessly nostalgic for the times 40 years ago when believers and seekers on "both sides of the aisle" in US government would argue all day about what was the BEST way to bring justice to bear on the society, and then go out to supper together and discuss what they'd been reading in their personal devotions that morning.