GET OFF YOUR BUTT

This past weekend I was down in Austin attending the Verge Missional Community Conference. It was, without question, the most spiritually powerful and transformative weekend of my life. I have never been in a setting where I felt the spirit of God more directly. The Holy Spirit was just making it rain all over the weekend through worship, the speakers, and the entire conference.

The conference was aimed to get the church get off her butt and out in the culture reaching people groups, cities, and nations with the message of Jesus Christ. Speaker after speaker kept challenging all of us that for a church to reach the culture it has to be outward focused, not inward focused. The church has to be without walls, a sending agency for all the people of God to do the work of God.

The work of God is for all God's people. Everyone is a minister, everyone possessing all the gifts they need to plant the Gospel in anyone...anywhere. Alan Hirsch, a speaker at the conference, said that "Your conversion is your commission, your baptism is your ordination." And he talked about the church (and any institution) often strives for equilibrium, for the status quo, for business as usual. And he said this is why the church in the United States is simply no longer reaching the culture. The church is passionate about her equilibrium and "maintaing" order.

Jesus is our disequilibrium.

Jesus is all about messing us up and making us uncomfortable and breaking us of our traditions for the spreading of His Name. The closer you get to Jesus, the more dangerous things are gonna get. Jesus has called you to share Him with everyone. You have all the gifts you need. You must go. Live on mission wherever you are. Wherever you are.

Jesus has sent us out in the world. We exist for Him. So how many lost people do we know? How many times have we had them over to dinner in our apartments the last few weeks? How well have we loved others?

Do we really take the time to see people? To walk slowly enough through life so that all the people that we interact with can be impacted by us. Give up the comfort, give up the security, give up spending your life doing things that don't matter.

Jesus is so serious about loving others. We take so much of what Jesus said as suggestions, as good ethics to live by, but we are either obedient to Christ or we aren't. End of story.

So is Jesus your disequilibrium? Francis Chan spoke Saturday afternoon right before the conference ended and he spoke on suffering. The Scriptures call all of us to die to ourselves and that call for most Christians has meant they will probably die physically because of their faith. Francis Chan said that "some of us need to suffer just to know if we are for real." Are we for real? If all you had was Jesus would that be enough? If you woke up tomorrow and everything you had was gone and everyone you loved was gone and all you had was Jesus...would he be enough? Francis Chan challenged us to live radically for the sake of Jesus. To quit being Christian atheists who say we love Jesus but don't love the poor, don't tell anyone about Jesus, don't want to actually sacrifice in any way for the Kingdom. And in the worship that followed him message the Holy Spirit absolutely blew up the room like nothing I have ever seen. Ever.

And I think there was such unity in the room, such oneness in the room of people saying we are done playing church, we are done with the small things of this world, we are done trying to get people to like us, we are done doing anything except surrendering to Christ and His will for our lives. We are done seeking equilibrium for our lives. We want Jesus and His spirit. And Jesus was saying right back that this it...we are getting it finally. We exist for others. You exist to love others.

GET ON MISSION. LIVE THE GOSPEL. LOVE YOUR CITY. PRAY FOR THE NATIONS. LIVE LIKE JESUS ACTUALLY ROSE FROM THE DEAD. BE JOYFUL. NOW. RIGHT NOW.

True giving is not measure in what you actually give, but in what you give up. Francis Chan said that the Holy Spirit is the Comforter and he asked us "Why would God send the Comforter if we were supposed to be comfortable?"

LET JESUS BE YOUR DISEQUILIBRIUM. KILL RELIGION. LIVE THE GOSPEL. BE RADICAL. EVERYTHING IS AT STAKE.

"I had to go, I just had to go, and I didn't care anymore if anyone was coming with me...cause I had to sleep at night." -Francis Chan

SO GO. GO. GO. GO. GO. JUST SAY YES AND GET OFF YOUR BUTT AND INTO THE CITY.

Check out this video from the Austin Stone. It says it all. The Gospel matters. And those who have yet to be transformed by it remain enslaved to brokenness, to shame, to guilt, to separation from ultimate LOVE.

FREE THE SLAVES,
RD