Keeping the Faith; Never losing Hope; Always Loving

“and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the  fullness of God”  Ephesians 3:19

Often I forget that the modern culture of evangelical christianity in America has spent so many hours constructing a box around God that we (I consider myself an evangelical christian in america) are choking out the Holy Spirit and the power of mystery of faith.  We have so many “check boxes” to check and if one of the boxes isn’t checked then that means that person or that community of faith doesn’t pass the test.  Are we really that arrogant to think that we have it figured out?  In our effort to be faithful we have replaced the power of mystery (that is essential to the faith…..”we proclaim the mystery of our faith…Christ had died; Christ has risen; Christ will come again.”) with a box that is grounded in our own need for safety and security in our tightly knit package of culture that says it all needs to “fit together” or else is can’t be valid.  But yet scripture seems to say the opposite.  Scripture shouts from the rooftops that the love of Jesus surpasses our knowledge (our effort to piece together a tightly knit package of the story that fits perfectly in the effort to prove its not all a lie) and that it is only in realizing this that we can experience the fullness of God.  When the fullness of God is linked to our ability to systematically prove why our faith is true then we will never experience the fullness of God.  That’s the amazing thing about faith in Jesus.  It frees us from having to systematically prove that “we” are right and “they” are wrong.  So often evangelical americans (again I consider myself one) have traded in their faith in the mystery of Jesus for a tightly knit constructed box that is a false attempt to walk by faith but is actually walking in a fear that at the end of the day they are afraid they might be wrong.  The result is evangelicals protect the box on all sides because of this fear instead of experiencing the fullness of God that comes through the love of Jesus that surpasses all human knowledge.

My hope is that Jesus would continue to save His church from themselves; that He would destroy our boxes; confront our fears; and force us to walk by faith and not by sight.

Peace Pastor P

PS. It occurs to me today that in the same way the church opens it doors for recovery from addiction and abuse we should begin opening our doors to longtime “evangelicals” who’s boxes are being destroyed and think they are losing their faith…..the church must open their doors and help them to see they are not loosing anything but actually being set free to experience the fullness of God.