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Five Things I Learned Studying Other Religions

Five Things I Learned Studying Other Religions

“He who knows one [religion], knows none.” – Max Müller 

Last year I had a strange realization…I know way too much about Christianity.

When I say this, I mean that I know way too much about Christianity in comparison to other religions. I have lost count of the books I have read about Christianity, while I can barely think of one written by a non-Christian about another religion. I know the Bible like the back of my hand, but I could barely tell you the basic facts about the Quran or the Bhagavad Gita (I even had to Google how to spell that!).

I grew up in the church, have spent the past eight years of my life studying Christianity in an academically rigorous setting, and now my full-time paid job is to teach others about Christianity. I am blessed to have the opportunity and technology to study the Bible and Christian theology in great depth. As I reflect on this, I am struck by the immense privilege and heavy responsibility it is. If both my personal calling as a disciple of Jesus and my professional calling as a paid pastor compel me to encourage others to choose to follow Jesus instead of other paths, I should at least have a working knowledge of other faiths. So, last fall I set a goal to read eight books about other religions by the end of the year, and I want to share five insights from my reading. 

 

Why learn about other religions?

 

You may wonder why a Christian should learn about other religions. Isn’t it dangerous to listen to “false teaching”? While we certainly should be discerning about what we read and listen to, I think Max Müller’s quote noted at the beginning of this blog is tremendously helpful. Without a working knowledge of other religions, your understanding of Christianity begins to suffer because you don’t know what makes it unique. Learning about other religions only bolstered my faith in Jesus and understanding of him. 

As America becomes more religiously pluralistic, it is imperative that believers know how to have conversations with those of different faiths and be able to thoughtfully and respectfully disagree. Here are five lessons I learned as I studied other faiths. 

 

1. All religions are not the same. 

 

I believed this before my research journey, however,  the popular assertion that all religions are different paths to the same God reflects a profound ignorance of the various religions and what they teach and practice. Stephen Prothero, author of God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions that Run the World, argues that this modern Western view is actually the minority position of the current scholarly field of religious studies. Prothero, a serious scholar teaching at Boston University and by no means a fundamentalist Christian, claims that very few of his academic peers even try to argue that religions are essentially the same. Each religion fundamentally disagrees about the problem facing human existence, presents divergent ways to solve those problems, and differs on what an ideal resolution would look like. For example, in his view, Christianity is unique in that it is essentially a religion of salvation. Human beings are trapped because of sin and are in need of someone (Jesus) to save them from this. 

Prothero thinks the popular pluralistic view is derived from ignorance. The less one knows about various religions, the more likely one is to assume they are all the same. This viewpoint, while starting from a commendable and sincere desire for religious tolerance, ends up not only wrong but also disrespectful. It denies adherents of other religions the dignity of disagreement. If you’ve ever argued with someone and they refuse to acknowledge you are in disagreement, you know what I mean. It is quite demeaning to tell someone, “No, no! You don’t understand. We actually agree,” when you are in the middle of an argument.

Moreover, the origin of this sort of religious relativism is Western imperialism. Religious studies, as a secular discipline distinct from theology, began with liberal European academics seeing the religions around the world as different stages of “evolving” into their own moralized versions of Christianity (God is love and we should be nice to one another). Imagine how a sincerely devout Buddhist would respond if told they were really an anonymous Christian! Despite how much we might recoil at bold claims that a person’s religion is the true one, every person does have some sense that this is true, otherwise they wouldn’t believe what they do. Of course, we should seek tolerance for other faiths and fight for religious freedom, but we should do so by acknowledging diversity and disagreement instead of enforcing sameness. 

 

2. God as Creator is a uniquely Christian belief.

 

As a Christian, I have typically glossed over affirming God as the creator of all things in most Christian creeds. It seemed so obvious to me that I rarely reflected on it. If I ever thought about its importance, it was always in reference to countering the idea there is no God and material things are all that exists. God creating the world just proves God exists and that’s it. 

However, while studying other religions, I was struck by how unique God as creator is to Christianity. The original Jewish idea that a single God outside of creation created  all that exists from nothing, as something purely good, is a remarkable development among the history of religions. The only major religions that share this view are Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which also share a common foundation as Abrahamic faiths. Christianity originated as a Jewish sect that believed Jesus is the Messiah, and Islam was deeply influenced by Christianity and Judaism when it began in Arabia in the 7th century AD.

If you look outside these interconnected faith traditions, this idea of God as creator is almost nonexistent. In most polytheistic (multiple gods) religions, each god is only in charge of one thing (the sky, ocean, animals, fertility, etc.). In the Ancient Near East creation myths the biblical authors were aware of, creation is an accidental result of a battle between gods, rather than an intentional act of one God. The ancient Greek creation myth is called “Theogony” which means “the birth of the gods.” Their story of how the world was made begins with how the gods were made. They are not understood as having a divine life apart from the elements of nature they represent, like in the Jewish/Christian tradition. They are thought of as the personal embodiment of what they have dominion over. If you were to tell an ancient Greek that you didn’t believe in Poseidon the god of the seas, they would laugh and point to the Aegean Sea and say “There’s Poseidon.” Even other modern world religions (especially Eastern ones) like Hinduism and Buddhism similarly do not have a creator God, nor make a big deal about whether or not that is true. 

This is why throughout the Bible, people regularly say “the Lord, who made the heavens and the earth” when uniquely referring to their God. It might be a throw away line to us, but was actually a very big distinctive for Jews and later the Christians. God creating the world means so much more than just affirming his existence. 

It means that God is fundamentally unlike us since he is the Creator and we are his creation. God doesn’t owe human beings anything since he created them and so everything of theirs is rightfully his. Humans can’t give anything to God that would determine he owed them something in return. God can’t be controlled or manipulated. Everything we receive from him is an act of grace and love. 

This also means that creation is intentional. It is no accident and God has purposes in creating it. The created world was originally good and should be enjoyed as God’s gift to us. The evil and suffering we experience are deviations from and distortions of what creation was meant to be. Salvation and redemption are not about escaping this world, but rather seeing its goodness restored. 

 

3. Comparing Jesus to Mohamed and the Bible to the Quran can be unhelpful.

 

Despite the similarities between Islam and Christianity as compared to other religions, they diverge in some major ways. Christians and Muslims often misunderstand each other because they compare elements of their religions that are as different as apples and oranges. Martyn Oliver, professor at American University, argues that this can happen if people equate Jesus to Mohamed as religious founders and the Bible to the Quran as holy books when comparing Christianity and Islam. A much better comparison is to see thatJesus and the Quran play a similar role, and the Bible and Mohamed play a similar role in their respective belief systems.

In Islam, the Quran is like an embodiment of God because it is his exact voice. It has always existed for eternity past in the exact Arabic form Muslims have today. Mohamed is just the prophet who bore witness to the Quran that an angel spoke to him, and commanded him to recite it word for word for someone else to write down. This is why a translation of the Quran from Arabic into another language is no longer the Quran. I visited a mosque some years ago, and was surprised that during the ‘sermon’ the Imam (pastor) would read the Quran in Arabic, then translate, and then explain it. What if I brought my Greek New Testament to the pulpit each Sunday and read from it instead of an English translation? This helps to make sense of how Mulsims understand the Quran. When you try to understand the Quran, you don’t ask questions about authorial intent, historical or cultural setting of the original audience, or even how it fits into an overarching Quranic story line. They believe it is a purely divine project that Mohamed memorized word for word and regurgitated, and one should be able to read any part of it on its own, understand, and obey it.

Understanding how the Quran and Mohamed function in Islam as a backdrop to Christianity allows the relationship of Jesus and the Bible to come into a clearer focus.

In Christianity, the true embodiment of the eternal God is a first century Jewish man named Jesus of Nazareth, God in human flesh and the image of the invisible God (John 1:14; Colossians 1:15). This audacious claim that Christianity makes is unparalleled in other religions. Other belief systems that have divine embodiments do not have the concept of a single Creator God distinct from creation, and so their incarnations mean less than the once for all incarnation of God in Jesus. In Christianity, the Bible is a witness to Jesus (John 5:39; Luke 24:25-27), and has authority because Jesus affirmed it (Matthew 5:17-18). The Bible is a divine-human project when God’s Spirit inspires and uses human authors, and to understand Scripture one must pay attention to the human elements to understand it correctly. Scriptural authority and its living and active nature extends even to translations of the Bible, as even the New Testament authors were using a Greek translation of the Old Testament as they wrote and taught. This has much to say about the affirmation of human cultural diversity that the God of the Bible has, since believers will retain their linguistic and ethnic identities in the new creation (Revelation 7:9)!

 

4. The form of Buddhism we often encounter in the West is very Westernized. 

 

Buddhism as a religious system has always confused me, because so many of its basic tenets and presuppositions are so radically different from the Christianity I have known. It appeared incredibly individualistic with its focus on achieving Nirvana (liberation from the cycle of reincarnation) for oneself after purging all desire and selfhood. This seemed to be at odds with what I understood of the deeply communal culture of East Asian countries. 

It was helpful to learn how diverse and varied Buddhism is as a religion, both throughout history and in its contemporary forms. In particular, much of the Buddhism we experience in the West is deeply influenced by Western interpretations of Buddhism. Henry Steel Olcott, the founder of the Theosophical Society, created the “Buddhist Catechism” while living in Sri Lanka in 1881. Olcott was committed to finding a simple, moralistic and universal religion, like many other Western liberal intellectuals in the 19th century were attempting to do by critiquing traditional Christianity. He used many of the same methods in his distillation of Buddhism into his catechism. This literary work was deeply influential in Buddhist revivals that followed in South Asia, and the belief system and its practices that have been adopted by Westerners. While Buddhism remains a predominantly Eastern religion, its current form, especially as it is practiced by Westerners, remains influenced by intellectual developments in 19th century Europe and North America. 

One aspect of traditional Buddhism that Olcott largely omitted because of its perceived “superstition” was the concept of Bodhisattvas and their role in Buddhist practice. A Bodhisattva is someone who is able to reach Nirvana and so cease to exist, but instead chooses to remain in this world so that they can alleviate the suffering of others and help them also reach Nirvana. They function as a sort of demigod in that they have supernatural powers and have devotees who petition them for help through religious rites. This concept was an early development in Buddhism that enabled Buddhist missionaries to incorporate local deities into the Buddhist world view as they spread their message in new communities. This others-centered, communitarian model contrasts with my initial individualistic take on Buddhism. The ideal is not just to achieve Nirvana for yourself, but rather to selflessly help others reach that state as well.

Even with this better understanding, what strikes me about Buddhism as compared to Christianity is its radically different notion of ‘salvation’ which turns out to be annihilation rather than redemption. The Bible teaches that we retain our individuality as we are bodily raised to live in the new creation, though in harmony with oneself, others, and God. 

 

5. The Bible’s presentation of women is radically different from its contemporary mythologies. 

 

One example of this is the Ancient Greek origin myth of “Pandora’s Jar” (often mistranslated as ‘box’) which presents a dramatically different view of gender than the biblical story of Adam and Eve. The myth of Pandora is about Zeus giving man the first woman, Pandora, as a veiled punishment for Prometheus stealing fire from the gods and giving it to men. Pandora came with a jar (meant to evoke womb-like imagery) that contained all kinds of evil and misery. Since Pandora was so curious, she naively opened the jar and brought suffering and evil into the world. So, in the Ancient Greek worldview, women are conceived of as a necessary evil. Men need women to reproduce, but women bring pain and suffering to men. Yikes!

While there is some overlap between this story and Eve’s role in the Fall, the differences are stark. Eve is created for Adam because it is not good for man to be alone, not as a punishment! She is a necessary ally to him, and both genders are essential for each other and incomplete on their own. Both Adam and Eve are blamed for sin’s entrance into the world, but it is through the woman’s offspring that evil is finally defeated (Genesis 3:15). 

 

God “is not far from each one of us” yet “he commands all people everywhere to repent”

 

As we learn more about other religions, it is important to use Paul’s posture in Acts 17 while speaking to pagan, Greek philosophers as our framework. God, as the creator of all, has not left himself without a witness, and through his common grace and natural revelation of the created world, human beings try to reach out and find God and “he is actually not far from each one of us” (Acts 17:27). Because of this, we shouldn’t be surprised if we find truth, beauty, and goodness in other faith traditions, and we should engage them with respect while seeking to understand them better. Moreover, learning about other belief systems can help us become better Christians as we see more clearly what is special about our faith. 

Simultaneously, sin has broken our ability to understand God, and every attempt ultimately ends in idolatry, gods created in our own image (Acts 17:29). God overlooked this ignorance for a time, but since Jesus has inaugurated a new age through his death and resurrection, God “commands all people everywhere to repent” from their idolatry and follow Jesus (Acts 17:30). May we winsomely, graciously, and boldly help others of all backgrounds come to find authentic faith in Jesus!

 

Five Reasons to Practice Solitude

Five Reasons to Practice Solitude

Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. John 16:12

We are afraid of being alone. So much of our self-worth and self-image is tied to what others think about us. We can so easily fill our schedules with other people and activities to keep us busy. Even when no one else is physically around, the whole world is just one click or swipe away. We can endlessly distract ourselves with noise and images from TV, social media, music, podcasts, and so much more in this digital age. We use other people, endless activity, and entertaining technology to keep ourselves from ever truly being alone.

The intentional practice of solitude can be scary, but it has deeply formed Jesus-followers for over two-thousand years. Here are five reasons to engage in the discipline of solitude.

 

 

1. Jesus practiced solitude.

 

As disciples of Jesus, our goal is to become like him. We must imitate our master Jesus or that to happen. He was not afraid to be alone because he knew his Father was with him. He practiced the discipline of solitude daily throughout his life to commune with God, even as others would clamor for his attention (Mark 1:32-39). As Jesus approached the most difficult week of his life that would culminate in death and abandonment, he ultimately trusted his loving Father to meet him there.


2. Solitude teaches us to rely on God for identity and not others.


Whether it be a positive review from your boss or your friend’s laughter after telling a joke, it is so easy to rely on the opinions of others for our sense of self-worth. Intentionally taking time to be alone and connect with God through prayer and Scripture reading can teach ourselves to find identity in Christ and not in others. This is what Jesus did even at the height of his ministry so that he would not be caught up in others’ expectations of him (Luke 5:15-16). Jesus’ identity firmly rooted in God’s love empowered his ministry toward others.


3. Solitude empowers us to be present with God and others.


If you’re like me, perhaps you’ve found that your attention span steadily decreased as you began carrying your smartphone more. Technology has complicated the practice of solitude because we are never more than a swipe away from superficial connections with others. The intentional practice of solitude to remove ourselves from distractions like technology can clear our minds of distracting thoughts, and retrain our brains to have longer attention spans. This enables us to be present with God while reading the Bible and praying. It can also change our habits and patterns so that we can be more attentive as we interact with others. 


4. Solitude can open us up to the Holy Spirit’s gentle correction.


Often the fear of solitude stems from unresolved guilt and shame. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said, “We are so afraid of silence that we chase ourselves from one event to the next in order to not have to spend a moment alone with ourselves, in order to not have to look at ourselves in the mirror.” As God’s beloved children, there is no need to fear shame or judgment from him (Hebrews 4:16). When we are alone with God without anything to use as a distraction, God’s Spirit can reveal ways we are living and thinking that are different from the abundant life God wants for us. In solitude, we can confess these things and receive God’s forgiveness and empowerment to change.


5. Solitude develops contentment within us.


As we sit alone with God, we can develop a sense of contentment in him. Other pleasures or accolades can be seen in proper perspective to God. Practicing gratitude in this time of solitude can shift the focus from what you don’t have to how God has already blessed and sustained you. This contentment reminds us of God’s love for us and empowers us to say “no” to lesser things that ultimately won’t satisfy us.

As we enter this season of Lent, preparing to celebrate Jesus’ death and resurrection, we invite you to join us in a seven-week journey to experience greater intimacy with God through the discipline of solitude. This study is available at theFormed.life, an online daily devotional resource to deepen your relationship with God and build habits of spiritual discipline. 

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How to Rediscover Lost Values with MLK

How to Rediscover Lost Values with MLK

One of my personal traditions is to listen to my favorite Martin Luther King, Jr speech each year on MLK weekend. While not as popular as “I Have a Dream” or “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop,” my favorite speech, entitled “Rediscovering Lost Values,” embodies the compelling moral vision of King and the broader African-American church that we celebrate each year on MLK day. This speech was actually a sermon delivered at Detroit’s Second Baptist Church before the Montgomery bus boycott that elevated him to a national stage. It reminds us that before King became the renowned activist and public persona, he was a preacher of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was his deep faith commitments of the latter that propelled him to become the former. The sermon’s correct diagnosis and searing critique of modern western culture’s moral relativism, in both theory and practice, is as relevant today in 2023 as it was in 1954.

King begins by asserting that, as modern people, “the means by which we live, have outdistanced the spiritual ends for which we live.” The profound problems we face in our world today cannot be solved by more information or more economic resources, both of which we have more of today than any society in human history. No, the problem lies within the hearts and souls of human beings and results from leaving behind the value of there being a God-given moral fabric to our universe. King likens this to the story of Joseph and Mary accidentally leaving behind Jesus as a boy in Jerusalem while returning to Nazareth (Luke 2:41-52). If we are to move forward as a society, we must go back to rediscover these foundational spiritual and moral values.

The problem is that we have forgotten that God created our universe with moral laws every bit as true as physical laws. Even if you don’t understand Newtonian physics, you know that if you jump off a tall building the law of gravity means that you will fall to the ground and die. Certain things are right and certain things are wrong, in every time, place, and culture, precisely because God made it so… 

It’s wrong to hate. It always has been wrong and it always will be wrong! It’s wrong in America, it’s wrong in Germany, it’s wrong in Russia, it’s wrong in China! It was wrong in two thousand BC, and it’s wrong in nineteen fifty-four AD! It always has been wrong, and it always will be wrong! It’s wrong to throw our lives away in riotous living. No matter if everybody in Detroit is doing it. It’s wrong! It always will be wrong! And it always has been wrong. It’s wrong in every age, and it’s wrong in every nation. Some things are right and some things are wrong, no matter if everybody is doing the contrary. 

Yet, King points out, we think we can disobey God’s moral laws and not face the consequences. He says that we live by an 11th commandment that supersedes the other 10… “Thou shalt not get caught.” You can break any command you want, so long as you don’t get caught and face negative consequences for it. We have deceived ourselves and forgotten the biblical truth that “You shall reap what you sow” (Galatians 6:7). This is the result of forgetting the moral foundation of the universe, and the God who upholds it.

At this point you may be amening just like the congregation at Detroit Second Baptist back in 1954. This is when King shifts the focus from our broader culture to the church. He observes that even believers can unintentionally forget God and leave him behind, just like Jesus’ parents accidentally forgot him back in Jerusalem on their way back to Nazareth. It is easy for Christians to “pay lip service to God and not life service.” We create false gods out of materialism or political ideologies that affirm us and how we want to live, and we use those idols to distract ourselves from the real God of Scripture who places moral demands on us and holds us accountable. 

All too often, Christians are passionate about either personal holiness or communal justice, while neglecting the other. King and others in the African-American Christian tradition show us there is a strong moral foundation that should lead to both. There is much the broader church can learn from them. We should seek to know the God who created this moral universe, and follow him by his grace.

This MLK weekend, I encourage you to take some time to read or listen to one of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermons. Let’s remind ourselves of the moral foundation of God’s created order, and how we follow the God who upholds it.

 

More Resources:

Rediscovering Lost Values

E90 Is Over… So What’s Next?

E90 Is Over… So What’s Next?

“I have loved watching my heart soften toward the individuals that I have been praying for, and how often I’ve been thinking of them and noticing things about them. Much more intentional interactions!” – Linda

 

Spending 90 days praying for others to come to know Jesus was an amazing time together as a church. Over the course of these 13 weeks, close to 400 different people across all five campuses texted me about their experiences witnessing and praying for others. I was blessed to hear so many people, just like Linda, share how praying each day for the same people shifted their perspective toward them. It is surprising (though it really shouldn’t be) how many opportunities for greater connection with others arise when you intentionally and regularly pray for them. I was even more deeply encouraged when I heard about perseverance through the challenges people faced in their witnessing.

 

A handful of people let me know that one of their nine made a decision to follow Jesus during these 90 days. Beyond these, so many more had their nine make significant movement toward God. Some of their nine reached out with spiritual questions for the first time. Others reached out while facing significant life difficulties and asked for prayer. Some of their nine decided to visit church with them. Others saw their relationship with their nine deepen in new ways. There are so many more powerful stories that you can read about on theformed.life/e90

 

But if you’re like me, as soon as these 90 days finished, you wondered what’s next.

 

Was this just a cool 90 day challenge? One more project to mark ‘done’ and move on? No, from the beginning of our team’s planning process, we hoped e90 would be a catalyst for continued growth in prayer and personal evangelism for our church. Though this initiative is done, we continue to be a caring family of multiplying disciples, influencing our community and world for Jesus Christ. Here are four ways you can continue to grow in this even after e90.

 

Keep Praying

 

Just because the 90 days are over does not mean you need to stop praying intentionally and specifically for others to come to know Jesus! This season hopefully started a habit that remains with you well after it officially finishes. Consider how you can keep praying regularly for others. Think about how much movement you’ve seen in yourself and in them over 90 days. How much more could happen through the rest of the year? Maybe your list of nine grew to fifteen. Keep praying for your fifteen! Perhaps there are just two people from your nine God has highlighted to you these past few months. Keep praying for those two!

 

Pray Together

One of the best parts of e90 was that this was something we did together as a whole church. It reminded me that I’m not alone in witnessing to others. This doesn’t have to end either! What if your community group decided to keep praying for others specifically to come to faith as a part of your regular prayer time? What if you and just one other person committed to praying together for your lists? You could do a short phone call once a week and pray together. Or you could exchange names and pray for their list in addition to yours. This would encourage you to stay consistent in praying for others.

 

Learn Together

 

Another awesome part of e90 was how praying and witnessing motivated greater learning about the gospel and how to practically share it with others. This doesn’t have to end either! What if your community group, or just you and one friend picked a book about evangelism to read together? In addition to discussing what you’re learning from reading, you can also debrief how you’re practicing those things as well. If you don’t know where to start, two of my favorite books on evangelism are The Sacrament of Evangelism by Jerry Root, and Questioning Evangelism by Randy Newman.

 

Keep Inviting

 

Lastly, we can continue to grow in personal evangelism beyond e90 by continuing to invite others. Continue to invite them to hang out with you in a relaxed setting with other believers, to read one of the gospels from the Bible together, to come to church with you, to hear your story of what God has done in your life, to consider what following Jesus might look like. Not every invitation will be responded to with an enthusiastic “Yes!” but that does not mean we’ve failed. Even small invitations and planting seeds over time can be used by God to draw others to Him.

 

I encourage you to keep praying, keep learning, keep inviting, and do all these together with other believers. And I hope I continue hearing how God is working through it all to reach others with His love for His glory.

 

Four Lessons St. Patrick Has for the American Church

Four Lessons St. Patrick Has for the American Church

It is unfortunate that St. Patrick has become synonymous with wearing green to avoid being pinched, dyeing rivers green, and consuming large quantities of beer while pretending to be Irish. Little is widely known about the tremendous influence that this man had on the nation of Ireland and western Christianity. Patrick is easily one of the most successful Christian missionaries of all time. The indigenous Christian movement he started took root where missionaries had failed. Patrick’s influence grew to even re-evangelize much of western Europe in the centuries following the chaos of the Dark Ages and the decline of the institutional Roman church. His success is especially remarkable considering this was all done without any aid from other institutions of political or cultural power. As the current American church declines and we are in an increasingly post-Christendom world, we would do well to listen to voices like his.

The Life of Patrick

Patrick was born in roughly 389 AD to upper-middle-class parents in the British part of the Roman Empire. This was only a few years after Emperor Theodosius made Christianity the official religion of the Empire and Christendom was established. Patrick’s father was a Christian deacon and a member of the city council, both highly respected roles. His grandfather was a priest, so it would be fitting to characterize his family as a pious one with high social standing. Despite this, Patrick described his own Christian upbringing as nominal at best.

A drastic change to this life of privilege happened when Patrick was 16. A band of Irish warriors raided his town, and he was taken away to Ireland, outside of the Empire, in captivity. He worked as a slave herding pigs for six years. Finally, apart from his complacent life where he tacitly accepted nominal Christianity, Patrick was forced to consider the ramifications of his faith. In his own words, “the Lord opened the sense of my unbelief.” He began to pray daily and call out to God to sustain and deliver him. His interaction with the religious beliefs of the Irish also strengthened his faith. Their belief in multiple gods and spirits that roamed throughout the land needing to be appeased aroused a deep sense of peace from the security he had in Christ.

After spending six years in Ireland, he received a vision that encouraged him to escape. While sleeping, he heard a voice tell him to rise and find a ship to take him home. He awoke, ran down to a nearby port, and found a ship that took him away from Ireland. He went to Gaul (modern day France) and spent some time learning and living at a monastery in Lerins. Although he felt called to live a life with common men, during this time he developed a strong appreciation for the monastic rule of life. When he left the monastery he returned to Britain to be reunited with his relatives. Later, at the age of 48, he received his version of the ‘Macedonian call’ (Acts 16:6-10). In a dream an angel brought him letters from his former captors in Ireland, and he heard their voices cry out “we appeal to you, holy servant boy, to come and walk among us.” After consulting with the bishops of the British Church, he was ordained a bishop and sent out to Ireland in a missionary band.

His method differed greatly from other Roman missionaries of his time. Instead of forcing conquered “barbarians’’ to convert or waiting for them to come to him as spiritual inquirers, Patrick and his companions would set up a community of faith in each village they visited. They would practice a monastic life of prayer and work, not in a cloister far from society but in the midst of the Irish. As they looked for receptive villagers, the band would pray for the sick, exorcize demons, and mediate conflicts. They were interested in the felt needs of the communities, even regularly praying for fish in the village river. In open-air settings, Patrick would speak about the gospel, using his vast knowledge of Irish culture to communicate the gospel in a way that would connect with them. Parables, symbols, drama, and other visuals were used because of the Irish people’s vivid imagination. Responsive villagers would join the monastic community and partake in their practices.

After a few months, a church would be officially born and the new converts would be baptized. Patrick’s group would leave behind a priest and a few others to continue instruction in Christian doctrine, but take some of the converted villagers with them as they moved on to the next village. It is estimated that Patrick started 700 churches, commissioned 1000 priests, and reached 40 out of the 150 tribes in Ireland, during his 28 year ministry.

Four Lessons for Us

1. The gospel is central.

Patrick’s ministry was rooted in a profound belief that humanity’s only hope was God’s intervention of grace through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. His personal experience of liberation from slavery by divine intervention no doubt made this truth a vivid reality for him. Each of his surviving writings begins with the words: “I, Patrick, a sinner.” This humility was not from self-loathing, but from an honest recognition of his need for a savior. Patrick was zealous to maintain that salvation is a result of God’s work of grace, in opposition to his contemporary fellow British monk, Pelagius, who taught human effort alone was enough to be saved. Patrick’s strong conviction that the unconverted would suffer damnation and had no hope apart from Christ motivated him to return to his former captors to share the good news with them.

The Church today should never grow weary of proclaiming the gospel and trusting in God’s grace. We should take care and not water down the biblical gospel. We must also be zealous like Patrick so that the good news does not become old hat.

2. The gospel changes everything.

Patrick’s missionary bands differed significantly from Roman missionary models by doing their Christian life in the midst of pagan communities. Patrick himself was deeply influenced by the Irish reverence for nature and so developed a sacramental vision of all of life, where the line between the natural and spiritual was paper-thin. Work was an integral part of their monastic life and not a distraction from it. Their concern for the economic realities of their Irish neighbors bolstered their witness.

One of the greatest dangers facing the church today is the unbiblical distortion that creates a sharp sacred-secular divide. This can lead us to believe our Monday work does not matter to a Sunday-focused God. As our culture becomes increasingly post-Christian and the influence of the institutional church wanes, we need to be faithful disciples of Jesus in the particular places He has us the majority of our week.

3. The gospel demands justice and reconciliation.

Similar to the previous lesson, the gospel Patrick preached did not only restore sinners to God but also led them to love one another and pursue justice and peace. In his writing, Epistola, he writes a letter rebuking a nominal-Christian warlord named Coroticus. He had raided some of Patrick’s converts and taken recently baptized women off as slaves. Patrick commands him to release them because he is compelled by “the zeal of God, the truth of Christ… (and) the love of (his) nearest neighbors.” His concern for justice and the flourishing of the Irish was also evident in how he ended the slave trade in that region. Patrick earned the respect of various Irish tribes by acting as a broker for peace to end conflict between clans. His evangelistic effectiveness was integral to his concern for the whole-life flourishing of the Irish.

The American Church would do well to follow Patrick’s footsteps. As we allow the gospel to speak to all of life, it will inevitably move us to work toward a society that is ordered by God’s justice and enables the flourishing of all.

4. The gospel is lived out together.

Though Patrick gets all the recognition and a holiday all to himself, we must never forget that he did not evangelize the Irish by himself. He was not a lone ranger, solo-climber, or solitary pioneer that set out on his own. Patrick owes much of its success to the many unknown members of his missionary bands that evangelized together. They demonstrated a different way of being in community among the Irish that became a compelling witness. Rather than requiring a profession of belief from ‘barbarians’ before partaking in Christian community like the Roman church, they recognized that belonging often precedes belief. Irish inquirers could join their monastic community, “tasting and seeing that the Lord is good” by experiencing the care of His people before making intellectual assent to Christian doctrine.

In a similar way, the American church will go nowhere relying on its celebrity leaders. It takes communities of extra-ordinary believers doing life together so that others can be drawn in to experience the reality that the gospel changes everything.

Let us take time this St. Patty’s day, in addition to any other celebration, to thank God for the work He did through St. Patrick and his friends. Let us also consider how we might emulate him by being a faithful, gospel-centered presence in our communities.

Seven Ways Sharing Your Faith Grows Your Faith

Seven Ways Sharing Your Faith Grows Your Faith

A few years ago, I was attending a church plant that failed. After several years of stagnant growth and little evangelistic fruit, the leaders decided to close the doors. I felt like a failure. I thought, “If only I was a better evangelist, then more people would have come to faith, joined our church, and it would still be open today. Here I am, in school learning to be a pastor, and the first church I am a part of goes up in flames!” I wondered if this evangelism thing was just something I was not cut out for. But that would be okay, right? Not every Christian needs to be a ‘super-soul winner’, right?

For many Christians, evangelism can be guilt and shame inducing. We know that we should share our faith, but so few of us do. Even as some of us try, a lack of fruit feels like failure. Seeking to alleviate the guilt from these experiences can lead to questioning the need for all Christians to share the gospel. You may have had this exact reaction when our church announced our plan to grow in evangelism through e90 (the practice of praying for 9 people for 90 seconds a day, for 90 days).

From “Do I have to?” to “Wow! I get to!”

Perhaps our perspective needs to shift. Instead of only sharing out of a sense of duty, what if we viewed the practice of evangelism as something that was good for us? While sharing our faith is certainly a command Jesus gives, it is something He commands for our own benefit! I want to encourage you to sign up for theFormed.life as we go through e90 so that your faith can grow as you seek to share it with others.

We should keep in mind that one does not need to convert others to Jesus to be a mature Christian. We are to tell others about Jesus, but we are not responsible for their  response. Even Jesus had many reject Him and His message. We should focus on being faithful in the process, not on the end product. 

How is this faithfulness in evangelism something that is for our own good?

How Sharing Our Faith Matures Us

Not only is evangelism a mark of Christian maturity, but it is also a pathway to Christian maturity in other areas.

  1. Evangelism grows our trust in God. As we step out of our comfort zone, our faith is strengthened by our need to rely on God. If you feel inadequate and unprepared to share the gospel, what a great opportunity to trust in God, who is the only one who can draw people to Himself. As you pray each day for your nine, you are developing the habit of inviting God into this area of need.
  1. It builds our love for others. Our broader postmodern culture implicitly defines love as merely tolerating another’s preferences. In this mindset, evangelism is a hateful enterprise. However, if you think of love as seeking the best for another person, what better way to love someone than to introduce them to the One who can lead them to fullness of life! Atheist magician and comedian Penn Jillette once remarked how loved he felt when a fan gave him a Bible and shared the gospel with him even though he still completely disbelieves in God. He said, “How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate someone to believe everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?” Seeking to have those around us come to know Jesus, if done with their best in mind, is a loving act that develops a greater love for them within us. We hope praying for your nine will be used by God to give you His heart for them that “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4).
  1. Sharing our faith transforms our lifestyle to be more missional. If we seek to make evangelism an integral part of our lives, we will develop habits that allow us to consistently partner with God in His mission of redeeming creation. This is why every Friday, theFormed.Life invites you to take a small step in developing missional habits. Telling others about Jesus invites us to critically examine our own lives. Do we live as though the gospel is true? The fear of hypocrisy that paralyzes us from sharing our faith can be an invitation to go deeper in our own discipleship. 
  1. Practicing evangelism enables growth in our theological knowledge. The year I gained the most theological knowledge was not while in seminary, but rather when I went to community college and was actively sharing my faith with classmates. Getting hard questions from others motivated me to read theology more rigorously than any systematic theology test could. This is why in theFormed.life we reflect deeply and biblically on the gospel twice a week. On Thursdays we look at a single passage that articulates the good news. On Saturdays we focus on one chapter of the Four Chapter Story, reading one passage explaining that and reflecting how we are living that story today. As we share the gospel, we will have greater motivation to understand the good news more fully.
  1. Not only does evangelism develop our theoretical knowledge but it also grows our practical knowledge of God. As a pastor, I am better able to understand a congregant after visiting their workplace. By seeing where they work, how they invest their energy, and knowing more about what their labor produces, our relationship deepens. Similarly, seeing God at work in His mission of wooing people to Himself allows us to experience the truth that God loves everyone in a deeper way.
  1. The practice of evangelism enables us to praise God and thank Him for how He is at work. This is why every Tuesday theFormed.life shares a short story about how God is working in someone’s life through their witness to Jesus. We want to hear more of these moments from you so that we can join you in praise and thanksgiving! Let us know how God is at work in this practice for you. You can sign up for that by texting “e90” to 913-379-4440.
  2. Not only does this practice increase our intimacy with God, but evangelism also can lead us to greater intimacy with one another. So many Christians can feel isolated as they share the good news in contexts where they might be the only believer. However, focusing on evangelism should lead us to treasure the hope we share in common as believers. We desire that doing this together as a church reminds us we are not alone in our witness. We encourage you to press into community even as you reach out to others individually. Make gathering on Sunday mornings a priority. Discuss the joys and challenges of this practice with others in your community group. Let’s grow together in this.

….

When my church closed its doors, God reminded me that it’s not the end product He cares about but rather being with me in the process. He does not need me to evangelize to save people. Salvation is His job, not mine. He wants me to develop deeper intimacy with Him and others by sharing my faith. Evangelism is not something He wants from me, but for me and for my good.

I pray that this would be true for you, that “the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ” (Philemon 1:6). I encourage you to join us in theFormed.life as we engage the discipline of evangelism together.

More Resources:

Root, Jerry., and Stan Guthrie. The Sacrament of Evangelism. Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2011.

“Atheist Penn Jillette Doesn’t Respect Christians Who Don’t Evangelize”