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For those looking for some real meat to sink their teeth into, here it is. This book by Gilbert Bilezikian took me awhile to finish but it was well worth the effort. Taking the time to chew and digest Gilbert’s comments about authentic community, real leadership and the role of women in ministry was eye-opening. Below is an excerpt about servant leadership. Get your steak knives out!

Because Jesus knew that the kingdom he was bringing was not of this world, he also knew that it would not be structured like the kingdoms of this world. Early in his ministry, he made it clear that his kingdom would be for the poor in spirit, the meek, and the merciful. But his disciples lived in a world where these sorts of people were ruthlessly crushed at the bottom of the pyramid of hierarchies that made up their social environments.

The pecking order was an inescapable reality of daily life, whether in the home, at the marketplace, in the synagogue, or in political life; everyone had to assume one’s appropriate rank on multiple ladders of hierarchy in consideration of birth, race,  gender, fortune, and influence. This mentality was so pervasive that the disciples could not think of the kingdom of God in different terms. They knew that Jesus was dedicated to the task of launching a new community. They also realized that they would be the charter members of this organization. Because they were the first participants, they also thought that they should be foremost in it. But there were twelve of them, and all twelve of them could not be in first place. So, they argued among themselves as to “who was the greatest” (Mark 9:33-34). They were in competition against each other for the position of front-runner in the kingdom of Jesus Christ!

When Jesus learned of the disciples’ contest, he sat down. Their discussion was a hard blow to him, and he took it sitting down. Gathering the Twelve for an emergency teaching session, he summarized his message in the following words: “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all” (9:35).

Jesus did not condemn as wrong the desire to be first. Leaders  are needed, and the desire to use one’s gift of leadership is legitimate. But Jesus transformed the concept of leadership by redefining its style and the motivation for doing it. The style demands that roles of leadership be fulfilled not with the pride of one who comes first, not with the self-glory of one who wins a competition, but with the humility of one who comes in last. The motivation should not be the desire to rule, control, or command, but to support and assist others, just as a servant does.

In other words, leadership among Christians is not  authority-intensive but service-based. Biblical leadership is willingness to fall behind in order to help those who are struggling instead of striving to be first and to win the competition for power. There is no command or instruction in the New Testament for any Christian to exercise authority over another. But there are strict orders for all Christians, including leaders, to act as servants within their communities (Matt. 20:26; Mar 9:35; Gal. 5:13; etc.).

In order to drive the point home, Jesus gave the disciples a living illustration of what it means to be servant to others. He brought “a little child” and had him stand in their midst, and then he took the child in his arms (Mark 9:36). The disciples had no use for children. They treated them as a nuisance and wanted them out of their way (10:13-16). But Jesus showed them the deep meaning of servanthood by making a child, who had no significance for the disciples, the most important person in the world for him at that moment. Jesus explained to them that by loving and serving lesser ones, as he was doing for the child, they would really be serving Christ and loving God, who had sent him to serve in this manner (9:37).

Jesus went on to reveal the servant-mindedness that motivates the Godhead by stating that he was willing to identify with the lowly child as closely as he was himself identified with the Father. By receiving children one received him, just as one who received him also received the Father. This was a complete reversal of the competitive, ascendancy-driven values of the world. It meant going all the way down the world’s ladders of hierarchy and  lifting up those at the bottom above oneself. Concern for children, for the weak, and for the disadvantaged was not invented by welfare organizations. It was ordained by Jesus as an authentic expression of servant leadership (Matt. 25:34-40).

The disciples seemed to be bent on going out of their way to demonstrate how uncomprehending they were of Jesus’ teaching and of the ways of the kingdom of God. Not long after this teaching, Jesus caught them chasing away parents who wanted him to bless their children (Mark 10:13-16). Jesus became “indignant” and told the bumptious disciples, driven by upward mobility aspirations, that unless they became as submissive and unpretentious as the little children they were despising, they would have no part in the kingdom of God. In order to enter that kingdom, they had to receive it as a child does (v. 15). A child receiving the kingdom does not aspire to positions of authority and power. The kingdom is not for those who use it to position themselves above others but for those who enter it as servants.

Gilbert Bilezikian, Community 101

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This is another great book by Wayne Jacobsen. Previously involved in the institutional church, Wayne writes honestly and powerfully about his transition and why true Biblical relationships are the most healthy for Christ followers. The following is the second of two excerpts from his book. This excerpt talks about the clergy/laity divide. This book is available for purchase or can be downloaded free by clicking here.

The power of a clergy class over the so­ called laity has always been a focal point of church reformers. Church leadership easily falls into the trap of validating their usefulness by placing them­selves as an essential link to personal spirituality. Reformers have instead championed the priesthood of all believers—which sim­ply means that every believer can have a personal relationship with God and be used by him to touch others. Leaders may have distinct functions in the body, but they do not have a relationship with God substantially different from that of other believers. 

Never before in the history of the church has the theology of priesthood received so much lip service and so little actual practice as in this century. Though it is preached with conviction from our pulpits, only a small percentage of believers are involved in significant ministry opportunities on a daily basis. They may be doing busywork for someone else’s program, but they are neither thriving in their spiritual experience nor confident to intervene in crisis situations. 

I would say that fully 90 percent of those who were already Christians when they came to a fellowship I pastored did not at that time have a daily time of worship and bible reading which was effectively nurturing their lives. They had been accustomed to being fed by pastors and TV preachers. When opportunity arose to lead someone to Christ or to liberate them from oppres­sive bondage, they were told to see the pastor or come to church for their answers. We are breeding a generation of believers who perceive themselves as incompetent to live out the Word in their own experience. 

How are we doing this? Church leaders have historically used two tactics to keep people dependent. Regrettably we have our twentieth­ century versions of these today, subtle or unintentional though they be. 

The first revolves around interpretation of the Word. Are the Scriptures clear enough for the average person to read and understand, or must they be interpreted by a professional? In the days of John Wycliffe this issue was obvious. The Bible was available only in Latin, which the priests alone could read and interpret. The church killed anyone who translated it into com­mon languages or who possessed translated copies. This they did in spite of the fact that the Holy Spirit used mostly unlearned men to pen his Word. The New Testament itself was written in the style of Greek used on the street, not the classical style used by scholars. 

Today misapplied scholasticism serves the same purpose of making people feel as though they can’t understand the Word on their own. I’m not against the knowledge which the church has gained over the centuries nor using the original languages to help us understand the Word more fully. If, however, we use those tools week after week to say that though the text seems to say one thing it really says something else, we effectively destroy people’s confidence in feeding from the Word themselves. Good preaching doesn’t dazzle people with interpretations of the Word that defy the imagination; but instead equips people with a fuller appreciation for the inherent simplicity of the Word and increases their ability to understand it. At the end of a good sermon people should respond, “yes, I see that!” 

The second tactic to keep the masses dependent on leader­ship is to make them a mediator in the salvation process. In the Middle Ages the church viewed the communion elements as the means of salvation—which only a priest could consecrate. The priest could withhold communion from whomever he chose; convincing them that they had been denied salvation. 

We have long recognized that the whim of a man cannot determine salvation. Many people, however, surrender the qual­ity of their spiritual life to ministry professionals and become willingly dependent upon them. We’ll take a closer look at this phenomenon in Chapter 11, but for now I want only to point out the adverse effect which ministry professionals often have on spiritual intimacy. 

Instead of people sitting at the feet of Jesus themselves, hearing his voice and obeying his will, they sit at the feet of their favorite teacher. Public ­relations techniques have produced a generation of leaders today who aspire to lead by their own personal popu­larity. We have our celebrities just like the world does, and many Christians are more awed by them than by the Lord himself. 

Media use today has only heightened this problem. Instead of multiplying ministry through transformed people, we seek to do it through satellite dishes and direct mail. How ineffective these have proven to demonstrate God’s love or to help people grow up in Christ! Some people can’t make it through the day without a fix from their pastor’s cassette ministry or a word from the TV evangelist they champion. In an age of capitalistic Christianity, leaders only encourage such dependence: “You must hear what I’m going to talk about next week.” “This series on growth will change your life like nothing else you’ve ever heard.” Dependent people ensure the future of the ministry. 

Even church­ growth experts suggest that this kind of promo­tion and visibility is essential for church growth. We’ve entered dangerous waters indeed when the promotion of a man’s image is the means by which we extend the gospel. The reformation did us little good if we only exchanged one pope for thousands of little popes through whom to live out our Christian experience. 

No wonder people perceive themselves as incompetent to handle the situations in their life through personal knowledge of the Word, sensitivity to the spirit, and support of the body! While our books on child­rearing were intended to help parents, they often do the opposite. I constantly remind discouraged parents that they do not need a degree in child psychology to raise their children. Any parent who takes a personal interest in his or her child is in a far better place to disciple and discipline that child than any outsider, no matter what the outsider’s knowledge or experience. Though we can benefit from the insights of other people, we must be sure that they do not intimidate us. 

In the same way, daily Christian living has become far too complex. Jesus chose the weak things to confound the wise. With all the principles and precepts that have been outlined in recent years, we need to ask ourselves whether we’ve kept things simple enough for the person on the street to walk with God in confidence. Jesus channeled a powerful gospel through the lives of fishermen, farmers, and former harlots. Walking with Jesus is within the reach of every individual, for he makes us competent to walk out the gospel in our own lives (2 Corinthians 3:4,5).

Wayne Jacobsen, the Naked Church

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This is another great book by Wayne Jacobsen. Previously involved in the institutional church, Wayne writes honestly and powerfully about his transition and why true Biblical relationships are the most healthy for Christ followers. The following is the first of two excerpts from his book. This excerpt asks who is your covering. This book is available for purchase or can be downloaded free by clicking here.

It is usually not long in the Christian journey before the question of accountability surfaces. Some churches talk about the impor­tance of having a covering, by which they mean a committed rela­tionship to a local church institution. Without one your salvation is suspect. This thinking is built on the notion that an individual cannot be trusted to discern truth and so must draw that security from a tradition, denomination or trained professional. 

It is so much a part of our religious psyche that it remains unchallenged, even though not one New Testament Scripture vests our accountability in another human being. In actuality the New Covenant declares quite the opposite. Each of us are account­able to God alone for our choices. At no time did the early apostles project authority over others, nor command their actions. Instead, they urged, beseeched and encouraged leaving each person to live consistent with their individual conscience. 

When some among the Ephesian elders had begun to pervert the gospel in order to ply their own power games over people, John wrote for them to trust the anointing they each had from the Holy Spirit. “You have no need for anyone to teach you,” John wrote, drawing a clear distinction between the value of receiving good teaching when offered, but never trusting someone else’s interpretation over the discernment of our hearts. 

From an institutional perspective, direct accountability to God has never been popular in church history, and cries of anarchy are raised at its mention. Instead we’ve entrusted our security to church councils, creeds or religious hierarchy, even though all these mechanisms have at various times led down paths far from the mission and character of Christ.

Jim Peterson shows, in his compelling book, Church Without Walls, that the major reason religious structures amass power is their desire to be the arbiter of truth. Yet, “Jesus never said or did anything to indicate that structure and organization could serve to protect God’s people… [He was not] against structure. It is neces­sary, as we shall see, but for protecting his people, he had some­thing far more trustworthy—the Holy Spirit.”

It would not be an overstatement to say that all heresies and abuse have come from those who would be leaders over the church of Jesus Christ. And it is usually not long in the formation of a religious tradition for people to use it to satisfy their own preferences, rather than help them stay true to the gospel. Even the early church evidenced this problem. 

From a personal perspective, direct accountability to God has never been popular either. It seems that we would prefer to subscribe to the dictates of a religious tradition, rather than to risk walking with the living God. We give up our own study of scriptures to get fed by our pastor or favorite teachers. Parents abdicate their role of discipleship to the church program. And instead of helping the needy we refer them to church counseling programs when all they need is someone to love them and take a personal interest in their lives. This is the road more traveled, because our flesh prefers the path of least resistance and risk, to firsthand accountability to God. 

But intimacy doesn’t work without unmediated access to God. All lines of accountability in the New Testament are clearly drawn between God and the individual. We will each stand or fall before him based on our response to his work through our conscience, and will not be able to point fingers at political or ecclesiastical authorities for our deception or lack of obedience. The awareness of that responsibility will lead us to listen carefully to other believ­ers, and to weigh the counsel of those who may be further down the road than ourselves. In the end, however, each of us must have the the freedom to respond to God as best we see fit. No church tradition or leader can usurp that place. 

Far from freeing us to do whatever we want to do in God’s name, this realization confronts us with the reality of our own struggle to know the difference between flesh and spirit. We’d much rather not sort this out on our own, but follow someone else’s prescription for relationship. But none will suffice. Our flesh gravitates to the path of least risk and resistance, and will even abuse any prescription in an effort to hide behind it. 

In order to grow in intimacy, we have to face the power of our own self­-preferring nature, that exalts itself above God’s purpose in its quest for comfort and satisfaction. Here the battle for inti­macy is won or lost.

Wayne Jacobsen, the Naked Church

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Authored by Wayne Jacobsen and Dave Coleman, this narrative tells the story of Jake Colsen, an overworked and disillusioned pastor, who gets transformed over time by his encounters with a mysterious man named John. This is the only narrative style book on my list and it might be a great tool to reach people who enjoy this style of writing. This book is available for purchase but it’s also available as a free download in English, Russian, Spanish, Dutch, German and French. To download your free copy go here. You can also go to Wayne Jacobsen’s website, check it out here. An excerpt from the book is below.

“The church is God’s people learning to share his life together. It’s Marvin over there and Diane back here. When I asked Ben about your life together he told me about your meetings, but nothing about your relationships. That told me something. Do you even know Roary’s greatest hope or Jake’s current struggle? Those things rarely come out in meetings. They come out in the naturalness of relationships that occur throughout the week.” 

“But we’re too busy for that,” Marvin’s wife, Jenny, added. “We try to do that when we get together.” I knew what John was going to say before he said it, “And is it working?”
“Is what working?”
“Are you accomplishing all of that in your meetings?” 

“Not very well, but we’re trying to learn to do it better.” 

“And we’re still talking about an ‘it’. We humans are notorious for taking something Scripture describes as a reality, giving a term to it and thinking we’ve replicated the reality because we use the term. Paul talked about the church that gathered in various homes, but he never called it ‘house church’. Houses were just where they ended up in their life together. Jesus was the focus, not the location. As I said, you can have all the right principles and still miss his glory in the body.”

“Now that is depressing,” Jenny said teasingly and the others laughed. “Why do you say that?” John asked. 

“Because we’ve been trying for nine months to get this right and now it all seems so futile. Maybe we should just go back to a traditional church and make the most of it.” The groans around the room indicated that wasn’t likely. 

“What I’m trying to get you to consider is that body life is not something you can create. It is a gift that Father gives as people grow in his life. Body life isn’t rocket science. It is the easiest thing in the world when people are walking with him. You get within twenty feet of someone else on that journey and you’ll find fellowship easy and fruitful.” 

“That’s what we’re looking for. We thought that when we got church right we’d all have the relationship with God we’re looking for,” Marvin broke in. 

John continued, “Just consider that you’ve gotten it backwards. No church model will produce God’s life in you. It works the other way around. Our life in God, shared together, expresses itself as the church. It is the overflow of his life in us. You can tinker with church principles forever and still miss out on what it means to live deeply in Father’s love and know how to share it with others.” 

“That’s not how I learned it,” Laurie offered. “How are we going to know how to live in God’s life if someone doesn’t show us?” 

“That’s where religion has done the most damage. By making people dependent on its leaders, it has made God’s people passive in their own spiritual growth. We wait for others to show us how, or even just follow them in hopes that they’re getting it right. Jesus wants this relationship with you and he wants you to be an active part in that process.” 

“But can we do it on our own? Don’t we need some help?” Marsha asked. 

“Who said you’re alone? Jesus is the way to the Father. As you learn to yield to his Spirit and depend on his power, you’ll discover how to live in the fullness of his life. Yes, he’ll often use other people to encourage or equip you in that process, but the people he uses won’t let you grow dependent on them. They wouldn’t dare crawl between you and the greatest joy of this family—a growing relationship with the Father himself.”

“That’s what I’d rather have talked about tonight. So many groups I’m with are continually trying to figure out the best way to do church. What if we spent all that time and energy focused on the Father’s love, what Jesus is doing in us, and how we can live more freely in his Spirit? Then we’d know how to love each other. We’d be honest and open and support each other on this journey. Our focus would be on him, not ourselves and our needs, and some amazing things would happen.”

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This is a great study guide for those interested in how the State historically has impacted the Church. Leonard Verduin writes with great insight and detail, making this book highly valuable for those trying to understand how the Church drifted so far from the teachings of Christ. Below is an excerpt describing the major transition that happened under Constantine.

The movement toward “Christian sacralism” began in A.D. 313 with the promulgation of the Edict of Toleration (also known as the Edict of Milan because it was first published in that city). This edict declared the Christian religion to be religio licita (a permitted cult), a status it had not had before. The immediate effect was the cessation of persecution, for the edict made the old charge of sacrilege-treason no longer possible. This change of climate allowed the Christians to come out of hiding, and it became apparent that the followers of Jesus were far more numerous than anyone had surmised. Through the Edict of Toleration the God of the Christians received space in the yellow pages. It could have been foreseen, however, that it would not sit right with the Christians to let him become one of many: their God was a God that ends all gods. The Christians continued to urge people to renounce the ancestral faith and its gods, embrace the one and only, and come to baptism.

As a result of either this intransigence on the part of the Christians or their unexpected numerical strength, soon after the Edict of Toleration a second edict was enacted that made Christianity the one and only legitimate faith. Christianity became the “right” religion, and all the rest were by implication “wrong.”  This sudden change of fortune for the Christian cause was largely the work of the emperor Constantine. For the part he had played in that mighty change he has been known ever since as Constantine the Great by all who think the Constantinian change was a benefaction for the cause of Christ. We must take a close look at that change to see whether such a high appraisal of it is warranted.

There is no evidence that Constantine had the faintest conception of progressive grace or the remotest understanding of authentic Christianity’s unique structuring of human society. All that happened was that the roles were reversed: the Christian faith now occupied the place from which the ancestral
faith had been expelled. Whereas Christianity had been persecuted hitherto, it now found itself in position to do some persecuting of its own-which it began at once to do. 

Elegant church structures, forerunners of the medieval cathedrals, were built at public expense, frequently on the ruins of an earlier shrine to some pagan deity.  Sunday, the first day of the week, which had been known to the early church as the “Lord’s Day,” was now proclaimed a legal holiday with the pagan name “day of the sun.” This return to the pre-Christian name for the Christian day of rest was no doubt due to the emperor’s continued reverence for the sun as a deity.

Constantine began at once to subsidize the Christian church with lavish money payments, and functionaries of the church were paid out of the public treasury. This led to an unholy scramble for appointment, often by persons who had neither theoretical nor experiential knowledge of the new faith. This scramble was accelerated by a decree that freed all clerics of public burdens, such as the paying of taxes.

It is quite clear that Constantine promoted the new faith mainly for its “immeasurable benefit to the commonwealth.” He has left no evidence that he placed any high value on Christianity’s doctrine of sin and grace, divine forgiveness, pardon and renewal, or love and mercy. It speaks for itself that Constantine, like Plato before him, would see in the private cult of religion a frightful threat to the sacral ideal. Thus, before the Constantinian change had come full circle, the death sentence had been prescribed for either holding or attending a conventicle.

The kingdom of Christ, which the Savior in his hour of trial had declared to be “not of this world,” was now as much a kingdom of the world as any that had ever existed. The sword that Jesus had told Peter to put away was again drawn from its sheath – by men who wanted to be known as vicars of this Peter. And these self-styled vicars began at once to instruct the regnum to hack and to hew with it in the very domain from which Jesus had banished it. The kingdom of Christ now pitted army against army, sword power against sword power, and from this point on warfare was under the water of baptism, a very “Christian” enterprise. By the year 416 the army was declared closed to all but Christians. Calling down fire from heaven to destroy those who stood in the way (behavior which Jesus had rebuked in unmistakable terms) was now under the benediction of that same Christ. Not only did the church now pronounce its blessing on wars fought for political aggrandizement, as a tool for “causing the empire to wax greater and greater,” but it also began to give its support to acts of violence perpetrated in the name of religion. 

Leonard Verduin, Anatomy of a Hybrid

Highly recommended book by Robert and Julia Banks. About 260 pages, this will take some time to get through, but it’s well worth the effort. The following excerpt is so important, I hope you read this and commit yourselves to loving your new family members “for better or for worse”.

Paul frequently spoke of the church as a family. Comparing the church to the human body stresses the interconnectedness of the members and the importance of allowing room for them to minister to one another. The family analogy emphasizes the quality of members’ relationships and their care for one another. In congregations today family terms are used loosely. Members refer to their church as “a family” or “the family of God” when most have only a limited knowledge of one another-like those advertisements for various firms that project their mass market of customers as members of one large, happy family. In other congregations family terms are used in a purely spiritual sense. The bridge between members carries only religious traffic.

Paul not only used family language as his primary vehicle of expression regarding the church but he used it on a number of levels.

-NT churches-whether in smaller or larger gatherings-met primarily in people’s homes (Acts 2:43; 16:40; 20:8; Rom 16:5; 1 Cor 16:19; Col 4:15; Phlm 2).

-Paul and other apostles founded their churches primarily on converted households (Acts 11:14; 16:15, 25-34; 18:18).

-The church in the home was the basic building block of the congregation (Rom 16:23; 1 Cor 11:18, 33).

-The bond between church members is similar to that between family members (Rom 16:2, 13; Gal 1:2; 4:19; Col 4:9; Phlm 10; etc.).

-Congregations are described directly as the household of God (Gal 6:10; 1 Tim 3:15; Eph 2:19; etc.).

-The central activities of these churches were familial in character (1 Thess 5:26; Rom 12:9-10; 1 Cor 11:33).

-Ministry-whether by resident members-or visiting members-was basically modeled on a Christ-centered form of ministry exercised in the family (1 Cor 16:15; 1 Tim 3:4; 5:1-2).

So there are multiple ways in which the church is a home based, homemade, homelike affair. It can be argued that these days it is not always helpful to draw an analogy between the church and the family; so many families are abusive or dysfunctional that often people do not know what a good family is. We should remember, however, that families in the first century were just as ambiguous, if in different ways, and that the early Christians transformed the model of family life so that they could make use of it. This meant that in the best instances members became ideal fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters to one an other. Their authentic relationships developed out of their belonging to a common family, with all the resulting privileges, responsibilities, and rewards. This heightened sense of family included physical, psychological, social, and material dimensions. Members were to greet one another as a family with a holy kiss. They were to treat each other as a family by expressing affection for one another. They were to eat together on a regular basis, as a family. They were to love and care for one another, as a family should.

For some early Christians the church family replaced the original family that they had lost upon conversion. For others relationships in their churches restored or deepened the family bonds that already existed. In either case Paul intended that believers maintained a real involvement in each others’ lives that
was based on a serious commitment to one another.

What difference would it make today if members of a congregation, like the members of a family, committed themselves seriously to loving one another “for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health”? We may not live under the same roof, but, according to Paul, when I join with you in a church, I am to take care of you and you are to take care of me. You become my responsibility and I become yours. Both of us have, as Martin Luther put it, a responsibility “to become to each other what Christ is to us.”

Robert and Julia Banks, The Church Comes Home

This book by Tony and Felicity Dale is an easy read at about 115 pages. The excerpt below comes from a chapter entitled You in Your Small Corner and I in Mine and talks about sharing ourselves with others.

It is hard to enjoy any sense of “community” when we see each other a couple of times a week for an hour or so, at the most.  It is wonderful when Christians, desiring to share their lives in more meaningful ways, begin to so order their priorities that they can spend time together.

In the New Testament, the believers not only shared their time but also their possessions. None of them said that anything they had was their own, but they shared everything. Many years ago, we were challenged by A. W. Tozer’s five vows, one of which was that we were never to own anything. This means that the Lord can do what He wants with my possessions. If He asks me to give something away, it is not mine to hold on to. The principle here is stewardship rather than ownership. I need to take good care of the things that are entrusted to me. I may need to think twice before lending out my possessions to people who I know will not return them in as good or better shape than they received them. But apart from that, my material goods are not my own. Think how many resources could be released into the kingdom if we shared, for example, our power tools, our lawn mowers, or our cars.

I (Felicity) will never forget another blessing that came our way. We were newly married and one of the people in the student church that we had helped to pioneer decided that we needed a car. Unbeknownst to us, she worked for the whole summer, and then presented us with her entire earnngs. Imagine how surprised we were, how unworthy we felt, but also what an incredible blessing it was! And looking back on what that car enabled us to do as newly married students in a busy medical school context, I can see that we were able to touch many more people because of the travel time saved. She really had made her gift to Christ, and we were enabled by her generosity to live our lives more effectively for the kingdom.

Sharing ourselves is often the most difficult thing to do. Paul could say in I Thessalonians 2:8, “We loved you so much that we gave you not only God’s Good News but our own lives, too.” In our culture it is not acceptable to show weakness. We all go around wearing masks. We wear the mask of a bright smile and “everything’s fine,” when actually our marriage is falling apart. Or maybe we don’t know how we are going to put food on the table this week, or we are scared that our kids are going out control, or we feel so depressed we don’t know if we are going to make it through the day. The contrast to what has become the norm is illustrated by a passage such as I John 1:7 that tells us “if we are living in the light of God’s presence, just as Christ is, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from every sin.” There is a transparency here, a willingness to let others see us as we truly are. Openness of this sort does make one liable to be hurt at times, but all loving relationships have the potential of causing hurt. Those we love the most have the greater capacity to hurt us. Does this mean that I won’t accept love because I refuse to risk hurt? Jesus loved us so much that He laid down His life for us. Love covers a multitude of sins. It also builds us up into a living demonstration of the body of Christ.

Do we feel safe sharing our innermost selves with a trusted brother or sister? It can take a lot of courage. Or from the other side, are we able to respect confidences and to love unconditionally without judging? The book of I John is full of passages that talk about the need for us to love one another. Time and again it asks how you can love God, whom you cannot see, if you do not love your brother. Our love for God is to be measured by our love for our brothers and sisters.

Are we prepared to rise up to the challenge of meeting the New Testament standard of building our church on relationships rather than just attending meetings or being part of the program? Are we willing to be inconvenienced in our personal lives to do this? Are we prepared to take the children of the single mom for a day so that she can get some time off, or to take time to visit the person who is sick or in prison?

In John 13:35 it says that the world will know that we are His disciples when we love one another. Is it currently that surprising that not only the world, but even many Christians are dropping out of involvement with the church because they cannot find any real relationships there?

Tony and Felicity Dale, Simply Church