It's all connected

Recently, I've been thinking a lot (but probably not enough) about how interconnected life is. That was a seriously vague statement, so here's what I mean: God's command to love Him with everything and to love others should be at the center of all that I do. Here's why this has come up...

My friend Ryan has cancer. I'm far from a scientist and so I have little concrete knowledge of what cancer is and does, but I know this - cells are growing and multiplying rapidly inside of his body and, if allowed to go unchecked, they would kill him. There is death there. Those cells take away life.

I just spent about 8 weeks traveling the world. On that trip, I encountered people and places and religions and customs I had never seen first-hand. While observing people practice their religions (Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism) I was struck by how their religious behavior was first and foremost an attempt to appease, and was motivated by fear of a god or gods who give or take away life.

I encountered people whose lives were, by my standards, filled with misery - poverty, sickness, oppression, abuse. Who were mistreated by any host of authorities - from parents to the government. I also met people who were daily working to bring them life (one of these people, who is working to bring life to refugee women in Jordan, writes about here experiences here).

And because I'm finishing my trip with a week at home and have lots of time on my hands, I've been working out rather heavily, pushing my body to the point of extensive soreness for the sake of obtaining health - of prolonging and improving life. The discipline of regular exercise, of eating healthily, of regular Bible study and prayer, of simplicity in what I own and generosity in what I give... all of these things bring life (and were taught by Jesus, essentially) and are things that I find SO incredibly difficult. (Ever looked around at how many Christian leaders are obese... how could we as a church make bodily sins like sexual sins such a huge deal and give ourselves a free pass to be as sinful as we want with our physical condition?)

I was reading an article by Scot McKnight that was recommended to me today, and it stated clearly what I'd been dancing around in my thoughts recently. McKnight is writing about how to bring the gospel to this generation of young adults (me!). He is saying it isn't done through rigid teaching of salvation or hell (sign on with us or pay the consequences) and it isn't found in a merely moral examination of Jesus (social justice means buying Tom's shoes and conserving water). Instead, the message of the gospel is that, while death is happening all around us, because of the cross (and only and always only because of the cross) we who claim Christ can both be redeemed (made alive) and work to redeem. He says,

"The life Jesus lived, the life that made his kingdom vision so appealing and so potently penetrating, was the life that ended up on a cross as an atoning sacrifice. The story of Jesus, the only story the church has ever told, is the same story told by Paul, and Peter, and John, and the writer of Hebrews. It is a story of the Incarnate Son of God who sketched a vision of a kingdom that God wants for the earth ("your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven") and who made that kingdom possible by willingly surrendering himself on the cross for others. And it was the life of a body that came back to life on Easter to empower us to new life as the new creation."

(he also says a ton of other really good stuff in that article that is worth a read if you are in any way involved with adolescents/young adults and ministry... which really should be everybody...)

Most of you who read this are probably nodding right along because you've heard this a hundred times before, but here's what's been hitting me and why it's all connected. I can't continue to make decisions based on what's best for me, what makes me comfortable, what feels good, what is safe. Because Jesus "made the kingdom possible by willingly surrendering himself on the cross for others", my top priority is bringing about that kingdom and God's will on earth as it is in heaven. I cannot continue to segment my life, to claim ultimate life from God and not make letting that life transform all areas of me my daily mission.