Perrydox.com is devoted to the pursuit of truth, whether plain or paradoxical, whether simple or sublime, or simply absurd yet absolute.
Cleaning Up the Streets
There was a gang of young men, led by a troublemaker, going around cities disturbing the peace. The federal forces always kept an eye out on such disturbances. The local religious leaders were trying to stop this gang because sometimes they would even come to their worship services and try to turn things upside down. One occasion even got a little rough where the leader of the gang chased people out. Things were getting bad.
Part of the trouble was the type of trouble this gang was instigating. It was not drugs, violence, racial hatred, and such. They were disturbing a false peace that was not really peace. What they were spreading was love and a better and deeper understanding of Scripture. By now you have figured out who this leader and gang are – Jesus and His apostles.
I saw a commercial that helped form this way of thinking. It’s a 100 million ad campaign stating “He gets us”; and even cleverly emphasizes the last two letters in JesUS. The whole point is to make Jesus relatable by, and this is my explanation, “reprogramming” and “modernizing” how we look at Jesus. I am not writing this to endorse everything this campaign is doing because I have not researched it enough. But the first time I saw it, it hit me hard. I thought it was a political campaign about cleaning up the streets from gang violence. That means it helped me to re-see Jesus, not as I always have, but as the authorities around Him saw Jesus.
If the church is going to have an impact, we must change our thinking when needed, maybe even reprogram how we view Jesus and His work. This is not a call to change the gospel, nor the work of the church. It is, however, a call to be willing to be seen differently, contrary to the status quo, counterculturally, attracting the outsiders, neglected, and despised. We must evangelize those different than us, even people our society would view as less desirable. Or as the Bible says in accusation against Jesus by His enemies, that he was a friend to tax collectors (those who disagree with us politically) and sinners (those who lives demonstrate a lack of Jesus and need of the gospel) (Luke 7:34).
The church is a gang of forgiven sinners, following a counter-cultural and counter-religious leader. Are we willing to truly and completely be His followers?
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