I'm reading this book....
The Irresistible Revolution
It's about living the Christian life like God did. The author Shane Claiborne is a young guy who decided to start living what he read in the Word. So he started hanging out with homeless and giving all he had to the poor. I am so challenged by him. Because he's right! God did say to give up everything I own. God did say to make my self last in order to be first. God did say to love the poor and the sick. And if love is really what 1 Corinthians says it is, then I'm not doing it. I can't even love my enemies. I complain because I can't afford ice cream, but what about those that are truly poor.
Shane lived with the homeless of Philadelphia. He worked in Calcutta with the same mission as Mother Teresa. People call him a radical, but he's only doing what God told all of us to do. Maybe we don't all have to work in leper colonies. But we can't even love those who hurt us. We can't even give more than 10% to help out those who need it more than us.
He challenged my thinking on one specific philosophy I hold. I always believed the statement "Give a man a fish and he's hungry tomorrow. Show him how to fish will never be hungry again." So I don't give to beggars. I want to discourage them from expecting people to provide for them! What a selfish non-Christ-like thought.
Shane talks about how Jesus worked. He raised Lazarus from the dead, but he died a few years later. He healed the lepers, but they died eventually anyway. He gave fish and bread to the hungry, but the next day they were hungry again.
If I want to live like Christ, then I need to stop reasoning in my head. God said to love.... somehow I think that means using my heart. They remember the love. I wasn't commanded to save the world. I wasn't commanded to find excuses not to give. I was commanded to love. And even if it doesn't make since to you. I'll do it. I'll love them. I'll give all of myself to them.
I'm going to be someone who only studies Christianity.
I'm going to live it.
Come on, read the gospels. You try to reason away why "giving it all up" doesn't apply to you. You "love" people... ha.
Think about what love really is supposed to look like.
What did it look like when Jesus did it?
1 comment:
Rich Mullins said: "You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too...[And he paused in the awkward silence.] But I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."
it's so true. great post!
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