Chapter 6: Common Calling
“I shall be telling you all the time, but I will not tell you how long or short the way will be, only that it lies across a river. But do not fear that, for I am the great Bridge Builder.”
Discovering The Others
There was a time when I actually didn’t think it was possible to be a Christian and a Democrat. I’m just being honest here… That thought was the product of placing myself on a side and in a political camp. I didn’t start there, I arrived there. I started with what I cared deeply about and slowly, over the years, I started to believe that anyone who approached matters different than me was the enemy. All of us, if we are being honest, probably do the same. The nucleus of my reasoning was built on the subject of abortion. My viewpoint of abortion being murder meant that those that disagreed with me entered into the conversation wanting to murder the unborn. It was that simple for me, but I confess that this isn’t fair reasoning. No matter how much I disagree with it, it is not fair to assume that pro-choice ideology begins with such an evil agenda. It, as you know, begins with emphasis on the initial life rather than the life to come. Abortion is only one small example of how I did this with my politics.
I think the finish lines of rival ideologies may be opposites, but the starting lines are not necessarily that different. Both start with decency and respect, it’s just a matter of where our focus goes beyond that. My argument though is that a Christian should not and can not think this way. A christian cannot be led by secular ideologies driven by political leaders. I am conservative but I am not a little Trump. I am empathetic, but I am not a little Biden. Let the joke be on them if they want to campaign for their own discipleship. For us and the Greater Mission, we need to do everything we can to not take the bait.
When we step back from the heated discussion of the public square, there is great humor to be seen in how similar the radical left and right are. As they venture further into their opinion and lose the skill to listen to anyone but themselves, they begin to take on basic human behaviors that aren’t too difficult to pick out.
Anger, Sex, Money
Consider a thug, Can be white or black or blue or green…but someone who has no respect for the law and is laser focused on getting rich. Now meet the old timer - if Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino popped into your head that’s perfect. The thug has developed his outlook on life and the people around him based solely on experiences. The old timer has done the same. Regardless of education or concrete evidence, there is no reconciliation to be had because each one totes their own baggage as truth. Now intensify the situation and allow the thug to engage in rioting and looting. And the old timer watching the news will verbally spew “hard R, N-words” or other obscenities he watches this drama unfold. The question at this point of the story isn’t who is right or who is justified in their behavior ..or even what one of them should do in the name of humanity. The point isn’t a question at all but to rather highlight the bitterness that each of them harbors in there heart of hearts. Both the thug and the old timer are mad and that’s the most common ground one can find in today’s world. Just this past weekend I was talking with someone who I know deeply disagrees with me on many issues, but we are still friends… and as we caught up about the past year and how we were doing - anger was our most common ground.. Not at each other in that moment… but just being real with one another about what we were dealing with. I’ll remember that conversation for a long time.
The same irony of a shared anger is in the conversation of sexuality. The argument around heterosexual and homosexual desires is riddled with hypocrisy. Meet a straight, married christian man who lives with his wife. Now meet a self-identified homosexual teenager “exploring his sexuality.” It could be argued that the married man generally has more freedom to be sexually active, however both of them are subject to the same driver in their decisions. Whether one is socially justified or not, they each have the ability to give in or to abstain. They may have a different nature, they may have a different upbringing and ultimate nurture of that original nature, but they each still have a daily choice and in most cases, they are probably each dealt with the same. Just because one is in a heterosexual married relationship doesn’t give him the liberty to be an animal. Everyday is a battle for each of them because they each have false expectations built around their needs.
Foment the thought further into the focus of fiscal ethics as well. How you like that alliteration? Envision Leo playing the Wolf of Wall Street, and Denzel dealing as the American Gangster. From Wall Street to MLK Ave., from stocks to dime bags and everything in between- neither of them gives a hoot about you, me, or anyone that stands in their way. So from anger, to sex, to the almighty dollar, there is more common ground than we want to admit in all of us. To highlight the topic of Hip Hop influencing culture once more- this captivated all of us in all parts of our life. It impacted country music, it impacted pop culture, it impacted everything we know and love because it spoke about these very things in the most authentic way. So when we begin to look at what decency is and point the finger at a particular group being a radical or at a minimum “more radical” than us, we’re just kidding ourselves. At the very heart of cultural decency is the notion to conform, while radical ideology refuses. Meanwhile, radical ideology is nothing more than conforming to culture, while moral decency may very well be a blatant refusal. That’s a mouthful so said another way… If we want to fit in with culture, we conform, and to them- a refusal is radical. Meanwhile, to be radical is to conform to our present culture, and maintaining moral decency requires blatant refusal.
Ecc. 1:2 says “Meaningless! Meaningless! Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless!”
Give Something Better
If the joke is on the politicians and we can get to a vantage point of seeing the stupidity in our quarrel, then maybe we will stop taking ourselves so seriously and start taking our calling all the more serious. It’s here that we don’t just begin to see the humor but we actually get to cultivate our own. Life is such a gift and there is no better illustration than that then when we learn to be radically generous with one another. It impacts the Kingdom, it impacts society, it impacts individuals around us, and we get to have a ball doing it.
When we learn to get out of our own way and give beyond what’s “required” of us, we tap into one of the most wonderful characteristics of God. Think about the very reason God created in the first place; out of an abundance of His very being, he expressed himself tangibly. He gave the first work of art. But He didn’t just stop there, when He created the different forms of life, He created each of them in the most diverse and magnificent ways to be in harmony with one another. As Tope Koleoso put it (paraphrased), “If I were God and I created plants, I would have created 100 and been satisfied. If I were to stretch and come up with 250 I would be pretty impressed with myself, but 400,000 different species of plants!?” God loves to give out of an abundance, not out of scarcity. He didn’t just make us like plants and animals though, he gave even more to us when he gave us absolute freedom to be an autonomous human beings capable of choosing for ourself what we want to do with out life. Do we want to take the reins of our life and roll up our sleeves and make our own way, or do we want to concede and defer to the Spirit who gave us the choice in the first place? And then of course, we see God giving in His greatest act of love known to man when He gave up His own Son on our behalf. Despite us choosing our own way, God didn’t just give us His son as a sentiment for us to celebrate every Easter, He gave us a free pass into eternity. He gave us a “get out of death free” card. And when we learn to put on a fraction of his generosity we don’t just open up our home or buy a homeless person a burger, we give a glimmer of eternity to a world trapped in the trimmings of death; the bondage of anger, the false hope of sexuality and the empty house of cards built by a hard earned dollar. If hypocrisy is what pushes people away from the church then generosity is what makes them curious again. When we learn to drop our agenda and link arms with zero hope of a kick back down the road, an unbelieving world will scratch their heads and be forced to ask, why?! And that is when we get to say because He first loved us. Why do we guard our mouth? Because as He was getting spit on and carrying our cross, He guarded His. Why do we bridal our sexual cravings? Because if we can learn to control that, we can learn to control our thoughts. Why do we give our money away? Because if we can learn to let it go, we can learn to let our life go. Why do we care so much? Because while we may be heirs of a Kingdom that doesn’t belong to this world, we also know that this world belongs to the Kingdom.
There is a real temptation to bite off more than what is asked of us. While simply teaching becomes a thing of oppression and affirming masquerades as teaching, we must not only learn to teach better, but know where to stop affirming. Very quickly we can become the biggest joke of all. We teach from a place of humility and call from His authority rather than our own. If we’re going to pick a battle to engage in, if we’re going to pick a hill to die on, then we need to be ready to go all in. Case in point: As I originally wrote this there was a call on people to cancel Netflix because of the show Cuties. This is no endorsement of that show or Netflix, but if you’re going to flex the Standard here, then you need to cancel Disney+, Amazon, Hulu, and likely just go ahead and sell all devices in your home. In fact, sell your home because it is on American soil which is quickly tossing all biblical authority out of the window. My point is not for you to feel good about keeping Netflix, my point is to say we can walk in wisdom without calling for heads. We can invoke reform without doing the very thing that the Cancel culture is doing. There is a piece of irony for you - Conservative Christians object to cancel culture, until the culture becomes worth canceling. …no cancelling can’t be the answer. It must be something better.
Called to Further Up and Further In
Empathy is a good buzz word to strive for right? But we need to use that word cautiously. Empathy suggests that you either know first hand or are willing to know first hand what an individual is going through. Sympathy on the other hand allows us to simply be human and feel for people. For instance, I’ve gained sympathy for black people over the last decade, but it’s the empathy I’ve gained that has motivated me to work in a more intentional and hands on way. Sympathy can produce powerful prayer, empathy can product powerful missions. Which leads to an ultimate consideration of our sphere of influence. We are not responsible to jump into every relief effort and justice march. Social media has made our window of information too big and ultimately too far out of our control. But even in our cities, are our eyes bigger than our hearts can handle? A friend of mine recently referenced Matthew 18, specifically the part where Jesus discusses dealing with sin in the church. He said once you get to the end of Jesus’ advice, He says to treat them like a tax collector or a pagan. His interpretation of that is perhaps that Jesus wants us to reflect on His life and see that He was constantly spending all of His time with “sinners” and ultimately we should “double down” on these people when it gets to this point of rebuke. Respectfully, I don’t agree with that. There is a certain point where we shake the dust off and move on. We don’t do this because we don’t love the people, we do this because some people just won’t choose Christ. God gave us the room to make that call, but that may be the hardest thing for us to give to others. It’s ok to have empathy, but it’s also ok to have sympathy before you drown yourself in empathy.
Being called to more doesn’t always mean being called to more people, but will always mean being led more by the Spirit. In Galatians 5 it says this:
“For you were called to freedom, brother; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” But if you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another. But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.”
So as we consider our calling, I want to go further in contrasting what we so often seek in happiness verses what joy really is. These are five tangible examples to point out that I believe make some practical steps in going further up and further in on God’s calling on your life.
1. Earthly Agenda vs Kingdom Agenda
We see an earthly agenda freshly labeled as the American dream.. The curse of the American Dream is that you never truly “make it” though. There is no real finish line. There is always a new obstacle and a next goal or a looming bankruptcy. You will always be chasing happiness and only achieve it in strides.
A kingdom agenda is nearly the exact opposite. I say nearly because it’s not like you stop working hard when you put on this agenda. If anything you work harder because it’s no longer about you. The Weight of Glory comes to mind in C.S. Lewis’ carefully explained kingdom agenda. “To please God… to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness… to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son- it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is.” Or you can’t not quote Tony Evans here, he literally wrote the book on The Kingdom Agenda. Tony said “Many in our society want the benefits of freedom without its responsibilities and boundaries. They want “God bless America,” but not one nation under God.” A Kingdom Agenda operates under the rule of our mighty God. But maybe my favorite quote about a kingdom agenda in our everyday life comes from C.S. Lewis in The Horse and His Boy when he writes, “One of the drawbacks of adventure is that when you come to the most beautiful places you are often too anxious and hurried to appreciate them.” I like that one because it can be a litmus test for us.. Are you in a place where you can see the beauty around you? Or are you drowning in a world of tasks and obstacles? Are you building your kingdom, or enjoying being in His?
2. Temporary vs Eternal Philosophy
At another point in The Horse and His Boy (and yes it is my favorite book in the series) C.S. Lewis writes, “For this is what it means to be a king; to be first in every desperate attack and last in every desperate retreat, and where there’s hunger in the land to wear finer clothes and laugh louder over a scantier meal than any man in your land.”
If we are living for the temporary and fail to see the eternal bleeding into our most dreaded Tuesday, we are missing out on our calling as believers. Colossians 2:9 talks about how in Jesus is the fullness of the deity. In John 15 Jesus famously commands us in color to stay connected to “The vine.” Friends if we are staying connected to Jesus and living life in the Spirit then when the world is literally losing their minds we can be composed. When there is reason to be on the offense, we will lead the charge biblically. When push comes to shove and our convictions are being held at gun point, we will have the same courage as the countless martyrs before us. But in the normal, everyday stuff, when crap is being served up cold on every news channel, the Christians will laugh louder than any man in the land. Why? How? Because our hope is not of this world and when we believe that -it shows.
3. Paying it Forward vs Generous Giving
In the previous example, if we aren’t inviting others to the table, then we aren’t living. George Straight said it similarly, “If you ain’t lovin’, you aint livin’.” Let me ask you though, right now, in real time wherever you are, what is on your calendar next? What about after that? And tomorrow, what’s the first place you intend to go? I can bet that each of your answers centered around your needs and your plans. When is the last time you planned to be generous? When is the last time you planned to roll out the red carpet for someone for literally no reason at all other than you love them? The golden rule that we find originating in scripture says “Do to others what you would have them do to you.” (Matt. 7:12) Are you waiting for goodness to come to you before you bless others? Are you waiting for a big income before you learn to tithe or give? The verse doesn't say to treat others like they treat you, it says to do to others what you would have them do to you. What do you want? What would just knock your socks off? Go love someone that way. Because when you do that, you show the fullness of the deity to someone who may have never seen it.
4. Leading as a Heroes vs Leading as a Host
Before you excuse yourself from the category of leadership, I’d like to ask you to reconsider for a couple of reasons. We may not all enjoy the title of leader, but deep down all of us are giving permission to others to live the way we do. So what is it that you’re inviting people into? What is it that you are modeling as the path of life? You then tack on the responsibility of a believer and your leadership capacity just grew exponentially. You now are an ambassador for the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. We speak of a God of Victory and yet our lives so often model fear. As we lead others there are a few things to consider. A hero needs validation and delivers the plan, A host is validated and invites people into the plan, a hero pursues leadership as a means to happiness, a host pursues leadership from a place of joy.
5. A Set Free Faith vs A Walking Free Faith
There is no better illustration for what faith is than the jail cell illustration. If we are truly set free, then belief in that is determined by what happens next. Are we camping out in the jail cell, knowing that it’s unlocked, or are we leaving the old and walking into the new. I can’t help but wonder what Paul must’ve felt like to be stuck behind bars in such a pivotal time in history. All the apostles must have been overwhelmed and feeling trapped at different points. There was so much work to be done, so much momentum, so much persecution and all they had was the relationships in front of them and the ability to write. We may be bound in different capacities, but we are all equally privileged in different capacities as well. We may have different platforms and different audiences, but we all stand on the same perfect authority of scripture. Communicating truth confidently isn’t arrogant or pompous, it is what we are commanded to do (Matt. 16:13–20; 18:15–20; 28:18–20). What if the Church determined what was trending because of how outspoken we became? What if we carried as much pride and confidence in the gospel than the pride that’s carried in June?
1 John 1:4 says “We write this to you to make our joy complete.” What a wonderful way to summarize the reward for faithfulness within our responsibility. Not because we finally get something off our chest, but because we learn to say what needs to be said authentically, from one broken person to another and the thought of them finding the savior too.
The Gospel is the good news, that God loves you so much that he would provide both a scapegoat and a blueprint for you. The real gospel isn’t a cheap gospel - one that suggest if you do this He will do that. It’s not karma, it’s not prosperity for you. The real gospel is a free gospel, but the real gospel will cost you everything.
In our flaws, our past, our levitical let downs, we have a responsibility to point to Jesus and how He is the central theme of the entire Bible. The law exists to show us just how incapable we are of achieving salvation on our own. My entire life reminds me of that simple need of a savior. The people who lived Before Christ desperately needed a better way and Jesus is The Way. Jesus came and fulfilled the law for all of us. Today, we live in the freedom and real joy; the obedience that we could not handle was achieved in full by the person of Christ and imputed to us. That’s the gospel! If we make the theme of the Bible about the law or about ourselves, we will read a sad story with some even worse characters. It is 100% about the restoration of a broken humanity through the God-person named Jesus. When we follow Him, we leave the old life behind and find new & real life in Him. That is a difficult process, because we often love our old life. But that is faith; trusting that what He has for us is better than what we once longed for. There are literally countless examples of how unqualified I am to call myself a Christian. Anger, lust, greed... those are the everyday examples. But while religion will tell us to do better, the Gospel says “it’s done.” Faith + Doing better ≠ salvation. Faith = Salvation and that produces a desire to take on the character of Christ. We want Him and nothing else. Our past is indeed our past. That doesn’t mean I’m proud of it, but it does mean that my life is the greatest example of how the Lord takes a lump of imperfections and can sculpt it into a purpose-filled life. I have nothing to boast in but Him. Could you imagine if Jesus told us to “do better” from the cross?! But He didn’t -I’m so thankful He declared that “it is finished”. There is a belief that being a better person is the key to happiness, but the reality is that apart from life in Christ, there is no such thing as happiness that lasts.
Aisle to aisle, we have a common ground in sin. And we have a common opportunity to give the world something better. “I will not say much more to you, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold over me, but he comes so that the world may learn that I love the Father and through the Spirit within me, I’m learning to do exactly what my father has commanded me. Come now; let us leave.”
