Review of “Prototype” by Jonathan Martin

22 Feb

Contrary to popular belief, Charlotte is big enough for both Jonathan Martin and myself. I am not speaking of our egos or personalities—I’m talking about our literal size. Jonathan is 6’6 and I’m 6’4; meaning, when we walk into a restaurant people stare. Height isn’t the only thing we share in common. We are both the sons of Pentecostal preachers. We both share a love of NBA basketball and the culture surrounding it. We both like hip hop. Despite the misgivings of the Pentecostal church, we still are a part of the movement. We both are academic. In other words we would certainly be paired in a “eHarmony compatibility test.”

Jonathan has become an older brother figure for me. He’s a little older, a little taller, and a lot wiser. Because we share a city, we make it a point to get together as often as possible to hang out. It was at one of these meetings that he gave me a copy of his upcoming book, Prototype. So for the next couple paragraphs allow me to brag on my big brother.

The book is genuine. There is not an ounce of pretentiousness in it. Jonathan’s openness and vulnerability is refreshing. He offers his own story as a gift and this is not the kind of thing you expect from a “big shot” pastor. The tenderness with which he writes gives me hope that I don’t have to be anything other than myself. Even in (especially in!) my obscurity and woundedness, Jesus is there.

The book is bold. He takes direct aim at the false images we carefully craft for ourselves. The reality of our belovedness as our only identity permeates the book. He quotes Jay-Z and Herbert McCabe. Bruce Springstein and Annie Dillard. Dr. Suess and Soren Kierkegaard. Bono and Henri Nouwen. Perhaps this is how he got Stanley Hauerwas and John P. Kee to endorse the same book.

The book is lived. The pages are not the abstractions of an academic. Rather, the book comes packed with stories out of a messy community in Charlotte. There is no PR for Jesus or ministry here. The book bears witness to what God is doing in the life of Jonathan and Renovatus. It is a “ground level” experience that allows the reader to live with the tension that marks any genuine pursuit of God.

The book is uniquely Jonathan. I joked with my pastor last week that the book could really be titled “Jonathan Martin: the memoir of a giant pastor.” This book is a peek into the heart of a wonderful human being and I recommend it with the highest degree of enthusiasm.

(Buy the hard copy of this book because you’re going to want to pass it along to the people that matter to you.)

Pre-order here.

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Marketing Jesus

11 Feb

I overheard a conversation this morning at a local coffee shop between two small business owners about marketing strategies. Very matter-of-factly, they spoke about ways to garner more customer engagement and, in turn, dollars in their bank account. It was a very typical conversation and hardly worth writing a blog about if taken in isolation. The thing that really made the hair on the back of my neck stand up was the striking similarity in this run-of-the mill marketing conversation and the conversations I hear pastors having. Both are using similar language. Both are reading Jim Collins and Malcom Gladwell. Both are after growth. Both want excellence and success. Both have to compete to be relevant in the market. Both are employing the same tactics–excellent print design, a slick website, clever social media campaigns, quick follow up with new customers, and existing customers spreading the word about the product.

All of this scares me and leads me to think we’ve got a gospel problem in the Church. I think we have commodified Jesus into a product and made the gospel into a sales pitch. Churches have become cleverly disguised businesses that sell their product. The measureables of Disney World and many churches are interchangeable. Each wants butts in seats, dollars in the bank account, an incredible customer experience, and a customer desire to come back for more. If you look at the consumer culture around us this is not shocking. Everything is screaming at us to buy a product. And like every insidious evil thing, it looks wonderful from the outside.

We have bought into the lie that if we want to reach this consumer culture we’ve got to bow to it. In order to reach people that are rabid consumers, we have to give them an excellent product in order to compete.

The gospel was never meant to be a sales pitch. The Gospel is an announcement. The Gospel announces that the Kingdom of Heaven is here and that Jesus is King over the whole earth and that because of His life, death, resurrection, and ascension we are invited to experience salvation and join Him in His work here and now. We are not called to be a sales rep for Jesus. We are called to bear witness with our lives to the power of the gospel. You bear witness with the sum total of who you are. You proclaim the truth of Jesus as King with your story and with radical love.

I’m not saying that churches shouldn’t have promotional material. I’m not saying that the church shouldn’t have an accountant. What I’m saying is that we have commodified the gospel and made it into something it never was. We’re not trying to trick people into signing up for Amway. We are bidding the broken sinner the same invitation Jesus gave us–to drop our nets and follow him. It will cost everything and it will be worth it.

We’re reading through the book of Acts right now as a church and I want that. I want there to be healing in our midst. I want the broken to be set free. I want thousands to be baptized and added to our number. I want people being transformed progressively into the image of Jesus. I want the power of God to be evident. I want to see people full of the Holy Spirit. You can’t have any of that without the direct involvement of God. Our production teams for Sunday services can’t make that happen. Lights, smoke, and a really great band won’t make it happen. Only God can.

Jesus is the hope of the world…not our marketing efforts for him.

Ordinary.

30 Jan

I had a 80-year-old physics teacher in high school named Mr. Webb that would read motivational statements off a bookmark to encourage “struggling students.” He was known to be a bit rough around the edges, so the administration figured a bookmark with 100 motivational statements would help him be more uplifting. So whenever a student would answer a question completely wrong, he, in the most sarcastic manner, would pull out the bookmark and read something like “you’re extraordinary.”

Everyone, seemingly, wants to be extraordinary. No one wants to be perceived as average. I’m not sure if this is something intrinsic to our human nature or something that has been imparted to us in adolescence and, to be honest, I didn’t listen enough in psychology to give you an answer. I do know that I’ve never heard an impassioned plea from a parent, teacher, or coach imploring a kid to “go out there and be average.” This kind of thing is good, I suppose. Perhaps it’s simply motivational rhetoric that could move someone out of their lethargy. I digress.

A few days ago I was reading Acts as a part of Center City’s Life Journal Reading Plan. This verse stuck out to me particularly:

“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.” (Acts 4:13)

This is the same Peter who in the previous chapter healed the crippled beggar outside the temple saying “silver or gold I do not have, but what I have I give you. In the name of Jesus of Nazareth get up and walk.” This is the same Peter that told a group of onlookers after the healing, “you killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead.” This is the same Peter that people dragged the sick into the streets in hopes that his shadow would pass over them and heal them.

Unschooled. Ordinary.

How could ordinary men walk with such confidence and power? (If this is the definition of ordinary, I want it to be ordinary.) Look at the last part of the verse. The people were astonished and they took note that Peter and John had been with Jesus. That’s it. Spend time with Jesus and watch what happens to your life. If you lack boldness or courage, spend time with Jesus. If you lack the faith to believe that God is who He says He is, spend time with Jesus. If you feel stuck, spend time with Jesus.

I’m not into formulas but this seems to be one that works.

Will all of life’s problems go away? Absolutely not. These same men were imprisoned, flogged, and beaten in the next chapter. But, “the apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name. Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.” When you have spent time with Jesus it’s impossible to have the same perspective. Everything is different. Even your suffering is seen through a different lens. Jesus has that effect on people.

So spend time with Jesus and watch what happens. I dare you.

“I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” (John 14:12)
-Jesus

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Do Something.

29 Jan

“We care more about you than what you do for us.” We say that to folks a lot at Center City–and for good reason. Essentially we’re saying, “we care about you as a human being beyond your functional role here. You are more than a door greeter.” It is an important thing to communicate to people.

I am sick of “functionary relationships.”
Hello (insert function), I am (insert function).

These types of conversations don’t interest me much. I like talking to people–to souls for that matter. C.S. Lewis said (as I wrote about earlier in an earlier post), “you have never met a mere mortal.”

However, I think we need to be careful when make blanket statements like “God cares more about you than what you do for him.” My friend Steve Witherup says that sometimes you must reject the premise of an either/or proposition. If someone asks me if I am married or if I have brown hair, I would obviously reject the either/or nature of the questions and say both. I think that applies here. See, when we make the aforementioned statements we are pitting one thing against the other. We are saying that what we do is divorced from who we are. This premise, I believe, is a false one.

I am reading a book by NT Wright about the nature of Christian character and virtue. His contention, as well as the belief of many others, is that what you do is intrinsically tied to who are. A belief otherwise is due to what I believe is an anemic gospel message. It is a message that sounds wonderful, and it is. It’s just limited. It is a gospel that says God is only concerned with your eternal destination–as if God only cares about two days of your existence: the day you are saved and the day you die. The Gospel is more than that. The Gospel deals with all of life’s DNA. There is not one thing on the earth that the Gospel doesn’t affect. This clearly would include your character. When you accept Christ’s invitation for salvation you haven’t arrived. You have been put on the right path for the beginning of a journey. Don’t hear what I’m not saying. I am not saying that we can earn our salvation or that what Christ accomplished on the cross is limited. I am saying we limit the implications of the Gospel by making it merely about our eternal status. Salvation is not just a “get out of hell free card.” It’s not just about life after death. It’s about eternal life. It’s about life before death. Jesus is both Savior and Lord. The implication of Jesus as Lord is that he rules the whole earth and his Kingdom has come and continues to come.

So, what does this mean for us? It means that God is in the process of forming (re-forming, transforming) us progressively into the image of Jesus. It means that all of life is included in the apprenticeship. It means that what you do today matters! It means that God cares about every second of your life. It means God cares about who you’re becoming. So do something. Because what you do matters.

Nike said, “Just do it.” Or as my Jordan t-shirt I’m wearing right now says, “Just Dunk It.”

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Update: Watch this!

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Super Mario and the Will of God

3 Jan

There is a curious thing that happens amongst the people of God and I feel the need to speak to it, not as an expert but as one who has fully experienced the tension. The thing to which I am speaking is the irrational fear associated with the will of God. As a pastor, I hear questions all the time like this: How do you know the will of God? How do I know I am making the right decision? What if I’m wrong? What if I miss God? Where does God want me to be?

We are all predisposed to thinking we live in a linear world. We see God’s will like a train that leaves at 11am sharp–and you better be there to get on. Once on, there are multiple stops along the way that will again give you the possibility of missing the train’s departure. So people stay in the comfortable confines of the cabin and never leave the train. They stay because they think that if they remain motionless there will be no possible way to miss the train.

The problem with that line of thinking is that God’s will becomes reduced to you being static. There is no vibrancy. Your life has the potential outcome of an old school Super Mario game. You are side scrolling through a 2-dimensional world and there are lots of things that can kill you and various pits to fall in. There is so much fear and apprehension with doing anything of meaning. Because anything meaningful you’ll ever do will come with great risk. It’s seemingly safer to do nothing. I believe this paradigm causes people who desperately want to live inside the will of God to miss it altogether.

Jesus said, seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and everything else will be added. Have we forgotten that he regards us as sons and not slaves? Have we forgotten that just as any parent loves to lavish good gifts on their children so too God loves to give good things to His children? Chad is one of our staff members at Center City. A couple weeks ago he put together a bike for his 4 year old daughter. You have never seen a grown man more pumped over a tiny pink bicycle. He couldn’t wait to give it to Allie. But we don’t believe God is like that. Somewhere burrowed in our subconscious we believe God is the headmaster at our boarding school. I guess it’s easier to believe in the cosmic-cop-god that hits you with his club every time you step out of line. The problem is, that’s not God. He gives us the freedom of choice. Notice in the story of the prodigal son, the father doesn’t chain his son to the porch. He freely gives him his inheritance, though desperately sad at his choice to leave the safety of the father’s home. We too have a choice. As long as we are seeking the kingdom and His righteousness first, we have freedom. “Where the Spirit of The Lord is there is liberty.”

So seek The Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. And seek the kingdom and His righteousness. Everything after that is up to you. What is a dream God has put in your heart? Go for it. What are you waiting on? Jesus has given you the freedom to choose. You are blessed with option A or option B. Sure, there are times when the still small voice of God will say, “No.” Obey that. Paul says in many of his letters that the Spirit wouldn’t let him go to a certain place. But he also expresses many times his desire to travel certain places and his hope for the circumstances to work out for. That’s his choice. I believe to my core that God wants you to feel the freedom of His Spirit. There is no fear in Love. Go and experience the joy of living the free life found in Jesus.

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