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Darren posted a review of a book that I’d like to get, called The Shaping of Things to Come. The quote that really grabbed me was:
“Too much existing bible teaching happens to passive groups of Christians, many of whom are not involved in any kind of risky missional activity.”
Kay & I went out for a lunch date a few days ago, and I shared that quote with her. Then we went on to talk about music, and I told her about an interview I read with the French group Air, sharing their view of live performances:
“To give emotion, you have to be in danger. It’s more exciting. Onstage, when you are alone, when you sing alone, when there is no music in the background, you are in danger because everybody is listening to you. For example, when I’m singing, sometimes my voice is weak. So my only chance to make some interest to the audience is to give some emotion and play on the fact that my voice can be sometimes strange and emotional. It’s the only chance that I have onstage to be interesting. And so the more you push yourself, the more you are special, and the more you give some emotion, the more you are in danger, and it’s more exciting. And when you’re scared before you play onstage, it means that you are really an artist. Because when you’re not scared, it means that you are doing some bad music.“
And suddenly, over lunch with Kay, the connection between these quotes struck me: When we’re not scared, are we doing some bad church? …What do you think?
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Exactly… no risk = no faith … really.
My copy of the book arrived yesterday – thank you, Amazon.
Can’t wait!
Rene, John Wimber used to say that “faith” was spelled r-i-s-k.
Mike, I’ll be looking for your review of the book.
Wow … bad church, huh? That is an intriguing parallel that you draw … We could all stand to be a little more scared I guess…
And to think that we don’t even face the prospect of persecution and death like the early church members faced. Yet so many of us shy away from anything even remotely uncomfortable, let alone scary. We are too often only concerned with ourselves and our futures and figure that it is up to everyone else to figure it out for themselves (“He would never buy into it… too bad for him. As long as I’m going to heaven….”).
We should spend more time in that ‘scary’ place. When we do, we know that the only one we can rely on is God. If there is risk involved we are usually not so eager to just walk into situations without first making sure that it’s really what God wants us to do. Risk keeps us closer to God, even if it starts as just a sense of self preservation.