Just finished listening to Rob Bell’s message, “One Mind” focused on Phil 2:1-4.
Excellent.
I could probably write a lot about it but I may use some of it for our community group tonight so I’ll save it for now.
I edited down the ending though. It’s about a 10 minute clip and well worth the listen (or you can listen to the full message here):
[audio:http://www.casadeblundell.com/jonathan/wp-content/uploads/mars-hill-one-mind-rob-bell-edit.mp3]This morning at the men’s What-a-Study we talked about labeling.
We’ve all done it. Whether it’s a group of guys standing by their lockers and rating the girls that walk by… “I give that a 3.” “I give that an 8.” “I give that a 15.”
Or it’s labeling someone because of their nationality… “Well all Hispanics are the same.” “Well you know, he’s Scottish.” “Well Americans are all the same.”
Or we label by stereotypes… “Well all Hispanics are lazy and they’re all illegal immigrants.” “Well he’s from the Middle East so he must be plotting against the U.S. and our Western culture.” “Well they’re Asian so they must be bad drivers.”
When we label people we take away a piece of their humanity. It’s a lot easier to disregard someone if we don’t have to look them in the face or accept them as equals. It’s a lot easier to dismiss someone’s comments when we can say, “Well they’re an idiot.” “Well they’re white so we know he’s racist.” “Well they’re just an angry black man.”
Gen 1:27 says, we are made in the image of God. Everyone of us. Each person in your family and each person you can’t stand. All made in the image of God.
Someone very close to me told me yesterday that a co-worker would be going to court this week because they’re husband is an illegal immigrant. The husband faces deportation. “She is not Illegal herself. All this immigration mess takes on a different twist when you put names and faces to the immigrates.” It’s so much easier to dismiss 12-million people as criminals and yell and scream for them to go back home — until we see them face to face and realize we’re talking about individual people. Real people with real lives with real problems and real feelings. Just like us. Made in the image of God.
In ancient Egypt it was said that all the kings ruled in the image of their particular god. King Tutankhamun (King Tut) ruled in the 1300’s BC. His name literally means, “Living Image of (the god) Amun.” In Egypt, if you wanted to see what a god was like, you looked at that god’s king. I wonder if that could be said of each of us today? If you want to see what God is like, you look at God’s followers.
In Matthew 5:27-30, Jesus says if you lust after a woman, you’ve already committed adultery with her in your heart. Jesus connects our eyes and our intentions with the state of our hearts.
But then He says, if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. Or if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.
Because (v 29 & 30) “It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.”
Wow! That’s pretty strong language. If you lust your body will be thrown into hell? It would appear that the only other option is to pluck out your eye. Good thing we don’t take that literally or as Rob Bell says, “half the population would be without an eye in a few moments.”
But according to Bell, Jewish tradition (Eric feel free to comment on this and/or clarify) has a slightly different idea of heaven and hell.
Psalms 103:19 says, “The Lord has established his throne in heaven and his kingdom rules over all.”
Heaven is the realm where all things are as God intends them to be. How many times have we said while sitting on a mountainside in quiet, or sitting by a pond or lake fishing, or enjoying a moment along with our wife or loved one, “Oh, this is heaven. This is heaven on earth.”
What if Heaven is more than just a place we hope to go to after death, what if it’s the realm where things are as God intends them to be? What if that place can be anywhere, anytime, with anybody?
Psalms 115:16 also suggests that God has given the earth to humankind to do with it as we please (for a temporary time).
So if there’s a realm where things are as God wants them to be. There must be a realm where things are not as God wants them to be.
Heaven or __(fill in the blank)__
Think about the opposite of “Heaven on earth.”
When something is a living hell or “Hell on earth” its void of love, peace, beauty, meaning. It’s absent from the will of God.
What if when Jesus says, “It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell” He’s saying when you’re lusting after someone, something happens – something serious – something hellish. So you must avoid it at all costs.
What if he’s saying, “if you lesson the value of someone, you lesson your value of me?”
What if to be “anti-human” is to be “anti-God?”
Now imagine if you can… the possibility of heaven invading earth. Or the opposite… hell invading earth. Which would you prefer? Which do you think is happening when we devalue those around us with our labels, heated language, sharp tongues of anger?
When we don’t treat others as Christ would (a.k.a the Inverted lifestyle) it not only takes away a piece of their humanity – it takes away ours.
Jesus called us to something bigger. Something better. Something different. He called us to look beyond Jew and Gentle. Roman and Israelite. White and black. American and African. Rich and poor.
My mom’s kept a lot of my writings over the years. In fact she recently gave me a book she made of most of the columns I wrote at The Belton Journal and Harker Heights Evening Star. She even kept some of the writings I did back in high school that I received failing grades on. I’m pretty sure she didn’t keep all those writings because they were great works of art. I’m pretty sure she didn’t see an aspiring writer in me and think, “One day he’ll be famous and I can make money off these high school papers.”
I imagine she held on to those writings because she valued me. She valued the creator much more than the creation.
Bell writes, “How you treat the creation reflects how you feel about the Creator.”
To be a Christian is to work towards a new humanity. To work towards a place where the first thing we see isn’t race, culture or nationality, but where the first thing we see is the image of the Almighty God.
Thomas sent me a tweet this morning after the What-a-Study. “Only label God uses is ‘loved.'”
His message was in response to a Tweet I sent shortly after getting on the bus this morning. “We talked about labelling people this morn and here i am on the bus and ive already labled 4 people. Geeze!”
When Jesus says to love our neighbors, it isn’t just for our neighbor’s sake. If we don’t – something happens to us. And on the flip side, when we do – something happens to us as well.
Josh sent me this via e-mail over the weekend. I’m assuming it was written or spoken by Rob Bell – but I can’t guarantee it was since I no longer subscribe to the magazine. Either way – love this… love it!
“We understand the Gospel to be how you are going to break yourself open and pour yourself out for the healing of the world.â€
Rob Bell, quoted in an interview with Relevant Magazine, Jan.-Feb., 2008.
I think the problem is that when people say “church,†many mean religious goods and services where you come and there’s a nice inspiring talk, good coffee in the back, snappy music and everything ends up fine. Jesus speaks of His people who are willing to suffer and die so that the world can be healed – that’s an entirely different proposition. For us [at Mars Hill], if you can resolve the sermon in the course of the church service, then the sermon has failed. If you can resolve what’s being talked about just by listening to it, then something’s seriously wrong. The only way to resolve the church service you just experienced, and specifically the sermon, is that you’re going to have to go and wrestle with it and then live it out. Our interest is not in providing goods and services that will leave you with a well-packaged religious experience. We understand the Gospel to be how you are going to break yourself open and pour yourself out for the healing of the world.
A couple of years ago somebody I love very much, somebody very close to me, was addicted to cocaine. He was wrestling with suicidal thoughts, addiction, and was in a downward spiral. He was not going to make it. A group of us who love him begged him to come to my house. He came over, and we all sat in a circle in my living room and begged him to get help. We literally pleaded for his life. One of the guys in the circle said, “I’m here. I’m going to be with you every day through this.†Another person in the circle said, “You know what? You can come live with me. I struggled with addiction, and I know what you’re going through trying to get clean. You can have the downstairs bedroom in my house, and I’ll make sure you get up every day. I’ll make sure you get to recovery meetings.†Eventually, he was able to get clean, and since then has totally turned around.
To me that is church. Church is when you are sitting in your living room with people who would give their lives for each other. So I don’t have any time or tolerance for nice services where we feel good about ourselves and give a little bit of our money to some people over here or there. To me, church is the people whom you are journeying with, and I think we are already seeing all sorts of new understanding of what that looks like. It has nothing to do with the building you’re meeting in; it has nothing to do with the name. It has nothing to do with how great your website is – it’s about the new humanity. It’s about people connecting with each other at the deepest, deepest levels of our being.
You have to challenge everything, and people should challenge Mars Hill. We have these giant services with thousands of people, and I think that public gatherings beyond 10 or 20 should be questioned.
My sister-in-law Jen bought me a copy of Rob Bell’s Sex God for Christmas, apparently Laurie may have given her a hint or two ;-).
I’m loving it!
I know some people who are turned off by the title, turned off by the table of contents and turned off by the idea of Christians selling books about sex, talking about sex or even thinking about sex.
Oh well. Don’t buy the book then. But for those of you who don’t judge a book by it’s cover or title, here’s a summary from Publisher’s Weekly:
Bell raises the bar with this evocative follow-up to last year’s bestseller Velvet Elvis. “Is sex a picture of heaven?” he wonders. It’s all about God and sex and heaven, he says: “…they’re connected. And they can’t be separated. Where the one is you will always find the other.” Bell’s book isn’t a sex manual, an exploration of the differences between men and women or a marriage how-to, though all of that is here. Instead, it’s the story of God becoming human, of humans mirroring God and love made manifest in the chaos of our humanity. Sex God is about relationships revealed in a way that elevates the human condition and offers hope to those whose relationships are wounded. In Bell’s spare, somewhat oblique style, he addresses lust, respect, denial, risk, acceptance and more. His love for God and the Bible is clear, as is his ability to ask probing questions and offer answers that make readers think deeply about their own lives. He does a fine job using the Bible and real life to show that our physical relationships are really about spiritual relationships. This book joyfully ties, and then tightens, the knot between God and humankind.
I’m a little more than halfway through the book and really want to comment on it now, but I think I’ll wait till I finish it up. But let me leave you with this GREAT quote from chapter one, God wears lipstick:
How you treat the creation reflects how you feel about the creator.
…When Jesus speaks of loving our neighbor, it isn’t just for our neighbor’s sake. If we don’t love our neighbor, something happens to us.
Share love.
I got a link to this parody video of Rob Bell’s video Bullhorn, a video I’ve shown to several groups, including our community group.
I’m trying to decide, did I miss the point of the parody, or did they miss the point of Rob Bell’s video?
Friday night, Laurie and I went with Brian and Heather to hear Rob Bell speak on his “The God’s Aren’t Angry Tour.” We weren’t entirely sure what to expect. I think Brian and I had a basic idea, he would talk – without PowerPoint, or visual aids and would be fairly good at it. I think Laurie and Heather may have had an even lesser idea of what they were going to. Heather tried to explain it to someone as a “not a conference.”
In the end I walked away curious, contemplating and amazed. Bell spoke for nearly two hours without notes, a chalk board, white board or any other visual aids other than a replica of an alter on the stage.
He dressed in plain clothes – black jeans, a black shirt, white belt and tennis shoes. And he walked onto the stage, applauded the audience and went right into his message. There was no, “Thank you Dallas.” No, “I’m so glad you’re here.” Just the message he plained to give.
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