Alan Hirsch...
Here's a snippet:
Here’s what I think: Christianity minus Jesus equalls religion. And this happens in more churches than we are given to believe. We marginalise Jesus all the time and in so many subtle ways. And we do this because dealing directly with Jesus (or God for that matter) is always a disturbing thing to a sin-wracked people who would prefer a stable, more controllable, religion. Like all living systems, churches seek equilibrium. We want to settle down. We want to bolt down the Revelation and make God understandable, accesable, and therefore more controllable–a ‘God-on-tap.’ Sociologists call this ‘the routinization of charisma’ (google that!) and it is written through the structures of all religions including our own.
But Jesus disturbs our equilbrium. He won’t be controlled. He won’t be handled only by priests and professional religionists. He won’t be domesticated. He is Lord! Yes, Jesus is our disequalibrium. And the way back to an authentic Christianity is simply to put Jesus back into the equation. Christianity plus Jesus equals World Transformation.
Also he has a book due out soon - called 'The Forgotton Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church'.
Comments
My appologies.
Here it is in a nutshell. Many blogs talk about balance. I like the thought of how Jesus disturbs our equlibrium. So what about balance? It seems that balance in some regards is compromise. I maybe way off but comment about balance in ministry and the equlibrium quote.