The View from the West Mesa

The Great Commission in Matthew’s Gospel charges the Apostles and the church to make disciples. Have you ever wondered why the Commission is worded this way? Often I think we equate “disciple” with “Christian” and then equate “Christian” with “churchgoer.” We think we have “made a disciple” when we have made a convert. This often passes as making a disciple in the modern world, but it isn’t what Jesus meant. Jesus told his disciples that he is the way, the truth, the life - not just for them but for the whole world. If any would come to the Father, they would do so by the way which is Jesus. The idea of the Way apparently gained traction outside the Bible as a name for the Christian movement. Paul in his defense in Acts 24:14 refers to his beliefs and teachings as the Way. Luke then uses the term as though it is a normative title in verse 22 when he tells us that Felix had “a rather accurate knowledge of the Way….” There are definitely critical doctrinal points that Paul and the earl...

12 “And you, son of man, say to your people, The righteousness of the righteous shall not deliver him when he transgresses, and as for the wickedness of the wicked, he shall not fall by it when he turns from his wickedness, and the righteous shall not be able to live by his righteousness when he sins. 13 Though I say to the righteous that he shall surely live, yet if he trusts in his righteousness and does injustice, none of his righteous deeds shall be remembered, but in his injustice that he has done he shall die. 14 Again, though I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ yet if he turns from his sin and does what is just and right, 15 if the wicked restores the pledge, gives back what he has taken by robbery, and walks in the statutes of life, not doing injustice, he shall surely live; he shall not die. 16 None of the sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him. ...

Christianity has over the centuries often been distracted by various things, different aspects of the supposed life with God, that we have repeatedly lost track of just what God is doing in the world—in the Creation. In the tradition I was raised in, we spent a lot of time arguing against “the denominations,” and “returning to the old paths.” The idea was that God wanted us to worship and conduct our assemblies just like the first-century church and we spent a lot of time ferreting out the divine rules for “church.” The result for many of us was a sort of catechesis of Bible passages on various topics, normally focused on those things that made us different and others wrong. One of our proclamations toward those who didn’t “do church” the way we did was that they were “worshiping in error.” This was such a convenient phrase that we could use it about denominations and even those of our own groups if they did something in their assemblies or even structured themselves differently as a c...

"We don't believe something by merely saying we believe it, or even when we believe that we believe it. We believe something when we act as though it is true." D.Willard, Renovation of the Heart "A tree gives glory to God by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be it is obeying Him. It “consents,” so to speak, to His creative love. It is expressing an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree….Therefore each particular being, in its individuality, its concrete nature and entity with all its own characteristics and its private qualities and its own inviolable identity, gives glory to God by being precisely what He wants it to be here and now, in the circumstances ordained for it by His love and His infinite art." T. Merton, Silence, Joy "The correct perspective is to see following Christ not only as the necessity it is, but as the fulfillment of the highest human pos...

 Beginning a new job often involves receiving a license or some other official indication that the practitioner has official permission and authority to engage in the profession. Doctors, lawyers, nurses, various sorts of therapists, and even many clerics receive a piece of paper that grants them authority to do their jobs, and attests that they are qualified.  Scripture gives us a lot of information about Jesus’s birth but then there is very little about his childhood other than a trip to the Temple. The next time we see Him, he’s meeting John the Baptist at the Jordon. John has told us that Jesus is the One who is greater than himself and he wants people to pay attention to Jesus. Before the two of them leave the Jordan that day, Jesus will ask John to baptize him and after an initial balking, John agrees. So they go into the river and John baptizes Jesus. While they’re in the river after the baptism, an amazing thing happens—the heavens open like they did when the angels an...

God says through Paul in the first Corinthian letter that love never fails. We can all agree when things are going well that love never fails, but Paul’s admonition is most critical when the world isn’t going well.  Here is what we are told, “love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.”  Paul wrote this to a congregation or set of congregations of the people of God, folks attempting to live as disciples of Jesus. They were failing at the very core of their practice, love for one another. It didn’t look that way to them. They thought they were OK in their cliques, their ignoring and abusing of each other, of their picking sides aligned with their favorite preacher. What they were doing every day seemed rational...