Comments on: Give Up Your Good Christian Life and Follow Jesus http://gracerules.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/give-up-your-good-christian-life-and-follow-jesus/ Live Simply. Love Generously. Care Deeply. Speak Kindly. Sat, 25 May 2013 03:21:26 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: wernerschwartz http://gracerules.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/give-up-your-good-christian-life-and-follow-jesus/comment-page-1/#comment-4725 Wed, 06 Mar 2013 15:09:32 +0000 http://gracerules.wordpress.com/?p=2397#comment-4725 Reblogged this on wernerschwartz.

]]> By: giromide http://gracerules.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/give-up-your-good-christian-life-and-follow-jesus/comment-page-1/#comment-3995 Thu, 09 Aug 2012 20:42:57 +0000 http://gracerules.wordpress.com/?p=2397#comment-3995 You might find this a good read: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2012/08/13/120813crat_atlarge_gopnik?currentPage=all&src=longreads

]]> By: peacejusticelove http://gracerules.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/give-up-your-good-christian-life-and-follow-jesus/comment-page-1/#comment-3986 Wed, 08 Aug 2012 22:03:18 +0000 http://gracerules.wordpress.com/?p=2397#comment-3986 I too often feel the call to leave the organized church , but then I pray about it, and realize the organized church needs to hear from people like me, and not ignore those within the church who are interested in social justice, peace, those whom Jesus called out to in, The Sermon on the Mount. It pains me to hear some of the things I hear from Christians, but realize I have a log in my eye, and am on a journey, and must not judge others. I must forgive over and over too. I do go to many other social justice events locally (encourage my class members to go with me), working in a kitchen for homeless in our downtown urban core, listening to sojourners give healing stories in a homeless shelter/church; changing payday loan laws to stop predators of the poor and those in the margins (by working with a group of Christian Organizing Organizations that go beyond piety and individual faith to doing what many call: “bringing the kingdom of heaven here on earth.” I do cross bridges to people who are different than I am–people of color, of different religious faiths, old people, young people, gay people, straight people, all the people I can meet with and remain sane and whole myself. I am concerned about the violence in our American society, and do not believe the organized church is doing much about this area, I feel in my heart Jesus, the man would be, God is, Holy Spirit in the mysterious Trinity are concerned about violence. Michael Hardin in the Jesus Driven Life explained many Bible verses in his Mennonite tradition that have helped me
to understand that maybe we Christians have gotten the violence thing wrong since Constantine swallowed up the Church with Empire and Onward Christian soldiers type ideology. Brian McLaren, Richard Rohr, Jan Richardson, as well as Gulley and Mulholland are some of my favorite, inspirational Christians to read and ponder. Church is the people, not a structure. I know the most about Christian history, art, poetry, theology, U. Methodist tradition, and the Jewish traditions it is related to, but not much about Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists. I honor and respect other faith traditions, but I realized long ago it will take me my lifetime to journey on this Christian pathway–through experience, tradition, Bible, knowledge, prayer, patience, foreberance, struggle, faith, hope, love. I like that you are on the journey to be the hands, heart to bring “kingdom of heaven to earth,” with God’s mysterious, amazing, interventions.

]]> By: giromide http://gracerules.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/give-up-your-good-christian-life-and-follow-jesus/comment-page-1/#comment-3985 Wed, 08 Aug 2012 16:15:38 +0000 http://gracerules.wordpress.com/?p=2397#comment-3985 Jesus brought believers freedom for the kind of apparatus of which the Jewish leaders of his day were a part. His life and death allows each of us to maintain a personal relationship with God that ultimately cannot be controlled via any religious authority.

As to following Jesus, keep in mind two strong themes of his life on Earth: harshly criticizing religious authorities and even his closest disciples, and putting himself among those the religious authorities deemed unclean, unworthy, and hopeless. I recall a sermon a year or two ago that stressed that were Jesus to walk the Earth today, he would not hang out at churches, but rather in crack dens and shelters.

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