God's Community with God's Commission, part 1

In our strolling discussion of Scot McKnight's Embracing Grace: A Gospel for All of Us, we are looking at God’s development of “a community with a commission,” chapters 6 and 7. Chapter 6 emphasizes that God’s M. O. (modus operandi, for you Latin-loving geeks) is to form himself a family, to cultivate a community, to create for himself a people to walk together through life with him. Chapter 7 explains that this community not only walks with God, but works with God. We have a task in this world to serve as God’s co-laborers in reflecting his image (being Eikons!), mediating his blessing (remember Abraham?), and expanding goodness, beauty, grace, forgiveness, creativity, love, patience, kindness, justice, compassion, generosity, and Shalom into this chaotic world of tohu va-bohu.

Collaborating Partnership: Koinonia

We opened with a story of an auto accident. From the moment the onlooker called 911, this trauma patient’s successful resuscitation was a community effort. All kinds of medics, nurses, techs, and physicians came together to contribute to a team effort toward a common goal. No individual alone could pull off such a feat. Everyone’s contribution was needed. It’s the same with “kingdom business.” God’s worldwide “Project Restoration” is multi-faceted and requires all of our participation. The Greek term the Bible uses for this is transliterated “koinonia,” which means partnership, often used of a collaborative business-partnership.

The Philippians Partner with Paul

During Paul’s travels and imprisonments the Christian community in Philippi stepped up to partner with him, even from a distance. Paul needed their help, and they needed to be helpers. They joined Paul in his labors by their prayers and their sending of financial gifts and supporting friends to his side. One such friend was Epaphroditus, whom the Embracers in Philippi sent to Paul as a “messenger and servant to [Paul’s] need” (Phil 2:25). Epaphroditus, who was representing his whole home church, came to partner with Paul, who described him as “a true brother, co-worker, and fellow soldier”—this was koinonia at its best, co-working, and co-soldiering with others.

Listen to Paul’s encouraging words: “You have done well to partner [koinonia] with me in my present difficulty. As you know, you Philippians were the only ones who gave me financial help when I first brought you the Good News and then traveled on from Macedonia. No other church did this. Even when I was in Thessalonica you sent help more than once. I don’t say this because I want a gift from you. Rather, I want you to receive a reward for your kindness. At the moment I have all I need—and more! I am generously supplied with the gifts you sent me with Epaphroditus. They are a sweet-smelling sacrifice that is acceptable and pleasing to God” (Phil 4:14-18).

Paul is grateful, so he not only responds with a letter of thanks to them, he also lifts his voice of thanksgiving to God. “Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God. Whenever I pray, I make my requests for all of you with joy, for you have been my partners [again, the word here is koinonia] in spreading the Good News about Christ from the time you first heard it until now. And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns” (Phil 1:3-6).

John Invites Us to Partner with His Group as They Partner with God

Listen to John’s invitation. He tells us at the beginning of his letter why he is writing. He is part of a community that has partnered with God in bringing life and light to the world. John invites his audience to join them in this commissioned community. “We proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard [about Jesus] so that you may partner [koinonia] with us. And we are partners with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy” (1 John 1:3-4). John is saying, in effect, “God is active in the world. He has enlisted us as his collaborators, his junior apprentices. Come, join us. Partner with us in this grand project of bringing new life to others.”

We’ve discussed that when we find our place in the story of God, when we re-connect with God and others, that we find ourselves at home, at peace with God and in sync with how we were designed to live. Here is where we find contentment. Here, John says, is where we discover joy. “Our motive for writing is simply this: We want you to enjoy this, too. Your joy will double our joy!” (1 John 1:4). To partner with other embraced Embracers as they partner with God is to posture ourselves in a place of joy. Joy like this cannot be found elsewhere.

The Greek word “koinonia” is often translated “fellowship.” The collaborative partnership this word denotes can be envisioned by thinking of “fellows” together rowing a “ship.” One fellow alone won’t budge the big ship. Just like I alone cannot resuscitate that severely injured trauma patient. But when partnered together, these fellows can accomplish big things—in the ship, in the ER, and in the neighborhood.

For more on the ethical and social implications of "partnership" with God in light and love, check out these (black-and-white) passages in 1 John:

• This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God [that is, if we say we are his partners] but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship [koinonia] with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin (1:5-7).
• If anyone claims, “I am living in the light,” but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is still living in darkness. Anyone who loves another brother or sisteris living in the light and does not cause others to stumble. But anyone who hates another brother or sister is still living and walking in darkness. Such a person does not know the way to go, having been blinded by the darkness (2:8-11).
• This is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another. We must not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because Cain had been doing what was evil, and his brother had been doing what was righteous. So don’t be surprised, dear brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. If we love our Christian brothers and sisters, it proves that we have passed from death to life. But a person who has no love is still dead. Anyone who hates another brother or sister is really a murderer at heart. And you know that murderers don’t have eternal life within them. We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person? Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God (3:11-19).

God's partners, those who walk and work alongside him, participate in his dissemination of life, light, and love to the world. And they do it in community. John invites us to join the growing group of followers who have partnered with him in partnering with God. This is Christianity--God's community empowered by God's Spirit to undertake God's commission in the world.

God Designed the Gospel for Us

Scot’s opening paragraphs on pages 64-65 are quite good. After re-reading these, we rehearsed God’s partnership with communities throughout the whole of the biblical narrative. Except for a brief time in the Bible’s story when Adam dwelt alone (the only thing in the early creation that God told us was “not good”!), God has lived and worked among groups of interdependent people: Eve and Adam, Abraham and his family, the 12 tribes of Israel, the nation in exile, the disciples of Christ, the dozens of home churches in the first century, and, looking into the future, “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language” (Rev 7:9). Christianity is a community affair. As important as believing is belonging. We don’t just need faith. We need family.

Is Our Gospel Presentation Sufficiently Comprehensive?

It is common in our culture to speak of salvation as an individual problem that involves just three components: the sinner, God, and entry into heaven. Here’s one common way the gospel is packaged: “If you were to die tonight, why should God let you into his heaven?” That’s it: you, God, and heaven. Another similarly reductionistic presentation is the “cross as bridge” analogy: The individual sinner is separated by her sin from God. Only the cross of Christ can bridge that divide. If she comes through Christ she can be reconciled with God and can go to heaven when she dies.

There are beautiful truths, but are they sufficiently comprehensive? What about God’s reconciled community? When I reconnect with him do I also integrate into his family? Am I embraced by his children? Or am I left alone, isolated and disconnected? What would it mean to say “God loves me” if none of his children do? I believe, but can I belong? And what about God’s transforming work in the world? When I get right with God am I myself a recipient of transformation? Can I be liberated from my selfishness, my prejudices, my incapacities? Do I become more like Christ? Do I recover the image of God? And what am I then to do? What if I don’t die tonight? Do I just wait idly for heaven? Do I not have a role as God’s agent in the world? Am I not useful? Can I not contribute? Am I not to partner with him in his ongoing work? And is heaven the ultimate destiny of all things? What about the creation which he pronounced as good? Will it be destroyed or renewed? Was Plato right, is matter itself evil?

Is was these kind of questions which prompted Scot to write Embracing Grace: A Gospel for All of Us. By tracing the story from the creation of Eikons, through the disruption of harmonious relationships, to the restoration of the image of God in communities worldwide, to the final consummation of all things, we are discovering the richness and comprehensiveness of the gospel. For more on this, listen to Scot’s lectures, here or on CDs in our basket.

Come and See: The Gospel’s Performance

We read the story of John Wesley, pages 68-69. (For an overview of his life, teachings, and influence, see the Wikipedia article here.) Wesley’s best argument for the truth, vitality, and authenticity of the Christian faith is the experience of Christian community. Do you wonder if God is alive, at work changing people? Well then, “come and see.” Are we, God’s family, not the showcase that demonstrates what God can do in the world? This section of chapter 6 complements nicely with what we learned in chapter 1 about the performance of the gospel.

As we mentioned earlier in our discussion, this relational, communitarian aspect of Christianity has a particular appeal to today’s increasingly post-modern culture. This is in agreement with the late theologian Stan Grenz, who wrote:

With its focus on community, the postmodern world encourages us to recognize the importance of the community of faith in our evangelistic efforts. Members of the next generation are often unimpressed by our verbal presentations of the gospel. What they want to see is a people who live out the gospel in wholesome, authentic, and healing relationships. Focusing on the example of Jesus and the apostles, a Christian gospel for the postmodern age will invite others to become participants in the community of those whose highest loyalty is to the God revealed in Christ. Participants in the inviting community will seek to draw others to Christ by embodying that gospel in the fellowship [koinonia] they share.

A Primer of Postmodernism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 169.

This sounds like John. “Come join us who have joined up with God and his son Jesus.” (Grenz, in fact, wrote a mid-level theology textbook called Created for Community: Connecting Christian Belief with Christian Living. His title could serve as a good mission statement for our small group, couldn’t it?)

The Cooperating Body of Christ

One of us observed that Jesus does much of his work in the world with his body (just like we do!). But his body is composed not of bone and muscle, but of you and me. We are the members who together comprise Christ’s body. We are his hands and feet in the world. This anatomical analogy perfectly communicates that we, God’s community, depend upon the participation of each of our diverse members. If you choose not to participate, it’s to the detriment of us all. Paul used this body metaphor in hopes of restoring unity to a fractured group of home churches in Corinth. See 1 Corinthians 12-14. The famous chapter of love (1 Cor 13) is embedded right on the middle of this section in order to show that our individual expression of “gifts and services” for the sake of the community’s welfare must be infused with love’s patience and kindness. Our own contributions cannot be self-serving, but must be loving if they’re to count for anything. Love is key. In fact, Jesus summarized the whole meaning of life with the word ‘love’ in two directions: Love God, love others (see Scot’s The Jesus Creed). For more on the indispensability of love, see Greg Boyd’s sermons, listed here on one of our resource pages.

Next week: “A Missional Gospel”

Now that we’ve reviewed how the communitarian aspect of the gospel is a corrective to today’s individualism and it is the way God works in the world, we’ll start next week by seeing how the missional aspect of the gospel subverts the exclusive ‘tribalism’ that has corrupted much of Christianity. If individualism focuses on ‘I’ with disregard for ‘you’ or ‘us,’ then tribalism focuses on the ‘us’ of kin or clan with disregard for ‘them,’ the ‘others’ of different ethnicity, creed, gender, education, economic status, culture, and the like. What world-wide good is community if it only serves itself? Worse still, what if the community exists to destroy everything that differs from it? Isn’t Al Qaeda a community? This is why God’s out-reaching, inclusive community is assigned a trans-tribal missional task for the benefit the world. We exist for others. See Exodus 19:4-6 and Luke 4:16-30 for the biblical basis of our global mission.

Scot opens chapter 7 (p. 74) with a nice little summary of the gospel of God’s work in the world.

What is the source of the gospel?

The triune God, the Creator and Restorer. This is his work of might and mercy. Hallelujah.

Where is the place that this work happens?

In the community, among his people. He works via relationships of mutual dependency.

What is the purpose of God’s communitarian work?

He seeks to restore fractured relationships in four-directions, and thereby restore his image among us.

What is the mission of the gospel?

We, God’s community, are here for the benefit of others and the world.