Chapter 9

A REDEMPTIVE FELLOWSHIP

     If you think that life is humdrum and unexciting you should read the book The Adventure of Living by Paul Tournier. All of us have different tastes in literature as we do in food. Thus far I have relished everything that this eminent physician and psychiatrist in Geneva has dished up. I especially appreciate his concern for persons as indicated even by the titles of some of his better known volumes.

     The Healing of Persons postulates that the road to recovery may actually begin when the sufferer realizes the therapeutic value of deep and prayerful meditation. The Meaning of Persons affirms the difference between the real person and the personage. The latter term is used for the mask which men wear as the artificial product of culture. The Whole Person in a Broken World deals in a kind of profound fashion with the effect of the scientific method upon the whole philosophy of life. All of us, without exception, have experienced the invasion of our lives by the culture in which we battle to keep our heads above water. Not one of us has escaped the feeling that we exist in a fragmented and disoriented material universe.

     All of the volumes thus speak to our condition, but the one I first mentioned catches me up in its pages because of its incisive analysis of our problem and the prescription for remedying it. Dr. Tournier declares that at the heart of humanity's sickness lies the failure of man to fulfill himself. He further asserts that many of us fail miserably in expressing our true selves because we are always asking for and accepting cheap substitutes for real adventure.

     You can read the book for yourself. When you do you will probably be most impressed by the chapter bearing the title "The Adventure of God." It is here the author refers to God as "the great adventurer." He thinks this is implied in the very word Creator. He also suggests that the earthly adventure of Jesus was "the supreme adventure, with its supreme risk of disappointment and suffering." The chapter closes with two sentences I want to share with you. "In the Bible we rediscover the deep emotion which rekindles within us the fire of adventure. The Bible also gives adventure its true meaning, for from end to end it reveals what is at stake in all our work, all our activity, all our choices, and all our self-commitment."

     I like the author's fortunate choice of the words "rediscover" and "rekindle." The first indicates that we have lost something. The second suggests that we have allowed a valuable emotion to be snuffed out, or to die down until it no longer burns brightly. In our day of spiritual illiteracy men exhibit the power to control everything but themselves. Insane men can pull switches, and when they do the result will follow, as regulated by those switches, as certainly as it would if the most rational being on earth had manipulated the levers. The world is sick, sad and sordid. It is cold, cruel and calculating. To offset its sickness and sadness it must re-discover an emotion. To overcome its coldness and cruelty it must rekindle the fire of adventure.

     Our only hope is to return to the Bible, not simply to learn how to work, how to act, or how to choose, but to find out what is at stake in all of these. The word "stake" relates to that which is hazarded for gain or loss, but it also means a prize for which men strive in a contest. We need to know what is at stake in hfe and we can only find out by turning to the Word of God. It is a sad commentary on the way in which modern man has allowed himself to be hoodwinked by the enemy of souls that a lot of people in our day regard the Bible as dry, dead and uninteresting.

     One who devotes himself to unrelenting research of the Bible, who regularly reads it and talks about it, is often regarded as eccentric. This is a strange turn of events, for the word literally means "out of center." When applied to an individual it is used in the sense of odd, irregular or unusual. God is either the center of the universe or it is not a universe. The Bible either contains His revelation or there is none, and man is left without a polestar by which to adjust his compass.

     We are a far cry from the world of four centuries ago when there was ushered in an era of almost three hundred years in which knowledge of the Bible was considered an absolute necessity for an English gentleman who wished to succeed in life. The sacred volume was read daily in many homes. Often the children and servants were examined as to their grasp of what had been read. Memorization of vast portions of scripture was encouraged. The Book was quoted in literature, in circles of business, or street corners and in the halls of Parliament. J. R. Green, in his now famous work Short History of the English People, wrote: "England became the people of a book, and that book was the Bible." By the time of William Ewart Gladstone, prime minister under Queen Victoria, "the impregnable rock of holy scripture," as he called the Bible, had become a foundation for moral and intellectual hfe. With our modern surrender of faith and knowledge we sacrificed the spirit of adventure on the altar of "the unknown God."

     One of the most penetrating writers of our generation is Eiton Trueblood, and one of his most powerful books is Alternative to Futility. It consists of five lectures presented at the Austin (Texas) Presbyterian Theological Seminary in 1948. It is significant that Dr. Trueblood, at the end of his preface, has inscribed the words "Earlham College Two years after Hiroshima." The justification for the book was that "modern man, now come to a full consciousness of his spiritual sickness, is ready for the first time to accept a thoroughgoing remedy." I am interested in the fact that the second chapter of the little volume bears the title, "The Habit of Adventure."

     In his autobiography entitled "While It Is Day" Dr. True-blood says that he wrote Alternative to Futility after his first full year of teaching at Earlham College. He states, "It was produced with a greater sense of exhilaration than I have known in any other literary effort." He also tells how, in conferences with the editors of Harper and Row, he worked out the format which he followed in his subsequent books. A unique feature was a pertinent quotation appearing in italics at the head of each chapter. I am particularly pleased that the one chosen to head the chapter to which I referred is from Alfred North Whitehead, the professor of philosophy at Harvard University, who died the year Trueblood was writing his book. The quotation says, "Without adventure civilization is in full decay."

     Dr. Trueblood writes, "In the spirit of adventure, and by the use of disciplined imagination, we might be able to encourage a new growth, within the existent churches. We might be able to inaugurate a redemptive movement that could take our dry bones and make them live...What we require, then, is a new reformation, but not one like that of the sixteenth century, which divided Christians so sharply. We need a reformation which unites at a deep level."

     It is an unfortunate fact of life that few of those who hear prophetic voices ever allow what they say to seep down into the subsoil of consciousness. Their words are like brief thundershowers on a drouth-stricken earth. They serve only to harden the layer of surface dirt and add to the parched state of the vegetation. There are drops of spiritual moisture in the brief statement of Dr. Trueblood which should challenge us to the depths of our being. Spirit of adventure. Disciplined imagination. New growth. A redemptive fellowship. A new reformation. Unity at a deep level. There is nothing feeble about such concepts. No wonder the eminent professor who admits to being greatly influenced by C. S. Lewis called his book Alternative to Futility.

     I must confess that for a long time I kept Jesus at arm's length. It wasn't that I disliked Him. I was not really afraid of Him. As I try to think through my attitude in retrospect of those days in which I delivered sermons about Him (as you talk about a friend in a remote country whom you have never seen). I think I was really afraid of myself. By making Him an object of religious veneration, singing songs about Him a couple of times per week, and discussing His recorded words in the context of "theology" I could keep my distance and yet stay close enough to Him to call Him to hear me in case of emergency.

     Now I want to be as close to Him as possible. It isn't a matter of protection or of being on safe ground. I am just more comfortable with Him than with anyone else in the universe. This is not an easy thing. It is not conducive to a "hail fellow well met" or "devil may care" stance. It is a responsibility which keeps one on his toes, and off the toes of others. You are forced to realize that what others say about Jesus may not be valid for you. Even when they quote His words they may put a slant upon them, or be using them as a tool to build some kind of rigid mental structure which they can control.

     This necessitates your listening to Him as if no one had ever heard Him before. But one does not exist in a vacuum. All of his life he has been subjected to interpretations and opinions about what Jesus meant by what He said. He approaches the things recorded about Jesus dressed in a mental garb which others have woven, cut out and sewed together, according to a pattern they have devised, and which many of them think was provided with the fabric. It is a little like going into a supposed virgin forest only to find that all of the trees bear blaze-marks. In spite of this, I think that each of us is obligated to listen to Jesus as if no one else had ever heard Him except those who actually wrote down what He said. It is one thing to read the record of the life of a person, but a wholly different thing to allow that person to become your life.

     As for myself I can testify that it made a great deal of difference in my life and thought when I was led to really look at Jesus in what G. K. Chesterton has called "the strangest story in the world." Perhaps one of the most difficult things in this life is to accept the thought that there is anything really new. We must always compare and contrast it with something already existing, something which we have learned to handle and control. So Jesus must be compared to Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Hillel, and other philosophers, and we must sort out His pronouncements and match them with theirs. Even a new life must be the old life polished up until it shines. We can accept a philosophy which indicates most things made new, but not one which begins with "Behold!" and declares that "all things are made new." There are some old things that we would like to keep.

     We reduce Christ to "Christianity" because it has been around for a good many centuries and has been shaped and moulded by speculation and opinion until it is easily handled. Christianity now comes under various brands and trademarks. We see its varied temples upon every side. We can "walk our fingers through the yellow pages" until we come to the one we seek, neatly filed under its own special heading. It is not easy to deal with a Christ who is unchanging and unswerving. The tragedy of sectarian division is that it encourages us to dabble in the shallows of a protected pond rather than to launch out into the deep. It blunts the challenge of the faith with a faith. It too easily substitutes a system for the Savior.

THE RELIGION OF RISK

     There is an aura of glamor about the very word adventure. We think of risk and daring when we hear it. There is nothing staid or commonplace in its implications. It is unfortunate that we seldom think of it in connection with the religion of Christ. The faith has lost something vital in its modern watered down version. It is often reduced to a routine of meeting attendance and this may be carried out from a sense of duty or because of fear of divine reprisal. Actually the brand of "Christianity" with which we are too familiar has little relationship to the kind of life which was characteristic of Jesus and the primitive saints. It has lost much of its verve and most of its vision.

     We have been conditioned to a life of security and safety. Our bank deposits are guaranteed by a federal insurance corporation. Old age has its social security and pensions. We are sheltered and protected against the storms of life. Every aspect of existence has its safeguards. Religion is no exception. The result is that it has lost its appeal to the fearless and the brave. It tends to become primarily the resort of the very young or the very old--the adolescent and the aged. But the "Christianity" we see manifested is no more like the original than a stroll through the city park is like climbing the Matterhorn. The very fact that men have diluted and weakened it is proof that they cannot tackle the responsibility involved in its powerful demands.

     We hear a great many sermons dealing with the quiet life, and advocating a serene and placid disposition. These have led us to think that Christianity is a rocking-chair existence. We conjure up visions of saints as retired persons, sitting in the shade, reading the Bible and conversing with mutual friends about matters of common concern. This is not the picture which the Bible paints. As God reveals it, the believer is a man of action impelled by an inner compulsion that allows no time for rest. He is pictured as a boxer, not in training but in combat. He is not beating the air or punching a bag. He is fighting for his life and willing to die to obtain it!

     He is depicted as a soldier, not on leave or furlough, but engaged in deadly warfare. God's word knows nothing about a soldier in civilian dress, but clad in the full panoply of armor with sword unsheathed and pressing the battle against an implacable foe. The Christian is engaged in a race. He is not sitting in the grandstand but is down on the course, running, straining, grasping, sweating, reaching toward the prize. We have become a nation of spectators. The many loll at ease to watch the few fight for victory. Thousands fill the stands to see a handful of persons battle it out on the playing field. This philosophy has invaded the field of religion and our contributions become the price of admission to watch professionals perform.

     We need to recapture the sense of personal adventure in the religion of Jesus. We should cease to make safety a fetish or security a god. Faith involves risk. It is true that it is a firm conviction as to things for which we hope, but that hope lies in the future and is not yet realized. It is also true that it is a firm confidence, but it is a confidence in things not seen. One who takes the leap of faith does so with the trust that His hands will be there to catch us and bear us up.

     Anyone who flies in a jet-powered plane six miles above the surface of the earth is taking a risk, but not nearly so great a risk as if he were borne into space on an eagle's wings. "But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31). We have too many who are grounded by fright, bounded by caution and bounded by fear.

     Jesus did not teach men to "play it safe." He taught them to live dangerously. He implied that it was better to risk and lose than to keep through fear. Do you remember the man with one talent? "I was afraid and I went and hid your talent." This man expected to be commended for his prudence and discretion. Instead he was addressed as a "wicked and slothful servant." This seems like strong language to apply to one who sought to safeguard another's property. But it is better to lose through use than to fail through fear. One is wicked when he seeks to "hold his own" when what he holds should not be held. He is slothful when he hides in the ground that which should be in circulation. Non-use is abuse! The master said, "You ought to have invested my money." When one invests he takes a chance. The one-talent individual pleaded the nature of the master as his excuse but the parable implies that it is that very thing which should prompt one to put what he has to work. The servant was faithful who "went and did"; that one was worthless who "went and hid."

     The New English Bible renders Matthew 16:25, "Whoever cares for his own safety is lost; but if a man will let himself be lost for my sake, he will find his true self." Men leave home to seek for gold, uranium or diamonds. When they find that for which they are looking a dream comes true. Yet it is a fact that the actual finding is often an anticlimax. It is the anticipation, the searching without knowing what the next minute will produce that is the real adventure. Not so with the man who finds his "true self." Life really begins when this happens. Millions are doomed to plod their weary way through earthly existence and never make this discovery.

     Our lives are "bound by shallows and by miseries," as Shakespeare puts it, because we are afraid to risk everything. We are frightened by what our relatives will say or what our neighbors will think. We fetter and shackle ourselves by rigid comformity. Life becomes a drudgery and a bore. We want to "stay in good" with all around us and we are resigned to insipid mediocrity to do so. "Whoever cares for his own safety is lost." Many are lost in their own homes. Many are lost in their own congregations. There are great causes to challenge thinking. There are great crusades which need conducting. There are abuses which need correcting. Those who take up the cross will be ridiculed, reviled and derided. But the heart will beat faster with the spirit of real adventure and when it seems that all has been lost all will be gained. This is the way of the cross!

     There is a difference in being at cross purposes with those around you and having the cross purpose for your life. Too many have a martyr complex. These are not killed. They simply commit suicide. They do not lose their lives, they merely take them. They cannot find themselves because they look too close to home. They get in their own way. Note that it is not the man who merely invests his life who will gain. There are thousands who commit their lives to the church and the religious way of existence. You can check their names on the record. You can see them sitting in the pews every Sunday, you can behold their punctilious observance of all the rules and ordinances. They will tell you that through habit "the church has become a part of our lives." That is the trouble--life is partitioned off in little well-defined cubicles. There isn't anything about such protected and well-regulated little procedures as they indulge which is adventurous.

     What a change occurs when someone who has been hanging on the church by his finger nails or "the skin of his teeth," suddenly encounters Jesus! It may not happen while he is doing what the world calls "something religious." Too often the church comes between one and Jesus. Our performances in it may act as masks to obscure reality. Sometimes the meeting occurs as a crisis in life. Everything which seemed so secure and orderly comes crashing down about your shoulders. It may be bankruptcy which "wipes you out." It may be the incredible unfaithfulness and infidelity of one in whom you placed implicit confidence. It may be a sin of your own, a sin of such enormity you cannot believe you did it.

     But whatever it is, while you are poking through the rubble of your caved-in dreams, weeping in emptiness and soul-hunger, until you come to the place where you cast yourself recklessly down before the Lord of life, you will sense that another is walking in the wasteland with you. And you will know your companion is the rebuilder of shattered hopes, the resurrection!

BUILDING ON THE BEDROCK

     There is a constant temptation in our modern culture to identify ourselves with Jesus in word while ignoring His demands upon our lives. It is a matter of personal honor to be regarded as a Christian. In respectable circles of society it is a card of admission. It is a good recommendation when you seek a position as a junior executive. It has come to pass that being a Christian is no more of an adventure than being a minor stockholder in Bethlehem Steel or the Carey Salt Company. A Christian is no more expected to change the world than a holder of one share is expected to change the policy of these corporations. Both are expected to acknowledge the head of the firm and do nothing but conform.

     Unfortunately for this philosophy, acknowledgment of the head of the community of saints entails a life of non-conformity to the world. We cannot really recognize His lordship without assuming our own responsibility to change and transform the environment in which we live. Any person who attempts this embarks upon the high seas of adventure. He will become a prophet without honor in his own country. He may be stigmatized and ostracized by the unthinking ones whose hearts he tries to fire with the real message of God. "It is always the same-you never fail to resist the Holy Spirit! Just as your fathers did, so you are doing now. Can you name a single prophet whom your fathers did not persecute?" (Acts 7:51,52). Those to whom this was addressed proved the validity of the accusation. They stoned to death the one who asked the question.

     We live in a profit-taking and not a prophet-making society! Our norm is deadly to the spirit. We address Jesus as Lord but serve things as our gods. Thus we are absorbed and assimilated by the culture around us. We talk about adjustment to life and by this we mean adapting ourselves to the standards of the world. We are afraid of being conspicuous by being different. Our witness is stultified, our hopes are crucified, and we become resigned to hopeless mediocrity. There is no longer very much that is heroic about what we call Christianity.

     Jesus recognized the temptation to conform. He asked, "What is the point of calling me 'Lord, Lord,' without doing what I tell you to do?" This implies that there really is no point to much of what passes for Christianity in these days. Those who subscribe to it are quick to acknowledge Jesus as Lord but the idea that they should actually adopt the implications of His way of life is remote from their thinking. The "churches" are geared and managed so that the spirit is not free. If one should attempt to eat with publicans and sinners he would be treated exactly as was the Master during His personal sojourn on earth. Every day must have been one of genuine adventure for Jesus. It was also one fraught with constant danger.

     Our lives are too shallow. It is easier to set up a prefabricated structure on the sand than to build a permanent home. The whole world around us is one vast sub-division consisting of pre-fabs. A man who goes in for solid construction is regarded as an oddball. If one chooses a course in college which will enable him to serve the needs of humanity instead of to secure a lucrative position, if he reads and studies diligently even to the neglect of the big football game of the season he is a "square." If he expresses a deep conviction in Bible class on Sunday which cuts across the thinking of the party with which he is allied he is a dangerous influence and will have to be warned. Because of this, religion has become a tedious and monotonous performance. We must recapture the spirit of adventure or die because we have lost the sense of adventure of the spirit.

     Here is the way Jesus puts it. "Let me show you what the man who comes to me, hears what I have to say, and puts it into practice, is really like. He is like a man building a house, who dug down to rock bottom and laid the foundations of his house upon it. Then when the flood came and the flood water swept down upon that house, it could not shift because it was properly built." Note that the test of a properly built house is not its external attractiveness but its ability to withstand times of crisis. The strength is derived not from the superstructure but from the foundation. Before a man can build upward he must first dig downward. If he does not do this any structure he erects will be superficial. That word is from a Latin term which means "lying on the surface." It refers to something which does not penetrate below that which can be seen.

     But what is "rock bottom"? How do you know when you have dug deep enough? The rock bottom life is one that involves three things--coming to Jesus, hearing his words, and putting them into practice. When one adopts as his philosophy one of total commitment to Jesus, when he resolves to reproduce the life of Jesus on earth to the fullest extent, subject only to his human limitation, that person has his "rock bottom." He is then ready to start building. After that, every stone he lays will bring him nearer heaven. What are some of the involvements of the rock bottom way of life? Let me suggest a few and this will enable you to test the permanency of your dwelling.

     1. A universal love for mankind based not upon reciprocity, but upon love for love's sake. The word for this is philanthropy. It is not love bestowed with a view of return. The world cannot be changed by love of force but by the force of love. We must inaugurate a reign of love in our hearts with all men as subjects. To the extent one does not love, to that extent he does not live. Love does not wait to see if it will be either received or returned. It is a blessing to bestow and not a bait with which to bargain. Love is never cheap, and what one gives or gets that is cheap, cannot be love. I think we need to recall again the words of Jesus which we have previously quoted, "For if you love only those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even the tax collectors do that."

     2. An association with men based not upon their agreement with us but upon their need of compassion and understanding. The closest companions of Jesus were often ignorant, selfish and quarrelsome. They did not grasp His purpose nor understand His motives. They selfishly tried to maneuver themselves into positions of prominence and prestige in a kingdom which had not yet come. They rebuked Him in some of His most solemn declarations. They sought to regulate where He would go and when. In the moment of His greatest crisis they lay down on the ground and went to sleep.

     In spite of all this Jesus never left them. He did not tell them that unless they straightened up He would withdraw Himself from them. To limit our association only to those who parrot our traditional slogans and fit the stereotype we have created is not to follow Jesus. It is to deny Him. Such an attitude of exclusivism is born of pride which will destroy us. It gratifies our own desire for prestige but defeats the purpose for which Jesus died. True adventure lies outside our narrow walls which we have erected because of fear and insecurity. We must love daringly. "And if you exchange greetings only with your own circle, are you doing anything exceptional? Even the pagans do as much."

     3. A renunciation of the rule of gold in behalf of the Golden Rule. This will enable you to disprove the cynical proverb that "every man has his price." No one can give his loyalty to some things and be loyal to the creator of all things. It is impossible to serve both the creature and the Creator. The temptation to try and do so is one of the most inviting in the world.

     During the past decade we have seen how this has once more fulfilled the declaration of Jesus, "I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother" (Matthew 10:35). Many parents have grown up in a world of affluence and inflation. It is an age of what is called the "expanding economy." At a time when millions go to bed hungry every night, and thousands die from malnutrition and starvation in other parts of the world, we gorge ourselves. One of the symbols of our day is the fast food franchise. Quick service eateries line our highways as do the poor begging for bread in India.

     Many young people reared in homes of wealth, have forsaken them to identify with the downtrodden and despised of the earth. I know of young men and women who have gone to minister to Indian tribes where death often comes early because of unsanitary conditions. I know of others who have made long treks to faraway places to discover their own identity. All of this bothers their parents who keep asking where they have failed. They have provided an education which would enable their offspring to become trusted bank presidents, engineers of note, or scientists of acclaim. It distresses them when these young people graduate and turn their backs upon the whole bit to live in an Eskimo village, or in the black ghetto of the inner-city.

     What such parents should do is to recognize that their children have weighed the gold standard against the bold standard of faith and sharing and rejected the former because it has no promise after this brief hfe is over. "A man's life consists not of the abundance of things which he possesses." I do not think this amounts to rejection of parents at all. It is to be regretted that they have allowed themselves to become so identified with a certain ambitious way of life that they can no longer distinguish between themselves as persons and the lifestyle they have adopted.

     4. A substitution of forgiveness of failures for a failure to forgive. This is not the same as ignoring failures or merely overlooking them. It requires a recognition of the failures and an understanding of those who have failed. It is not the same as pretending that no failure exists. The Bible quotes the words of Jesus thus, "For if you forgive other people their failures, your Heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you will not forgive other people, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive you your failures."

     It is apparent from this that the only individual who can dare to be unforgiving of the shortcomings of another is one who is perfect. To be unforgiving of others is to plait a noose for one's own neck. There is some truth in the idea that no one can ever be a real person who has not learned the grace of forgiveness. Certainly one cannot truly be hke God unless he has learned and demonstrated the art of forgiving. The apostle brings it into focus with the expression, "forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you" (Ephesians 4:32). Thomas Fuller, the English physician, wrote in 1732, "The worst of men are those who will not forgive." Families have been wrecked, churches torn asunder, and nations destroyed because of unwillingness to forgive shghts, whether real or imaginary.

     In his intriguing volume None of these Diseases, Dr. S. I. McMillen has a chapter entitled "The High Cost of Getting Even." In it he points out the startling fact that the moment you start hating a man you become his slave. Even though he may be hundreds of miles away he affects your sleep, your eating, your relationship to those about you, and may even be responsible for your developing ulcers or colitis. Perhaps Jesus was trying to save us unnecessary doctor bills when He said we should forgive a man seventy time seven. Jesus had a lot to say about forgiveness, but nothing was more vital than His observation, "If you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you."

     5. A proper sense of values leading to a life free from concern about the merely sensual and physical aspects of existence. The pagans in the days when Jesus was upon earth were always thinking of things to eat, drink or wear. The neo-pagans of our own day exhibit the same characteristics. Over against these is the wholly committed life. "Set your heart on His kingdom and His goodness, and all these things will come to you as a matter of course."

     Only a house built upon an immovable rock will not be shaken or rocked by storm and wind. It costs too much to build cheaply. No house can be better than he who lives in it for "every house is built by some man." We build for this age only when we build on the sand. That which is to endure for the ages must be built on the Rock of Ages. Shifting sands and drifting lives will not stand against wild waters and sweeping storms. Let us all take heed how we build.

Contents

Next Chapter: 10. Adventure in the Spirit