Thanks for meeting me here.
These articles have been a way for me to organize my thoughts so that family and friends could understand me better. They are external signposts of what is currently happening internally. Turns out other people have the same things stirring inside of them too!
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There once was a time in Christian history when proclaiming Jesus as one’s Lord and Savior necessarily meant you could no longer serve in the military because to be a Christian meant a life of radical non-violence. Early Christians memorized the Sermon on the Mount and took seriously the teaching to love their enemy - especially when being killed by them (see the account of Perpetua and Felicitas). Many of the early martyrs were those in the military who refused to give an offering to Caesar or to kill for Rome.
Contrast this way of life with the nominee for the Secretary of Defense, the one who manages the most lethal military the world has ever seen and who subsidizes a sprawling military-industrial complex, who made a point in his testimony to declare the once scandalous proclamation that Jesus is his Lord.
Look how far Christians have strayed from the teachings and life of Jesus! That statement should have been the #1 disqualifying statement for that violent job! Let alone his salacious habitus1 (way of life).
For the first two centuries, to join a Christian house church, one had to first learn orthopraxy (right living) before any kind of orthodoxy (right believing) was shared. If a person’s habitus (yes, there is supposed to be a “u” in the word) did not align with the instructions of Jesus (read the Sermon on the Mount), or at least have a desire for them to be aligned, there was no way they could become a Christian.
No opportunity to casually drop in for worship.
Impossible to see, let alone partake, in the Lord’s Supper.
No amount of money, fame, or influence would get you in.
If you did not act according to Jesus’ teachings, you were not a Christian. Period.
But if you expressed interest and were found to be sincere, then your sponsor would become your dedicated mentor who would guide you through the process of learning the habitus of “The Way.” They started with discipleship, not membership!
After at least a year of discipleship, the catechumen would have transformed their life to the point of being ready for their baptism - a decision that also guaranteed some level of persecution and probably an early, brutal death. Only then could they rightly declare that Jesus was their Lord (rules over all my earthly actions) and their Savior (rules over all my spiritual actions).
Honestly, I doubt I would be allowed in with my current habitus.
Would you?
Today, churches start discipleship with orthodoxy to make sure we all agree on the right theological propositions (you can probably rattle off a few pretty easily: the Trinity, the virgin birth, Jesus is God, the resurrection, death on a cross for sins, original sin, etc). Then, the church encourages and hopes that the new Christian finds a way to transform their habitus over their lifetime - or not.
Can you rattle off a few spiritual disciplines?2
Which ones have you ordered your life around?
Yah…same here…
This shift from slow discipleship to quick membership became accepted around the 300s with Emperor Constantine, who professed the Christian faith (supposedly) but refused discipleship and deferred his baptism until he was on his deathbed. This started the perception that only certain people were called to dedicate their lives to the faith (clergy) while everyone else could go about their lives as long as they believed the right things and did their best to be “good” - however it was defined at the time.
As a result, the world has seen centuries of destruction (and yes, crumbs of good) by a cheap and quick version of Christianity.
If Christianity is supposed to be so transformational, why are most Christians living no different than the world around them? Even worse, a recent study found that “the more racist attitudes a person holds, the more likely he or she is to identify as a white Christian.”3 In fact, data shows the more often white Christians attend church, the more likely they are to hold racist attitudes! Maybe some people should stop going to church…
So what can we do?
Seek discipleship.
Technically, we are Christians. But we don’t live like it. So are we really?
Over the last few years, I unknowingly started on the path of intentional discipleship, where you are really serious about reordering your life, not just your beliefs. From the outside, this has probably looked like deconstruction to many, peculiar to others, and a falling out of faith to some.
Books and podcasts have thus far been my mentors in this season. But head knowledge only gets you so far. Eventually, you need someone, a mentor, who has been committed to ruthlessly eliminating the things that had stopped them from confidently proclaiming: “Jesus is my Lord and Savior.”
Do you know someone like that? Someone who is unhurried? Slow to anger? Feeds and clothes the poor? A minimalist of possessions? Who truly loves their enemies? Who practices the spiritual disciplines?
I’d like to become that.
I need help to be that.
Where can I find one who is that?
A person’s general constitution; the way a person of a particular background perceives and reacts to the world.
A list from Richard Foster’s book, The Celebration of Discipline, includes: meditation, prayer, fasting, study, simplicity, solitude, submission, service, confession, worship, guidance, celebration
“White Too Long,” Robert Jones.