| Centrifugal God - devotional Pastor Don Baron |
| Sermons |
John 20:19-23
"As the Father has sent Me, even so I send you."
Note the "as…so…"construction.
Implying: In the same manner as…
In the same spirit as…
With the same urgency as…
With the same thrust with which the Father sent me out, so I thrust you
out…
The word there is apostello (send out) but the word "thrust" is not too
extreme.
Mark tells us that the Holy Spirit "thrust" or "hurled" (Jesus) out into the
desert" where He would hammer out His mission. (ekballo)
And later Jesus told His disciples to pray the Lord of the harvest to hurl
out (ekballo) workers into the harvest.
All of which is to say that God is a centrifugal power,
a reaching-out God
the hound of heaven, bent on pursuing another.
There is definitely no relationship between this God and the god of the
old philosophers who is the "unmoved mover"
aloof
indifferent
contemplating only Himself
more like Jaba the Hut in Star Wars than anything else I can think of.
Far from being the "unmoved mover," He is God-on-the-move -
moved by His nature and our plight to lay hands on us with a kind of
loving violence.
He creates man and woman - then actively pursues them in the Garden.
He's been doing that ever since, confronting every person with the
question, "Where are you?"
Mankind ruins itself and creation - and the centrifugal God breaks into the
mess,
Face to face with the serpent, He insists, "I WILL put enmity between
your seed and the woman's seed" and "He WILL crush your head."
Then this eager God invades another man's life and announces, "I WILL bless
you, and all peoples WILL be blessed through you."
Later, this consuming God stops Moses in his tracks with a blazing
bush and sweeps him up in His own passion to rescue His beloved
nation.
Later yet, Amos defends his impossible mission by complaining that he didn't
ask for the job. No, he says; "Yahweh took me."
Then this centrifugal God describes Himself as a father who makes a fool out
of himself as he pulls up his skirts
and races down Main street to welcome his rebel son home.
This God who will not be stopped confronts murderous Saul and
strikes him blind until he is ready for the washing of baptism and
becomes God's man to bring the blessing to all peoples.
The epitome of this moved Mover's movements is the Incarnation -
the climactic intrusion of that centrifugal force that is God,
when He pushes His way into the human race,
and binds the strong man.
"As the Father has sent me out, even so I send you out."
To be reconciled with this mission-driven God is to be turned inside out,
to become a man, a woman, for others - like Him.
Once we were centripetal people - turned in on ourselves by our curs-ed sin
- now being transformed into centrifugal people like He is.
Little Christs, to use Luther's term.
The tools for this total change of orientation are the means of grace.
But the means must not be confused with the end.
The end is to bowl us over with the reality of His unconditional acceptance
of us in Christ.
and, on the ground of that reality, to transform us into hurled-out people.
Peter is so bold as to tell us that we are actually "partakers of the divine
nature."
And that includes His centrifugal nature.
I wonder, How is my thrust as a church worker? How is yours?
It's so easy for me to become a mere "professional," doing all the right
things but having lost that persistent drive which can only be sustained
by Him who hurls us out into the harvest.
"As the Father has sent Me, even so I send you."
Note the "as…so…"construction.
Implying: In the same manner as…
In the same spirit as…
With the same urgency as…
With the same thrust with which the Father sent me out, so I thrust you
out…
The word there is apostello (send out) but the word "thrust" is not too
extreme.
Mark tells us that the Holy Spirit "thrust" or "hurled" (Jesus) out into the
desert" where He would hammer out His mission. (ekballo)
And later Jesus told His disciples to pray the Lord of the harvest to hurl
out (ekballo) workers into the harvest.
All of which is to say that God is a centrifugal power,
a reaching-out God
the hound of heaven, bent on pursuing another.
There is definitely no relationship between this God and the god of the
old philosophers who is the "unmoved mover"
aloof
indifferent
contemplating only Himself
more like Jaba the Hut in Star Wars than anything else I can think of.
Far from being the "unmoved mover," He is God-on-the-move -
moved by His nature and our plight to lay hands on us with a kind of
loving violence.
He creates man and woman - then actively pursues them in the Garden.
He's been doing that ever since, confronting every person with the
question, "Where are you?"
Mankind ruins itself and creation - and the centrifugal God breaks into the
mess,
Face to face with the serpent, He insists, "I WILL put enmity between
your seed and the woman's seed" and "He WILL crush your head."
Then this eager God invades another man's life and announces, "I WILL bless
you, and all peoples WILL be blessed through you."
Later, this consuming God stops Moses in his tracks with a blazing
bush and sweeps him up in His own passion to rescue His beloved
nation.
Later yet, Amos defends his impossible mission by complaining that he didn't
ask for the job. No, he says; "Yahweh took me."
Then this centrifugal God describes Himself as a father who makes a fool out
of himself as he pulls up his skirts
and races down Main street to welcome his rebel son home.
This God who will not be stopped confronts murderous Saul and
strikes him blind until he is ready for the washing of baptism and
becomes God's man to bring the blessing to all peoples.
The epitome of this moved Mover's movements is the Incarnation -
the climactic intrusion of that centrifugal force that is God,
when He pushes His way into the human race,
and binds the strong man.
"As the Father has sent me out, even so I send you out."
To be reconciled with this mission-driven God is to be turned inside out,
to become a man, a woman, for others - like Him.
Once we were centripetal people - turned in on ourselves by our curs-ed sin
- now being transformed into centrifugal people like He is.
Little Christs, to use Luther's term.
The tools for this total change of orientation are the means of grace.
But the means must not be confused with the end.
The end is to bowl us over with the reality of His unconditional acceptance
of us in Christ.
and, on the ground of that reality, to transform us into hurled-out people.
Peter is so bold as to tell us that we are actually "partakers of the divine
nature."
And that includes His centrifugal nature.
I wonder, How is my thrust as a church worker? How is yours?
It's so easy for me to become a mere "professional," doing all the right
things but having lost that persistent drive which can only be sustained
by Him who hurls us out into the harvest.
And what of our churches? Are they centrifugal forces?
That's our job, sisters & brothers - not merely to be such a force among
them while they glide passively through life -
but to be the Holy Spirit's agent to stir them up and thrust them outward
into community, workplace, and world.
Our greatest joy will be not what we have accomplished as ministers
but to see what they are accomplishing as ministers, because we
equipped them.
Our congregations are intended to be centrifugal forces in our communities -
externally focused churches, who are seriously convinced
that they exist for non-members.
And our centrifugal nature cannot stop with our own immediate communities,
for that too can be a subtle form of self-centredness.
The time is long since past when it suffices to send a few dollars our of
synodical dues to world mission headquarters and then forget about it.
There are still several thousand totally unreached people groups out there,
while 90% of our present missionaries are working among people
groups where there are already churches and Bibles.
They are needed where they are, to be sure.
But today, local churches are beginning to take the initiative to provide the
thrust to the unreached by adopting an unreached people group,
learning about them
sending out a fact-gathering team
eventually sending a long-term missionary among them.
All of this is within the reach of smaller congregations jointly releasing
their centrifugal powers to do the task.
It's when a congregation by faith moves out into the unknown that the
centrifugal energy of God begins to demonstrate itself to the fullest in the
life of a church.
This matter of a centrifugal congregation following its centrifugal God
is extremely well-expressed in an article by Canadian Pastor
Stuart Coles.
"A Parable Concerning God's Wife and Her Husband"
The Church is God's wife. He has married Himself to her "for better or for worse."
According to the church's history in the Bible and in subsequent ages, it is frequently
"for the worse." She suffers from selfishness, from self-righteousness, from
stuffiness, from timidity, from the cruelties that spawn out of fear and prejudice.
Most of all, God's wife suffers from the temptation to want to settle down. She
craves a place to shelter and entrench herself. She secretly determines to reform
her Husband, to domesticate Him, to ties Him down to where she is and where she
wants to stay.
"To tie God down" to that which has been is the essence of religion. Religion is the
corruption of the church's marriage partnership with her Husband. The OT calls it
shoring.
God cannot be tied down. He is free, He is a missionary, a pioneer, an explorer, a
frontiersman, a creator of that which has not been before. he shakes the status
quo. He tears the old times off the world's calendar, so that every age is a new age,
and every day is an adventure into an untrodden future. He is a very turbulent
husband. He keeps moving on, and He keeps calling His wife to follow Him, to
keep a-comin' with Him into each new situation.
The Church wants to settle down. She wants security. ("Organized religion is
interested in organized religion.") The Church knows in her secret heart how
dangerous it is to leave all defences and all establishments and follow her Lord:
why, a person can get killed going where God goes and doing things the way God
does. Where does God want to go, and what does He want to do? Some
religionists act as though all God wanted to do was "go to church."
Sure He "goes to church" - but just long enough to have a quick, no-foolishness
chat with His wife - a briefing session on "what's cooking." He pays her very loving,
very deeply understanding, husbandly attention. But the, all too son, He says,
"Come on, old girl. Let's get moving. We've got work to do." And He goes out the
door so fast, and in such an unexpected direction, that half the time "the old girl" just
stands there gaping. she tries to keep her skirts down and her housekeeping
papers from blowing all over the place in the breeze created by God's going. This
breeze is known as the presence of the Holy Spirit.
That's our job, sisters & brothers - not merely to be such a force among
them while they glide passively through life -
but to be the Holy Spirit's agent to stir them up and thrust them outward
into community, workplace, and world.
Our greatest joy will be not what we have accomplished as ministers
but to see what they are accomplishing as ministers, because we
equipped them.
Our congregations are intended to be centrifugal forces in our communities -
externally focused churches, who are seriously convinced
that they exist for non-members.
And our centrifugal nature cannot stop with our own immediate communities,
for that too can be a subtle form of self-centredness.
The time is long since past when it suffices to send a few dollars our of
synodical dues to world mission headquarters and then forget about it.
There are still several thousand totally unreached people groups out there,
while 90% of our present missionaries are working among people
groups where there are already churches and Bibles.
They are needed where they are, to be sure.
But today, local churches are beginning to take the initiative to provide the
thrust to the unreached by adopting an unreached people group,
learning about them
sending out a fact-gathering team
eventually sending a long-term missionary among them.
All of this is within the reach of smaller congregations jointly releasing
their centrifugal powers to do the task.
It's when a congregation by faith moves out into the unknown that the
centrifugal energy of God begins to demonstrate itself to the fullest in the
life of a church.
This matter of a centrifugal congregation following its centrifugal God
is extremely well-expressed in an article by Canadian Pastor
Stuart Coles.
"A Parable Concerning God's Wife and Her Husband"
The Church is God's wife. He has married Himself to her "for better or for worse."
According to the church's history in the Bible and in subsequent ages, it is frequently
"for the worse." She suffers from selfishness, from self-righteousness, from
stuffiness, from timidity, from the cruelties that spawn out of fear and prejudice.
Most of all, God's wife suffers from the temptation to want to settle down. She
craves a place to shelter and entrench herself. She secretly determines to reform
her Husband, to domesticate Him, to ties Him down to where she is and where she
wants to stay.
"To tie God down" to that which has been is the essence of religion. Religion is the
corruption of the church's marriage partnership with her Husband. The OT calls it
shoring.
God cannot be tied down. He is free, He is a missionary, a pioneer, an explorer, a
frontiersman, a creator of that which has not been before. he shakes the status
quo. He tears the old times off the world's calendar, so that every age is a new age,
and every day is an adventure into an untrodden future. He is a very turbulent
husband. He keeps moving on, and He keeps calling His wife to follow Him, to
keep a-comin' with Him into each new situation.
The Church wants to settle down. She wants security. ("Organized religion is
interested in organized religion.") The Church knows in her secret heart how
dangerous it is to leave all defences and all establishments and follow her Lord:
why, a person can get killed going where God goes and doing things the way God
does. Where does God want to go, and what does He want to do? Some
religionists act as though all God wanted to do was "go to church."
Sure He "goes to church" - but just long enough to have a quick, no-foolishness
chat with His wife - a briefing session on "what's cooking." He pays her very loving,
very deeply understanding, husbandly attention. But the, all too son, He says,
"Come on, old girl. Let's get moving. We've got work to do." And He goes out the
door so fast, and in such an unexpected direction, that half the time "the old girl" just
stands there gaping. she tries to keep her skirts down and her housekeeping
papers from blowing all over the place in the breeze created by God's going. This
breeze is known as the presence of the Holy Spirit.
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