For exiles trying to live faithfully within the host empire of post-Christendom, the Gospel stories are our most dangerous memories. They continue to fire our imaginations and remind us that it’s possible to thrive on foreign soil while serving Yahweh, but it’s the kind of thriving that often rejects popular wisdom. These stories are the standard by which we judge all other stories, all other descriptors of life today. If, after reading these dangerous biblical stories, you can’t imagine Jesus the Messiah as a televangelist, strutting around on stage in a flashy suit, playing it up for the cameras, then you are forced to reject this image and seek another mode of being Christ today. If you can’t picture Jesus driving a tank [onto stage for effect during a sermon] or pouring millions of dollars into new church building projects, then you are forced to allow the dangerous ancient stories to judge the insipid contemporary ones.
Exiles: Living Intentionally In A Post-Christian Culture | Michael Frost
Tags: mike frost, missiology, missional, stories
May 21, 2008 at 2:46 pm |
I enjoyed Exiles. I think it is written more for the exiles than Hirsch’s “The Forgotten Ways” which seems to be for church leaders and church starters.
May 21, 2008 at 3:41 pm |
They’re wired differently, that’s for sure. Alan is more apostolic, and so he writes about networks and movements. Mike is an evangelist, so he talks mostly about how to live amongst people. They’re best together, which is why The Shaping of Things to Come has been my favorite thing from either of them in book form, though Mike is an amazing speaker, and some of his online talks have probably done as much for me as their books (we can’t all go to Moscow to hang with Frosty). I hear they’re working up another book together. Hope it’s true.