I tell my story

After Galatians 1:11-24 

I was the zealot,

the persecutor,

the destroyer, aiming

not to control or limit

but to eliminate and

obliterate forever

this aberration,

this heresy, what

I knew was the enemy.

I was zealous, zealous

for what I’d been taught,

the traditions handed

down, the tradition that

had saved us. And then,

a moment of light,

a blinding light, a voice

calling me, summoning

me from my wilderness.

My zeal vanished,

replaced and transformed.

An old man dies.

A new man is born.

 

Photograph by Universal Eye via Unsplash. Used with permission.

“Conversion” by Michael Lawrence

Can “nice” be a pejorative? Can all those songs we sing in church about “Jesus healing me” be wrongheaded? That group of people who come together on Sunday – is what they are about simply coming together on Sunday?

In Conversion: How God Creates a People, Michael Lawrence, senior pastor of Hinson Baptist Church in Portland, Oregon, takes these questions and more, applies basic Christian doctrine, and outlines a view of the church that is historic, Biblical, and real. It’s startling to see the simplicity of Biblical doctrine applied like this – and to see just how radical it really is.

Take “nice,” for example. In too many churches today, the prevailing doctrine is the doctrine of “nice.” Things work like they’re supposed to as long as we’re “nice.” Everyone gets along because we’re all so “nice.” Being “nice” is doing all the right things.

Lawrence juxtaposes the doctrine of the new creation against the doctrine of “nice,” and “nice” doesn’t fare well. At all.

And he goes one, in what is a relatively short (128 pages) work packed with this same kind of upending discussion. Sincerity doesn’t save our souls. Christian conversion is not a decision you make. Faith is not about healing (the so-called “therapeutic model” that has engulfed everything form the church to education and politics). The church, and churches, are to be distinct, not designed like some marketing brand. In fact, the church isn’t about marketing at all.

Michael Lawrence

It’s a sobering account. It’s also a hopeful one.

Lawrence is the author of Biblical Theology in the Life of the Church (2010) and co-author of It is Well: Expositions in Substitutionary Atonement (2010). He’s also a regular contributing writer to anthologies and a number of Christian print and online publications. He received a B.A> degree in English Literature from Duke University, a Masters of Divinity degree from Gordon-Conwell Seminary, and a Ph.D. in church history from Cambridge University. He and his family live in Portland.

Conversion is part of the 9Marks Series for Building Healthy Churches. It tackles the basics of conversion and what it means in both contemporary culture and contemporary church culture.

Top photograph by Viktor Jakovlev via Unsplash. Used with permission.

I, Crispus

After Acts 18

A person of note in Corinth,

I, Crispus, synagogue ruler,

respected, heeded, sought for advice

and counsel, a benefactor welcomed

in the homes of Jews and Gentiles,

my wife acknowledged among the women,

and I have today thrown all of it away

because of the Tarsian, what he said,

what his words burned

into my heart there in the place

I ruled, the synagogue. The others

dismissed him, disparaged him,

laughed at him, ridiculed him,

gnashed their teeth at him and

tore their clothes, mocking outrage.

I did not.

I could not.

I followed him

to the house

next door,

sitting with

Greeks, me and

my household,

baptized.

I am lost.

I am found.

Photograph: The ruin of a Roman fountain in Corinth.

I am Ananias

After Acts 9:10-17

I am Ananias, a quiet man,

quietly a follower of the way,

the way that was born

in a cattle stall, born

on a hill in Jerusalem, born

in a cave on the hillside.

Quietly, the voice speak,

the voice unheard until now,

telling me to go, to find

the murderer, the persecutor,

the hater of the way, to find

him and to heal him, this hater,

to lay my hands upon him,

my hands upon his eyes,

blinded, to heal him.

I am a follower of the way,

a disciple, a saint, a brother,

a Christian obedient.

I go.

Top photograph: The Bible Series TV.

Near Damascus

After Acts 9:1-19

The persecutor has his letters

for Damascus, to begin

the good work of rooting out

the way, the followers

of the madman on the tree,

they who sprout like

noxious weeds.

To destroy the way

is to earn a way.

And then a light, the light

flashing and blinding

around us, an invisible voice

speaking in the light.

Knowing the voice,

the persecutor falls,

blinded. Led into the city,

three days in darkness,

three days before the sun

rises, three days before

the way finds him.

Photograph by Lynn Greyling via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.